vaguerant

joined 9 months ago
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Son of Norway’s crown princess suspected of 23 offences including rape, police say in c/world@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 1 points 14 hours ago

Yeah, he was reportedly conceived in a casual encounter. His parents weren't in an ongoing relationship and the father didn't remain very involved in either of their lives.

Son of Norway’s crown princess suspected of 23 offences including rape, police say in c/world@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 11 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

That is not how a bastard works. To be clear, all of this is archaic, I'm not actually calling anybody a bastard, but the definition of bastard is "a child born to parents who are not married to each other." He matches that definition because his parents were never married.

Affairs don't come into it, it's just some old bullshit cultural and religious ideals about which types of relationships (just the one: heterosexual marriages) children are "supposed" to be born into.

Staten Island Politician David Carr has 12 speeding tickets, 1 red light ticket and 1 bus lane violation ticket since 2023. He doesn't care. in c/fuckcars@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 19 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Missed an opportunity to say "Fuck cars and fuck Carr."

Son of Norway’s crown princess suspected of 23 offences including rape, police say in c/world@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 26 points 1 day ago

I don't think he's anywhere in the line of succession regardless. He's the son of the Crown Princess (by marriage) but not of the Crown Prince. i.e. His mother had him as a result of a prior relationship, then married the Crown Prince, making him the stepson of the man who will one day be king, but not really anything on his own account. Besides a rapist.

Sounds right in c/politicalmemes@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 24 points 1 day ago

Do we have our own /r/wowthanksimcured yet?

Democrats Shocked By Success Of Left-Wing Candidate Offering Left-Wing Policies To Left-Wing Voters in c/nottheonion@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 32 points 2 days ago (2 children)

This doesn't belong in Not The Onion, the Betoota Advocate is extremely satirical. OP ate the onion and then posted it on Not The Onion.

Live Long and May the Schwartz be with you in c/tenforward@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 15 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Did you all hear the recent announcement that they're making a Spaceballs 2? It's scheduled for 2027. Bill Pullman (Lone Starr), Daphne Zuniga (Vespa), Rick Moranis (Dark Helmet) and Mel Brooks (Yogurt) are all returning, alongside new characters played by Lewis Pullman (Bill's real son), Josh Gad and Keke Palmer. I'm not even joking.

https://deadline.com/2025/06/spaceballs-2-casts-rick-moranis-bill-pullman-keke-palmer-1236431204/

Retrospective Discussion | Doctor Who (2005) 1x03 "The Unquiet Dead" in c/doctorwho@startrek.website
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I think this one's pretty fun. The one disappointment for me is that the story sacrifices all its complexity by making the Gelth generic evil monsters. The moral question of reusing the bodies of the dead is an interesting one that the episode ultimately doesn't have to bother reckoning with because it turns out the Gelth really suck. It's the rare twist that makes the story less compelling. It's already pretty twisty to do a zombie body snatcher plot where it turns out the snatchers aren't evil, so pivoting back to them being evil again is just a bit boring.

Otherwise, I like how the episode makes good use of a historical figure. They can sometimes feel a bit hit and miss, but Dickens makes for a good one-off companion who doesn't suffer a major character assassination, etc. It is mildly weird that we have two episodes in a row where a one-off companion burns up (Jabe last week, Gwyneth this week). I wonder if more thought goes into episode order in later series, just to avoid stories echoing each other's plot points. It's not really a problem, but you wouldn't want to turn it into a pattern.

The Orville Rewatch Party 1x9 "Cupid's Dagger" in c/theorville@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

All right, we've come to my least favorite episode of the entire series. We have a character throughout the episode who has for years been dosing the people around him with date rape drugs. The worst reaction this gets from anybody on The Orville is "Aww, come on, mate. That's a bit rude." There are zero consequences for any of it. This one plot point taints my feelings about everything else in the episode.

I'm not in the mood for any of the comedy material--in fact, it's even worse on a rewatch. On first viewing. you don't know about the serial date rapist until the reveal. On a rewatch, the foreshadowing is peppered in right from the start with Darulio insisting on a handshake with Mercer. The dramatic plot of the episode also ends up tied in to non-consensually dosing people. Overall, just very unpleasant stuff. Not a fun watch. I'd rather have "Majority Rule" on repeat for 24 hours.

What's a random line from a movie that fans of it will instantly know? in c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 38 points 6 days ago (1 children)

"It really tied the room together."

Would you become romantically involved with someone with vastly different religious views? in c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 6 points 6 days ago (2 children)

There's already several comments saying "depends on the beliefs and how important they are," and obviously there's that.

I'll add that there are beliefs people don't immediately think of when talking about religion. There's religious humanism, which is a secular religion based around behaving ethically which also has a bunch of traditions similar to spiritually-based religions, minus the spirituality. Adherents (can) attend church and hear sermons on ways to be a better person, etc.

I'm not a religious humanist but they sound like they're probably decent enough people. They're quite different to my generic fediverse atheist/irreligious views, in the sense that I don't have any desire to attend congregations of people who identify as religiously ethical, but I don't harbor any strong objections to their beliefs.

