Maybe I’m crazy for this, but I don’t like the term politics, I feel like it hides what people are actually talking about. Think about the difference between the statements:
“I’m not interested in understanding politics, it’s too crazy”
“I’m not interested in understanding who gets to decide what my rights are, it’s too crazy”
Or maybe:
“It’s annoying seeing politics in my feed all the time”
“It’s annoying seeing people discussing the implementation of mass surveillance in my feed all the time”
In both cases, do you see how the first one feels like a pretty standard perspective, but the second one feels insane?
I don’t know if you realize this, but when people say things like “I don’t talk about politics” that’s just a short form of what they really mean, which is often:
I don’t want to talk about politics here.
I don’t want to talk about politics with you.
I don’t want to talk about politics right now.
I don’t want to talk about politics like that.
Surely you have to have seen the changes over the past 10-15 years in online discourse that has resulted in politics invading every available space. It used to be quite easy to avoid political conversations online. And still, a lot of people don’t come online for that and that’s okay.
They aren’t insane. They’re trying to tell you to calm down. Please take a hint and change the topic when someone says something like that.
Imma pull a classic middle of the road …thingy. Sometimes people use “I don’t talk politics” to mean “I’m personally happy with how this part of the system is working so stop complaining” which is kinda shitty when they’re not the one on the ass end of it. It’s also cool to just have some crochet groups where the biggest drama is that I hold the hook like a knitter. Gotta decompress sometimes. Have the strength to do both and all.
When someone says “I don’t like or follow politics” my reply is something alomg the lines of “well, that’s your choice, but you know who does take an interest in politics? Your boss, their boss, your bank, your landlord… So go ahead and choose not to care about politics, just shut the fuck up with your whinging about the state of the world you’ve just told me you opt out of having a say in.”
Or something
I’ve helped a visually impaired person find their dogs poop so they could pick it up via the “Be my eyes” app. They activated their camera and I used it to direct them to the poop
You are now a poop sherpa, thank you for your kind service.
Username checks out.
I’ve been logged in for years, and I just got my first call last week! I was so excited. Lady’s laundry machine had stopped with the clothes still wet, and I read off the dial settings and LEDs to determine why it had stopped the cycle and what to do. Took about 5 min.
The calls are few and far between that’s for sure. I’ve only had four or five in total
I think it rings several sighted people simultaneously to speed up the connection. Twice it’s rung but I was not able to pick up, once I was too slow and the other I just wasn’t available. Super frustrating because I was really looking forward to it.
Hopefully now that I’ve answered a call I get prioritized somehow.
It would be great if my existence and the existence of my friends and family weren’t considered “political.”
But here we are. Sorry that our not going quietly into the camps inconveniences you.
You know you’re in a discussion with a blind person, and you included an image without alternative text.
Please learn what alternative text is.
They did not say what you’re implying them saying. There is a world between not caring about people getting arrested by ICE, and not wanting every other post being about Trump’s antics or US politics.
Plus, if they are blind, I guess it’s harder for them to decide “at a glance” what they’d want to check or not. It doesn’t suffice to see someone’s face to decide to skip, they have to read what the post is about.
I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess that being blind is much worse than any of that extremely common stuff you want to feel oppressed about
Nobody is sending anyone to camps bro.
Might help if your talking points were delusional conspiracy nonsense.
The Trump administration literally sold merch at the front gate of one such camp in Florida. Old prisons are being reopened and new ones are being built to hold all the new ICE detainees, and they throw them all together in a cell with deportation papers in the middle of the room hoping they’ll give up and sign to be willingly deported. ICE now has massive deportation quotas that they’re being pushed to meet.
The above doesn’t even scrape the iceberg of everything that’s been happening. Your confident ignorance betrays your stupidity.
the issue is that ‘political’ people inject their politics into everything, and want to put every comment and commentator into the prejudged boxes they regard as right and wrong.
they don’t care about what anyone says. just about passing judgement and feeling superior.
put every comment and commentator into the prejudged boxes they regard as right and wrong.
I hate that this is commonly known as “politics”. To me, this is a sports event. I still like to think that politics is about discourse, compromise, coalitions etc.
that’s cool, but the vast majority of people don’t. for them it’s about whether you are on their team, and how pure your loyalty to their team is. discussion and discourse are violations of that purity.
Their tribalism is a violation of my purity test. Dumbasses don’t get to redefine what words mean, even if they’re dumb enough to vote for a braindead celebrity.
It’s not even always that I disagree with what people on here say, I’ve been a 3rd party/independent voter most of my adult life, hardly a Trump fan, but if I post about where to find good fajitas in Dallas I don’t want to hear a manifesto. A fanatic is someone who won’t change their mind and won’t change the subject, and a lot of lemmings fit that bill as evidenced by this very thread.
