Baker Street Doctor @bakerstreetdoctor - Tumblr Blog

In my freak era

Educate yourselves

In the tags of one of my posts, I pondered the overlap between tumblr tankies and anti-anti-Ai people, suggesting the common link is anti-intellectualism and the disrespect for the arts and humanities that comes with it. Someone left this reply.

I think this is correct (and am only blocking out their name so idiots don’t attack them).

It would sound mean out of context, but we’ve all been on here for a while and know that tankies are genuinely some of the laziest, stupidest, and most incurious people alive. They’re losers who are mad at anyone who finds any success through effort, because they’ve made inadequacy and doing nothing parts of their political praxis. These people aren’t researchers saying “actually this AI model makes this kind of research easier”, but people who’ve seriously argued with me that artists are “gatekeepers” because they…can actually draw or paint, and say you’re not an artist if you can’t draw and instead make a computer program do all of it for you. I said before that it's like crying that it’s “gatekeeping” to say someone who does nothing but order takeout isn’t a chef lol.

But these people act victimized by the idea that you need to put time and effort into something to get better at it. It’s the same with academics; as I’ve said before, this type of person doesn’t want to increase accessibility to education, they want to attack the concept of education itself to justify their own refusal to learn and insecurities over being willfully stupid. How dare you say they should actually read something, or that someone who has studied something and demonstrated their knowledge through getting a degree knows more than they do. These people want the recognition and respect they think artists, academics, and professionals get while putting in ZERO of the time, effort, or work. I repeat: the core here is anti-intellectualism. It sounds a hell of a lot like the right, who feels threatened by experts and the very concept of expertise. Anti-intellectuals of all stripes feel oppressed by the stance that you need to gain knowledge and develop a skill set in something to be taken seriously about it, or achieve something to be rewarded, and they see generative AI as their savior because they don’t have to DO anything, but can have some kind of a result and demand to be seen as on the same level as people who actually put the fucking work in

nitpickspot

I have, just yesterday, caught out a student for turning in an AI written essay into my English class (it all appeared in a single chunk over 30 seconds of version history and is using English skills she simply does not possess as an ESL learner. I don't say that to impugn on ESL learners, but she's an ESL learner in MY class so I know her skill level and progress point).

And she's arguing against getting in trouble because she "doesn't need the skills I'm teaching" for her trade. And that I'm "slowing her down from doing actually important things"

She wants to be a nurse. I am trying to teach her how to read and write in the English language. Yknow, so she doesn't kill somebody.

sprinkledsalt

That makes me laugh out loud, as someone who works with ESL speakers every day who have a hard time finding jobs due to their limited language skills! I've seen people argue that some ESL students will use AI programs like Grammarly to check their grammar because they're not confident in their language skills, but this is clearly a different scenario of a student just using entire AI-generated chunks in the assignment, being outright disrespectful to the instructor and, yes, engaging in anti-intellectualism by acting like literacy is ever a frivolous skill. How in the fuck are you going to be able to understand complicated medical texts in English if you can't write a simple essay in the language lol. But this is part of the larger, anti-intellectual attack on literacy and the humanities. The right has argued against the utility of English class "because science and math are more important!!" for a long time, and a lot of these people's mindsets are antithetical to higher education in that they don't believe a college graduate should be a well-rounded adult who is expected to have baseline knowledge in multiple respects (math, English, science, etc.); they think universities should function like trade schools

But frankly, how English class could benefit her in her chosen field doesn't even need to be part of the conversation. The fact of the matter is that there's no scenario where a student isn't an asshole for signing up for a class and then refusing to do the work and telling the instructor that it's all a waste of time lol. It doesn't matter what excuse she has, it's just not acceptable behavior (and I don't know what fantasy world these people live in where they think they won't have to do things that aren't personally useful or interesting to them in the workforce, either...). I've been saying for years on here that there's this bullshit "the customer is always right" attitude towards education right now, and it's infuriating.

charlesoberonn

No offense, but the group with some of the most unexamined internalized privilege are right-handed people.

A right-handed co-worker told me once that I put the papers in the plastic sleeve upside-down. I joked that from my perspective, she's the one putting them upside-down and she just didn't get it and started arguing with me.