Personally, I understand it more as something that might be nice for people who have left spiritual religion but still want the trappings of a place to go and be with a community of like-minded people, but that's not my experience. Ultimately, that's probably about as far as I'd be comfortable, where we have roughly equivalent spiritual views but highly divergent religious views.

Post to !right_to_unplug@sopuli.xyzposts not appearing in c/fedia@fedia.io
[–] vaguerant@fedia.io 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I see it on the other end: https://sopuli.xyz/post/29094211

Maybe it just took some time to get across?

15
Orphan Black: Do the characters get any easier to like after season 1? (spoilers) (fedia.io)
 

I know I'm very far behind, but I just finished season 1 of Orphan Black. It's clearly good and I like large parts of it, but several of the main characters are written to be kind of awful people, in-universe. I don't know how much I'd enjoy watching a show where I don't like about 30% of the characters.

Obviously, Helena is super broken from a terrible upbringing and to some extent can't be blamed for her unconscionable actions, most egregiously the murder of her surrogate mother, Amelia. But I've seen TV shows before and it's pretty clear that she's going to be redeemed in "future" seasons. I guess some of this will involve reckoning with her actions in season 1, but you know ... as of right now, she sucks.

Then, Alison basically murdered her best friend by watching her get strangled by the garbage disposal. There's mitigating factors in that Alison sincerely believed Aynsley was monitoring her, etc., but ultimately she just let her die because she was kind of nosy and mean. That also sucks.

Throw in Art the corrupt cop, who seems like he's going to become an important ally of the team, and these unlikeable people are really starting to add up. It might just be 2025-ray-vision making corrupt cops who cover for other corrupt cops less appealing as protagonists, but oof, that's not such a fun time.

Also, just about everybody's sexual dynamics in the show are sketchy as hell. I'll spoiler this part because it's about sexual assault.

tw: saIs everybody in this fucking show raping somebody? Most of the sexual relationships depicted are between people who are lying about their real identities. Paul and Beth, "Beth" (Sarah) and Paul, Delphine "Beraud" (Cormier) and Cosima, Donnie and Alison. Some of this is 2025-ray-vision again, but there's a hell of a lot of rape by deception going on here and I really don't like it.

I understand that these characters are clearly supposed to be morally grey at best, but right now I just actively dislike a lot of them. Maybe they really turn it around, or maybe you're just supposed to dislike them, I don't know. But I'm not eager to start on season 2 and spend more time with these people who all suck.

132
Watch Peter Dutton lose his seat, live (www.abc.net.au)
 

A few days ago, we saw Canada's Conservative opposition leader Pierre Poilievre lose an election and his own seat. Can we make that twice in a week?

Current numbers (6.1% counted) have a 5.1% swing to the ALP, resulting in a 6.8% lead for Labor's Ali France over Liberal leader Peter Dutton.

124
Liberal Bruce Fanjoy topples Pierre Poilievre in Carleton | CBC News (www.cbc.ca)
 

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is projected to lose his longtime rural Ottawa seat to Liberal Bruce Fanjoy.

18
Suffering from minor party confusion? Some links I found helpful (fedia.io)
 

Hey auspol. It's about that time again: you know, the one where you have to sit around researching about 15 minor parties that sound distantly familiar to figure out what to put as your bottom preferences.

This year I found my way to a couple of blogs which offer brief and unabashedly biased reviews of the minor parties in the federal landscape. These are not new, I'm just late.

Both blogs are written from a relatively progressive-left perspective, at least by Australian standards. Inside the spoiler below is what they say about themselves:

Summaries of bloggersBlatantly Partisan Party Reviews

I am not, nor have I ever been, a member of a political party. I review from the perspective of a small-g green democratic socialist. I am trained and work as a political historian of Australia and New Zealand. This background guides my reviews, which originated as—and remain—notes to inform my own vote. I do not aim for any false neutrality or objectivity, and I share these remarks in the hope they are useful to others trying to navigate Australia’s plethora of micro-parties. It should be obvious but these are my personal opinions, which should not be construed as representing the views of my employer nor of any other organisation with which I am affiliated.

Something for Cate

I’m Maz. In no particular order I’m left of centre, a grandparent, a writer, trans, pansexual, a mental health lived experience worker, agnostic, supportive of unions, and supporter of the Arts. I’m committed to holding governments and media accountable and, while I can’t promise complete objectivity, I can promise to deliver the same treatment to every party and independent in this election.

I’m Loki. I’ve been in several political parties and never found one left enough for my liking. I’m a bisexual cis male, and likewise agnostic, pro-Union and pro-arts. I try not to approach anything uncritically, whether I agree with it or not. I firmly believe that objectivity is a goal that can be striven for but never actually reached. That said, in that quest I will seek, strive and not yield.

While I obviously recommend you come to your own conclusions about the parties, it can be nice to hear what other voters think of them, especially when it's some shit you never heard of before.

Something for Cate especially includes coverage of unregistered groupings, which are a deep black box of nothing to me most of the time.