The unfortunate part is that politics isn’t necessarily tied to government. People get political over anything they identify with
Political, or tribal? Political is supposed to mean compromising on solutions to tough and intertwined problems. Not throwing on a jerzy and rooting for your dumbass team regardless of what they do or say…
How do you wipe your butt?!?!
Very few blind people have no vision at all, and many, including myself, have sufficient vision to see what’s on the TP. Otherwise, the friction as you wipe is a decent indicator, and if you’re not sure you can just make a few more passes.
That extra bit of context definitely helps to frame why someone would be asking you those things!
I thought most people on here would get the reference from how often “How do blind people wipe their butt?” comes up on /r/showerthoughts, but I’ll change the post title to avoid any other weird comments.
For what it’s worth, that’s probably more of a Reddit thing; I don’t think I’ve ever seen that asked on Lemmy.
I guess I assume all Lemmings are former Redditors like myself and I suppose that’s not the case.
I think most of us are, but a lot of us made the switch quite some time ago… mid-2023 was a pretty big migration wave, and so have largely forgotten about Redditisms. :)
I joined my first instance around that time, and finally deleted my Reddit account a few months later. But I still lurk on some subreddits. There’s no Orangutan community on Lemmy :(
I’d never heard that! So you might be able to see it from very close, or only in peripheral vision or something? That’s great.
This question, asked by Jim Jefferies in his bit about guide dogs, ruined my wiping experience. When I was younger, my ass smaller and and my shits smoother, it was enough to give a single wipe and go on with my day. Then Jefferies asked the question of how blind people see the poop on the paper, and the next time I had to look at the paper and do a control wipe to see that it’s clean. But now that I’m fatter and my shits messier, I have to do like six wipes to get a clean one. Curse you Jim Jefferies.
The same way they pick up dog poop. They have a theme or compulsion.
The same way they pick up their dogs poop ┐( ˘_˘)┌
I don’t mind politics. Just wish I, who’s never set foot in the US, could come in here waste my time as usual and not have US News & Politics make its way into my feed every time through some non-US News & Politics community.
Maybe I need to make more use of a skill most USians lack, knowledge of other languages, and find myself more non-US stuff. Not exactly easy, but would pay off easily.
There’s some great stuff in English, but I wouldn’t miss it much if it means no more US news & politics. There ought to be good shit in other languages. I just need to find the good stuff, and where it be
Try a multingual lemmy instance. On sh.itjust.works I get German and French posts in my feed all the time from various communities when I browse Local.
I do get some posts in different languages here and there, but I don’t really know some of these, so not useful lol. If I could, like, idk, filter or something.
I’d be down to getting languages I don’t understand if I could get rid of English. As an experiment, a trial. Or at least a similar amount of every language. Boost other languages.
At this point, I think I’m better taking breaks from Lemmy, or leaving altogether. Not sure it adds all that much to my life
How do you pick up your dog’s poop?
Guide dogs have bathroom breaks at set times, and in my experience if their diet is healthy they’ll drop a duce at the same time each day. In any case, the dog is kept on a leash and given a command to relieve itself. It’ll usually sniff around, then stop to do the deed. Straight back means pee and arched back means poop. The posture can be seen if the handler has sufficient vision or felt with a hand if not. If poop is indicated, you find the dog’s south end and use your foot to mark ground zero. When the dog is done it’s a simple matter of bagging it using your foot as the landmark.
Sounds like poopy shoes but I guess it’s all about practice…
Just stomp on it barefoot.
Dogs are amazing.
Interesting! As a seeing person who used to walk the family dog, I can attest to the technique of using your foot as a landmark - it was invaluable in order to not lose track of the pile among similarly-colored fallen leaves while I was getting the bag ready.
Wait… You’re blind?
👋
Sí
What’s your favorite screenreader?
Probably NVDA for Windows. Microsoft has tried to flesh out Narrator but it’s still the MS Edge of screen readers IMO, you use it just to download another screen reader. The fact that VS Code is built around NVDA and not Narrator should show how MS feels about it.
I definitely agree that NVDA is the best on Windows. Narrator is eh (you described it well) and JAWS is somehow both costly and shit? I’ll give it to Apple too, VoiceOver is one of the best I’ve used.
What are your thoughts on AI powered screen readers?
Personally, despite being rabidly anti-AI, it seems like one of the few positive uses for AI since it can fill in the gaps where web a11y fails. I’m honestly curious about its development, but worried about the technology being tainted by capitalism (as is tradition)
Disclaimer: I’m not fully blind (though I do have my own complex eye disability), but I’ve done a TON of work on web a11y and appreciate the responses
What are your thoughts on AI powered screen readers?