I had to physically demonstrate to her that the papers are right-side up when you hold the sleeve so that the opening is on the left.

charlesoberonn

I feel you. I'm left-handed but I can't use scissors in my left hand (even left-handed scissors) because I got used to only using them with my right.

shofarsogood

All the desks are my university are right handed. You know, the kind where you flip up the top to get seated and flip it back down to write? All right handed. There's no place to rest my arm. By the time class is over, I have a line on my arm from where the edge presses in. It's just uncomfortable. (Not to mention that those desks are hell for anyone who is not super super skinny and athletic. There's no space for bigger people.)

We have the same thing at the local movie theater which means that I'm constantly elbowing my girlfriend's drink trying to eat popcorn. It's less of an issue at a movie theater, though.

meshaamem-li

ever tried to use a computer mouse with your left hand? your pointer finger naturally rests on right click so you gotta move it to press left click. very inconvenient. (I just recently thought to change my mouse settings to switch left and right click but I haven't tried it yet) and that's not even mentioning those specialized computer mice that are designed to fit your hand shape more, those are so inconvenient for left handed people.

also, left handed people have actually been openly discriminated against up until pretty recently. my grandmother got her left handedness "corrected" at school and she's not the only one from her generation who have. I've heard of tactics from slapping them with a ruler to tying their left hand to the back of the chair.

isn't this kinda crazy how this discrimination existed and still exists independently in so many places in the world and against such a simple and unimportant human trait as a dominant hand?? it's not a different look, it's not a differebt gender, it's not a different lifestyle or culture, a different belief, or a different way of acting, it's literally just which hand you use for tasks.

jewish-rock

my kindergarten teacher, I was 5 and struggled with fine motor tasks so making a solid line without breaking the pencil or ripping the page was a success, made me switch to my right hand. (my autistic stubbornness meant I switched back every time she wasn't looking).

and talking to other friends of mine, as recently as the 2010s teachers have forced leftie kids to be right handed.

meshaamem-li

as recently as 2010???? holy shit.

jewish-rock

even worse, one person I know this happened to started school in 2012 (she's 19 now). haven't met anyone younger than that who's been forced to be rightie, but then again I just don't know a lot of people who are younger than that.

natequarter

[ID: 1. A diagram of papers in a plastic sleeve, showing how it would be orientated the right way for a left handed person holding it but the wrong way for a right handed person holding it, who would be holding it upside down. 2. Tags reading, "This is also why broomhandles and my tablet pen keep unscrewing themselves. And why I can't hold my phone in my left hand. Because the flip cover opens to the left. Scissors cut wrong. Doing anything with screws... I am basically ambidextrous for a lot of things at this point simply because the world is designed for right handed people." /end ID+

runawaymarbles

I don't disagree it's possible to vote out fascists, but I think the real question is whether this accomplishes anything beyond giving them a couple terms' vacation before they can slip back in and pick up right where they left off. Especially in the USA where it seems no amount of Repub fuckups can ever actually put their chances of winning below 50%

I mean it accomplishes getting them out of office, which is extremely fucking important, and then, yes, you have to keep campaigning and voting against them for the rest of your life. There is no one election that is going to #own the other party into not existing anymore.

We vote in every election forever. That is how this works.

If you get tired of that, the fascists are happy to provide an alternative.

bisexualhunterbiden

People like anon piss me the fuck off and I'm tired of being nice about it.

You will have to engage in democracy for the rest of your life. You are a citizen, not a subject. Fucking act like it.

ralfmaximus

It's a well known cycle. A pendulum that swings.

assholes gain power, fuck things up

sane people regain power, fix things

people forget how fucked up things were

repeat

But here's the deal: with every swing of that pendulum, history gets a little bit better. After the hateful 1950s the US got the civil rights movement of the 1960s. Interracial marriage was legalized. Freedom of the press was institutionalized.

After the shitty 1970s Viet Nam war & Nixon, we got women's liberation, voter rights, the EPA, affirmative action, and a zillion consumer protection agencies.

After 1980s Reaganomics shit the bed, we got an economic boom, the beginning of gay rights, and the internet. We started treating AIDS as a disease to be cured and not a curse on queers.

After the 1990s Bush era we got gay marriage, ADA, Obamacare, and the decriminalization of marijuana.

