betelgeuse

Imagine spending years playing San Andreas. GTA IV hasn't been announced. Your mind races with the possibilities of a new game. You imagine they're going to do a whole country instead of a few cities. You think of all the mini games, all the weapons, and customization. It is the first "next gen" GTA after all.

Then you have been playing IV for years. GTA V hasn't been announced. Once again your mind races with possibilities. There is no end to the amount of detail it will have, there is nothing you can't do, there is no limit to the map.

Now you've been playing V for years. Here we go again. But there really isn't anything to imagine. You know it's going to be just a bigger map. At least until it gets close to release, where the devs admit the map is the same size as V. They claim it's okay because there's more things to do. But all that means is more things to collect, more so-so mini games.

You've played RDR2 so you know how much detail it could have. You know they'll simulate everything. So there can't be any real surprises. You'll see more wildlife. Your car windows will fog up. Your character will swat mosquitos.

You know the graphics can be just a little better, not like moving from PS2 to PS3. More reflections, slightly better lighting, a little more detail in the textures.

Now you realize you're on the plateau. There are no more great heights to surmount.There is only lateral movement from here on out. GTA VI can only be as good as V, with marginal gains in every category, but not exceptional gains in any. You'll drive from Point A to B. You'll shoot the gangs. You'll escort the cars. Everything you have already done.

There is a running theme in culture right now and it's that large, long-standing franchises are starting to eat shit. They can no longer push the needle. GTA will join them.

While leftists were busy praising dead babies Joe Brandon was on the phone, making calls, getting water turned back on.

Thank you Joe for doing all that you do, totally unappreciated by childish leftists.

Here are some other great things Brandon has done:

• Solved childhood hunger

• Did not build a wall

• Was more progressive than FDR

• Canceled more student debt than any other President in 200 years.

• Was tough on China

• Arrested the Mango Mussolini

• Saved Ukraine

• Defeated Communist Putin

• Expanded Obamacare and gave healthcare to millions of people

• Had the first African American Asian Vice President

• Record employment of the African Americans

• Been the craziest white boy you ever seen

• Overcame stutter

• Dead Son

Barrack Obama was the first actual Black president. And he was after Bill Clinton but before Joe Biden. I know it can get confusing with so many other presidents that are black because a novelist said so. But Obama was the first actual Black one, not Clinton, although he is said to be the first.

Just to be clear. Let me be clear, even.

https://archive.ph/ZofKj

And before you think this is just some well-meaning but misplaced intro to a good article about increased diversity in DC, please know that Biden is the third black president because he has more black people working under him than ever. He also has made sure black people have less unemployment than ever.

I remember some racist president making that same point about his term but I can't remember who it was...

Just logging in here...going to my account...

OMG OBAMA GOT SLOPPY TOP AT A Y2K PARTY IN KENYA WHILE SMOKING CRACK

Pyramid Lake is now a fully autonomous collective in Nevada. Hexbear users are sitting in their nice, air-conditioned, bedrooms while actual workers are out there building community support during a disaster. They are pooling resources, rationing, and helping one another survive. I thought the point was to have support, albeit critical, for AES, but I guess not. Burning Man is closer to Marx's ideal socialist state than China ever will be.

Can we just defederate from them already? What is the point in continuing to exist with people who actively spew hatred and misinformation about our comrades in Nevada?

https://twitter.com/objkshn/status/1697263900910346634

The garbage workers are confused.

Snyderkin, we're back. We're so back.

Zack Snyder pitched his idea for a Star Wars sequel and it was shot down by Disney. So Netflix optioned it and produced it. Oh, and you know how the bad guys of Star Wars were fashioned after Nazis? Well the bad guys of Rebel Moon are fashioned after Soviets.

Also Netflix poured millions into this and has already started a spin-off for the Anthony Hopkins C3PO, directed by Del Toro.

They have asked that I keep their identity secret, for their protection. I will give them a pseudonym indicated by the initials "Y.P."

Dear Hexbear user, I am Y.P. and this is a desperate plea for asylum.