28
What's your read on Milchick and Kier's comedy routine in the S2 finale? (fedia.io)
 

Spoilers, obviously.

In the finale, we get the back and forth comedy argument between Seth Milchick (Tramell Tillman) and an animatronic Kier Eagan (voice of Marc Geller, animatronics by Ben Stiller).

I'll quote the exchange below:

Kier: Hail your earthbound steward, your very own flooooooooooor manager!

[audience cheering]

Milchick: Thank you, Kier! And may I say, you're looking very handsome, sir.

Kier: Thank you. I'd say the same of you, if not for my favorite core principle.

Milchick: Probity?

Kier: No ... Vision!

[audience laughter]

Milchick: Well, it's truly special to host a man so illustrious, so sapient, so magnanimous--

Kier: My, you're verbose. Good thing you didn't write the first appendix. It would have burst!

[audience laughter, Milchick visibly discomfited]

Milchick: It's an honor to receive your barbs, Mr. Eagan. The legacy you've left behind is truly and irrefutably larger than life.

Kier: You mean my company?

Milchick: (coldly) No. I mean this wax statue that's five inches taller than you actually were.

[audience chuckles, awkward silence]

Kier: (darkly) Thank you for that feedback, Seth.

Milchick: Thank you, Kier.

This is clearly a prepared routine. It has setups and punchlines and Milchick is visibly reading most of his lines from note cards. However, the performance obviously goes some way off the rails in the back half.

Who wrote this routine? Who performed Kier's lines in-universe? Has Milchick rehearsed this routine or does he only know his own note cards? Is Milchick's height roast part of the script or improvised?

I'll post my thoughts in a separate comment.

16
Severance Aftershow: Season 2 finale explained by Dichen Lachman, Tramell Tillman & more (www.youtube.com)
 

The title undersells it a bit, they also got Jen Tullock (Devon) and Gwendoline Christie (Lorne from Mammalians Nurturable). Weird to hear Dichen Lachman's natural Australian accent.

TV Insider has been running a Severance Aftershow on YouTube for all of season 2. Full playlist

23
A look at Firefox forks - LWN (lwn.net)
 

By Joe Brockmeier
March 4, 2025

Mozilla's actions have been rubbing many Firefox fans the wrong way as of late, and inspiring them to look for alternatives. There are many choices for users who are looking for a browser that isn't part of the Chrome monoculture but is full-featured and suitable for day-to-day use. For those who are willing to stay in the Firefox "family" there are a number of good options that have taken vastly different approaches. This includes GNU IceCat, Floorp, LibreWolf, and Zen.

If you're interested, you should read the whole article, but below are the summaries of the four tested browsers.

IceCat is probably a good choice for folks who are more concerned with the free software ethos and privacy than with functionality.

Overall, Floorp is an interesting project with some nice enhancements to the Firefox UI. However, the development roadmap seems a bit more haphazard than I would like—switching back and forth between Firefox rapid release and ESRs, for example. That may not dissuade other folks, though.

For the most part, users would be hard-pressed to spot many differences between LibreWolf and Firefox at first (or second) glance, so a screen shot of LibreWolf seemed a bit unnecessary. That approach is likely to appeal to many users who are uneasy with things like telemetry and Pocket, but don't want an entirely new browsing experience.

Currently, Zen isn't fully baked enough for me to consider switching to it. Others may be more adventurous in their browsing habits than I am, though. I can say that it has stabilized significantly since I first tried it shortly after its first public release. The project does bear keeping an eye on, and the Mozilla folks could do worse than to copy some of the ideas (and code) that the project is experimenting with.

16
A look at Firefox forks - LWN (lwn.net)
 

By Joe Brockmeier
March 4, 2025

Mozilla's actions have been rubbing many Firefox fans the wrong way as of late, and inspiring them to look for alternatives. There are many choices for users who are looking for a browser that isn't part of the Chrome monoculture but is full-featured and suitable for day-to-day use. For those who are willing to stay in the Firefox "family" there are a number of good options that have taken vastly different approaches. This includes GNU IceCat, Floorp, LibreWolf, and Zen.

If you're interested, you should read the whole article, but below are the summaries of the four tested browsers.

IceCat is probably a good choice for folks who are more concerned with the free software ethos and privacy than with functionality.

Overall, Floorp is an interesting project with some nice enhancements to the Firefox UI. However, the development roadmap seems a bit more haphazard than I would like—switching back and forth between Firefox rapid release and ESRs, for example. That may not dissuade other folks, though.

For the most part, users would be hard-pressed to spot many differences between LibreWolf and Firefox at first (or second) glance, so a screen shot of LibreWolf seemed a bit unnecessary. That approach is likely to appeal to many users who are uneasy with things like telemetry and Pocket, but don't want an entirely new browsing experience.

Currently, Zen isn't fully baked enough for me to consider switching to it. Others may be more adventurous in their browsing habits than I am, though. I can say that it has stabilized significantly since I first tried it shortly after its first public release. The project does bear keeping an eye on, and the Mozilla folks could do worse than to copy some of the ideas (and code) that the project is experimenting with.

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