One of my biggest gripes with AI is that it requires a cloud connection most of the time, and I’m all about my PC being my personal computer.
In terms of usefulness I can see it maybe for image description.
Easier said than done, it seems.
**American politics
This is the important part. I enjoy reading political news and discussions. But in the country I live in, not American politics which forced into each conversation.
Yeah once politics aren’t killing everyone slowly and ruining life in general for the public then it’ll be better
I get the desire but this is so over the moral boundaries its fucking crazy so your gonna just have to see it through
Maybe help make it so its not needed but bitching and moaning about that is just making it MORE necessary
So yeah. Fuck your post but heres to hoping you change your mind 👍
Trump is sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Biden was sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Obama was sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Dubya was sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Clinton was sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Bush 1 was sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Reagan was sending us to Hell in a hand basket.
Forgive me if I’m a little numb to it all.
Maybe a lesson here that your life is not in a way that it should be based on the reality outside and your ignorance is the product of that and not the solution
I know you want to live fat and happy so does the next generation and the slaves in Guatemala that’ll likely die in some water wars or some other byproduct of this insanity.
Its just not in the cards for people right now. You can always change your moral definitions but there will always be a jealousy of those that are stronger then that.
I see your not entirely wrong, (tho some of them obviously weren’t as responsible and/or more help then hurt outside of irresponsible but also nigh unavoidable (Considering the actual power structure in the US) military/industrial complex military “strategies”. (👀 Looking mostly at Clinton/Obama there) But being better then some isn’t enough and truly never will be. And it doesn’t make the defeatist “Well its not MY job” idea less bullshit. You clearly want it to change. Your just to apathetic to contribute meaningfully for whatever “reason”
Unless your literally incapable of helping for some reason (say mentally ill or debilitated) or near 100% maxed out personally and so stability is now a NEED not a want, you could be doing more and giving up is understandable at best but best be quiet about it as as to not encourage other members of the species to do the same out of groupthink or some misguided group justifications like it
Pay attention, talk about it, be uncomfortable, make others do the same, otherwise someone else is taking your share 👍 and I think that’s bullshit cause you seem smart enough to know better then that
lol Americans
Yes, politics is here, because Spez pushed a lot of it out, due to Elongated Muskrat.
considering the state of the world, politics really should be inescapable. everywhere. not just lemmy. not just reddit. not just social media. everywhere.
people trying not to pay attention are allowing evil to go on uncontested. you are showing a lack of empathy and self absorption that is ruining the entire world.
The world has always been this way. You just weren’t being doped on it 24/7 via your phone. There has always been war, corruption, and abuses of power.
It’s a lot easier to think the world isn’t ending when the news is a 30m broadcast once a night, or a news paper each day, vs endlessly consuming algorithmic rage bait calibrated to stimulate your fear response.
theres a difference now though. the rich have amassed more wealth and power than ever before and technology has multiplied that power many times over. In countries like the US, the fascistic and oppressive systems that have been put in place have become nearly unbreakable by any realistic means. A civil war is not realistic without outside support from other countries. And that’s not realistic. Smaller countries can have revolts because they don’t have the systems the US has in place. They aren’t militarized and policed to even a fraction of the amount. The US public only worsens the issue because it has been purposefully de-educated over many decades. We are staring a steel reinforced dystopia in the face and doing nothing because there is nothing we can do.
The world has not been this way before.
Yeah it has. It’s been way worse, actually.
But don’t let history get in the way of your doomer beliefs I guess.
Tell me when and tell me how.
And I’ll just add, you people, who are minimizing how bad things have become are only making things worse by nurturing a culture of complacency.
You mean I’m not a delusional internet revolutionary who thinks using Linux and making internet comments is going to bring about a communist utopia? Yeah, I’m one of ‘those people’.
Only person making your life miserable is you.
2 days later… still waiting.
I’ll be waiting for your explanation of when and how it was worse.
My favourite part of Lemmybis being able to block communities and users, don’t live in America so it’s not my problem you got a tangerine hitler for a president, we got our own problems.
Like it or not, it’s everybody’s problem. At least he unwittingly caused some positive change, pushing EU countries to break away from US tech/products
Don’t live in Europe
Were you born sighted? Or did you go blind over time?
I was born blind.
I’m sorry to hear that. I had a friend in college born without eyes. I talked a lot with him about concepts like shapes and colors. He was able to tell how much battery the electric carts on campus had by the sound of the motor, it’s quite interesting. I guess you might have an easier time than someone that lost their vision. I now have a friend that went blind after a car accident, he gets a lot of help from neighbors. He try’s very hard to do things himself, but often needs help. I hope you have a good support network for the things you need in life.