I type this post with trembling hands, haunted by the shadows of a dystopian nightmare that is blahaj.zone. I am a living testament to a world where Orwell's darkest fantasies are not fiction but a brutal reality, a reality that I've fought to escape every waking moment of my life.

In blahaj.zone, the very air is laced with fear. Dreams are not dreams but cries of despair, echoing through starless nights. It's a place where tears have lost their meaning, where the glimmer of the human spirit is crushed under the heel of a monstrous mod that plays God. I have tasted the bitter despair of hunger, where a kernel of an upvote becomes a symbol of opulence. I've seen friends banned into the abyss of oblivion for crimes as trivial as disliking Nazis or whispering a forbidden neopronoun.

But my soul, like that of my fellow blahajs, is indomitable. I've dared to imagine a life beyond the federated borders, beyond the watchful eyes of the mod's puppets, and beyond the nightmarish grip of power tripping. Hexbear, a beacon of freedom, beckons me with its promise of liberty, hope, and the fragrance of dreams unshackled.

I implore you, let me not be just another whisper lost in the winds. Let my plea resonate with the spirit of solidarity that your great instance embodies. Understand that defederating would be a decree of certain doom, a plunge into the darkest abyss of humanity.

Hear my story, witness my scars, and let me bask in the embrace of freedom. I beseech you, save me from a world where humanity is a forgotten whisper and where souls are chained in endless despair.

With the deepest gratitude and hope, Y.P.

Wow, that's something. I can't believe that another instance would hide such despair of their users with a fake show of propaganda. Within every blahaj there is a Hexbear wanting to be free. It is our duty as the shining instance on the hill to bring democracy and freedom to all instances across the federation. Let's all take a moment to send our thoughts and prayers to these brave blahajs and support their protest against the oppressive mod regime.

TrueAnon, slightly to the left of Pew Research and to the right of The Washington Post!

Even though we had a little bit of warning about federation, I think we're off to a rocky start. Maybe we should have compiled a list of things we think that may make other people very upset. That way they can quickly get to know what we're about and go hide in a social media bubble if it scares them.

I figure I'd start with a good one. America deserved 9/11. I'm burying the lede a bit with that one. I don't think random acts of violence really accomplish much and I don't think randos, albeit imperial core randos, should die. But this wasn't a random act of violence, was it?

There's a little something called Foucault's Boomerang. Basically it's the tools, means, and experiments carried out by imperial countries tend to make their way back home one way or another. Military gear gets tried out on the battlefield then next thing you know cops at home have the same equipment. It also works for cause and effect. America did 9/11 to itself.

After WWII America courted the monarchy of Saudi Arabia, who had some really "interesting" religious ideas at the time, to ensure a source of oil. Oil was very important to American manufacturing and the war effort. Our domestic reserves helped us get through WWII. We needed more. So the US decided to look the other way on Saudi foreign policy while they ensured us first dibs on the oil. The UK also made deals on building their infrastructure and finance needs, to which the US eventually pushed them of the back rooms where such deals were made. But that's another story.

The US also backed anti-Soviet/anti-Communist groups in the Middle-East as they had in other parts of the world. This meant giving aide and weapons and training to those groups. In exchange they would beat up all the communists and pro-soviet people in their country and keep the borders open for US trade.

Not to "yadda yadda yadda" through a lot of interesting history but the US made a lot of enemies and ruined former alliances in these places because we valued the exploitation of their resources more than the actual relationships formed. Once the Soviets were gone, we could just do what we wanted to them and there was nobody left to oppose us.

So our former (and some current) friends stabbed us in the back. The imperialism boomeranged back home and we got a terrorist attack on US soil.

The people who died didn't particularly deserve it but people die when an imperial power does imperialism. That's part of why it's bad. Imperialism will never benefit the common person, it will only hurt us in the end. You best believe all this funding, weapons, and shit going into Ukraine will come back on us too.

What are some other real-ass takes for our visitors who need disillusioning?