I’m seeing a lot of “democracy is going to die” posts… But… I hate to break it to you:

America is not a democracy. And if somehow it is a democracy, then it’s an incredibly bad one. It’s the least democratic democracy in the Western world.

The two party system, the first past the post voting system, the indirect method of counting votes, lobbying, gerrymandering, the electoral collage. Systems to try and manipulate what a vote means. Systems that try to remove as much democracy from democracy as possible, while still being able to keep up some mock appearance.

Your whole country is fucked and backwards from the very beginning, and that wouldn’t be so bad. But if America does something we all have to suffer for it!

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I don’t actually understand the purpose of karma on Reddit, beyond some sort of metric to feel good about yourself. It’s literally just a number and nothing else.

I’ve seen some people try to devalue what someone said because of “low karma”, so I’d say it’s a good thing Lemmy doesn’t have a karma system.

No, let’s not degrade language like that.

And “eliminated at all costs”? Sounds exactly the kind of thinking that leads to getting shut out and cut ties. Good riddance.

“Russian” is not a race. And Finland has a history with Russia that isn’t easily forgotten. That is to say, every Finn I’ve spoken to hates Russia for invading Finland… Twice…

Finland isn’t even the only neighbour that hates Russia. At some point one has to wonder why so many of Russia’s neighbours hate, or at the very least don’t feel comfortable with, Russia.

Maybe, just maybe, the reason why everyone is having issues with Russia is Russia’s own damn fault.

This is the reason why I don’t want to go to pools anymore.

A pull request, in its most basic form, is the request for a change. The joke is that the change I’d be requesting is to make Gimp more relevant, as there isn’t just one feature or quality of life change that Gimp would need.

Clearly you don’t know much about Cards Against Humanity.

It fascinates me how far we’re progressing in medical science. Never expected to ever see news like cures for HIV, tumours, and diabetes in my lifetime.

Hey, have you seen those Japanese? They have curved swords. Curved… Swords…!

“Please make Gimp relevant” would be a pretty interesting pull request.

Ah. So gimp is going to stop being 15 years out of date and instead going to be just 10 years out of date. Cool.

No, the US government didn’t. There were some guys who allegedly heard some other guys talk about a crash that allegedly was a UFO. They all happened to work for the American government.

There were also a group of guys that wasted US government resources on just plain bullshit for literal decades.

It’s not because of a lack of interest. It’s not because we “get used” to things to quickly. It’s because it doesn’t matter. Like, alright. So aliens are real. Aliens have secretly been communicating with all the world’s government.

So… What actually changes?

Is this new information going to fix the housing market? Is capitalism going to change? How is this information going to change corporations squeezing everything dry? Aliens being confirmed is awesome, wondrous news! But… How will I, an average dude, be part of it? What is the point if I wake up tomorrow and everything around me is still the same? Wars are still the same, religions are still the same, the economy, hell, even the information these aliens bring to Earth, only benefits the top 1%.

If I still have to work a shitty job just to barely afford living in a single room, what difference does knowing aliens exist make?

The tomato.

That’s about it.

Well let me think…

I know a few local supermarkets sell frozen chickpeas in bags of 500 grams. And I think, off the top of my head, the price ranges between 15 dkk ($2.24) and 40 dkk ($5.97), depending on if there’s a sale on and which supermarket I go to. I know that Rema 1000 is on the cheaper end, and frozen vegetable products tend to go on sale pretty often, but it’s never the same products, so it’s very unpredictable when chickpeas go on sale. These prices include tax, as tax is not excluded from products in stores.

That means that 3 kg of frozen chickpeas would be between $14.44 (uaually when on sale) or $36.02.

Now, I can get dried beans and peas in much larger bulk from the various Arab stores in Copenhagen, but buying bags of dried goods from those stores comes with the risk of getting pantry moths. I’m still battling those little fuckers from the time I bought a large 5 kg bag of really high quality rice two years ago.

I live in Denmark.

There’s no Amazon in Denmark. Basically anything bought from Amazon either comes from Germany or the UK, which makes Amazon probably the worst, most expensive option for any reason.

I can buy oats and flour on the cheap around here, but chickpeas and dried beans? That’s very quickly sounding like $10 a day.

Interesting…