randomsnark

joined 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

You need to prompt your party to roleplay as non-idiots and think through their solution step-by-step. Of course, it's possible your party is also running an outdated model.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 60 points 1 month ago (8 children)

I was going to say that's actually a G K Chesterton quote, but it turns out it's more complicated than that. Neil Gaiman himself said it was from Chesterton (when quoting it at the start of Coraline), but he wrote it from memory and didn't double check, so the original is worded differently. At least, that's how my quick googling claims the paraphrase happened. The misquote is pithier than the original so... is it now a Gaiman quote, even though it originates as an attempted Chesterton quote?

As far as I can tell, the passage he was thinking of was:

Fairy tales do not give the child his first idea of bogey. What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey. The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination. What the fairy tale provides for him is a St. George to kill the dragon.

  • G K Chesterton, Tremendous Trifles (1909)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

You already have a bunch of discussion on how "k" can seem dismissive as it's the lowest effort affirmative reply possible, but I'd add that "K." can seem worse, because it's the same message with more effort - if everyone has understood/assumed that "k" is the lowest effort/energy communication, capitalizing and punctuating it indicates that you do have the extra energy, you just choose to spend that energy on emphasizing the dismissive response, rather than on using a different one. It has the same connotations, but more emphatically and more intentionally (or, that's how it comes across).

I also think in general taking the effort to use correct punctuation and grammar seems more formal, less natural, and hence more emotionally distant. It can also seem more emphatic or assertive, like by using more correct grammar/punctuation than everyone else, you're positioning yourself as generally more "correct" than they are. The combination of emotional distance and implicit high ground can come across as a bit hostile, or at least standoffish.

The reverse could also be true - if you were in a culture or context where everyone else was using correct grammar and punctuation and you weren't, it could come across as implying that they're not worth caring about. For example, in work communications, or maybe when talking to members of an older generation or people from a country that uses more formal language.

In general, probably the smoothest approach would be to observe how others in a given circle communicate, and try to match their level of formality. I guess this is basically masking. If you'd rather not change how you communicate to fit in, you could explicitly discuss this with people - essentially say, "hey, I'm aware that my natural style is different from yours, and I want to be clear that this isn't indicative of my emotional state, or attitude to you, or any intended tone, this is just my natural baseline".

At the end of the day the options will always be a) mask, b) be awkwardly explicit, or c) get used to being misunderstood.

... this was really meant to be a quick addition about the difference between "k" and "K." but sometimes my comments turn into essays for no good reason. Hope something in here was useful anyway.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 month ago

they probably fell into an empty enclosure one day and the zookeepers just rolled with it and put up a sign

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Are capybaras as chill as their reputation suggests, or is that more a feature of cases that are used to captivity? If the memes/images/videos are to be believed, I'd expect to be able to just wander up to one in the wild and have it respond like a well-socialized pet dog.

[–] [email protected] 187 points 1 month ago (38 children)

For those like me who are not familiar with rapper feuds or sex offender locator apps, this is the rapper Drake's house shown as containing many registered sex offenders in an image posted by Kendrick Lamar. Just to save some googling.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago

Thanks! I guess Google actually translated almost all of it except proper nouns (and comrade). Haupstrasse 46 does seem to be a valid address in Mainz-Mombach. I guess I had hoped there was some mention of rank or something, to make clear that it was a German soldier, although tbh my research about the stamp has resolved that to my satisfaction anyway.

Thanks for your help! 😀

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

balls mama
gottem

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

I see a lot of cages there - is Scootaloo your only pet that can't fly?

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