Now in the 2020s we're in a backwards swing, back towards fascism and the bad old days of racism. But it's temporary [IF YOU VOTE and are allowed to vote]. The majority of people actively dislike what's happening in the USA and are pissed off.

When the pendulum swings back it's gonna swing hard, and things will be SO much better.

Please, hang on.

#God the line about being a citizen and not a subject is so fucking true #And you know what subjects still did back in ye olde times? Petition their masters! They still tried to change things!#And you know what? Sometimes they even succeeded!

skoomabong

sure

centuriespast

Indonesia

Eastern Java

Piggy Bank, 14th/15th century

Art Institute Chicago

milkywayes

i think there’s a fundamental difference between revenge for yourself and avenging someone else. there’s different implications about what’s most important to you. who are you doing this for, yourself or someone else? which is to say that i think the language matters when we talk about garrus’ loyalty mission.

fandom loves to compare it to zaeed’s quest for revenge, but i don’t think it’s easily comparable. zaeed was betrayed and left for dead by this man and he would kill any number of innocents to exact his revenge. it’s entirely about his own ego. what garrus is doing is far more complex, considering turian social mores of accountability and absolute loyalty to your team, which garrus is trying to uphold and which sidonis broke. he’s not the sole victim, and he never talks about it in the sense of what sidonis did to him. it’s about the deaths of his squad that he is trying to avenge, taking responsibility as their leader to rectify his mistake of trusting someone that he shouldn’t have trusted, and delivering a sentence that for all we know, turian courts would have upheld. i don’t believe for a moment that betraying your team and causing their deaths isn’t one of the worst crimes you can commit in turian society. as garrus points out, no one who knows what happened cares about it but him. they weren’t turians in the hierarchy, they were outlaws on omega. no one is going to deliver justice if garrus won’t, and his upbringing says this is a crime that cannot go unpunished, and it’s his responsibility, and his fault.

you can draw parallels about what it does to a person to put all their energy into chasing one person to execute them, especially someone who they once considered a friend or team mate. we see the toll it takes on garrus. we see how he reaches for violence first. all fair things to discuss, and i will always argue that talking garrus out of taking the shot is the best thing you can do for his longterm mental health and development.

but they’re fundamentally not the same. zaeed, as much as i like him, is a ruthless killer who thinks only about himself. garrus is trying to repay the trust that was once placed in him and do right by his squad after their deaths. the core motivator is not his own pride, though it gets tangled up in that when it comes to his self view (if he fails to do this, then what does that say about him, what kind of man is he, how could he ever take a leadership role again? he owes these people justice, and he doesn’t know if he can live with himself if he doesn’t deliver it.)

we have no reason to believe garrus would ever let a factory full of innocents burn just to put a bullet into sidonis. he is not zaeed, and this is not petty revenge.

emptyskiff

Grace's bike of "i ride a bike to work, and it's not for exercise" fame

diamondeyes-deluxe

I work with kids and sometimes we have to do safety lessons with them about like, not telling strangers on the internet your home address or something. And sometimes the kids wont understand why, so you have to impart upon them that, well, some adults want to hurt children. And thats kind of difficult to do, because you have to beat around the bush, both because you dont want to scare them (while still making them understand how serious it is) and because you might lose your job if you explain it too straight forward.

Luckily, for some reason, the villain of one of the most popular franchises with children for the last 10 years happens to be a serial child murderer. So when a kid asks why they shouldnt trust strangers, instead of hand wringing and humhawing my answer out, I can just say "we dont always know when a strange adult has good intentions with children, or when they are William Afton."

imaginarylands4000

dragon-in-a-fez

it's cool how in the 6 years since this tweet was written it's become significantly less useful not because anything has gotten better but because the majority of products on Amazon are now from fly-by-night brands called "ZZPORK" and "GLUM4PANT"

bettybeagettymcclanahan

okay. if you are a woman living in a country in which women have certain rights. and your family or lover wants to sweep you away to a country in which women have fewer rights.

well. don’t do that.

purplepints

Oldest human footprint discovered, made 153,000 years ago in South Africa.

Oldest human footprint in North America, made 21,000 years ago in New Mexico, USA.

Oldest human footprint on the Moon, made July 20, 1969 on the Sea of Tranquility, Earth's moon.

damnprecious

I had the funniest customer interaction today

A family of german-speakers came to buy ice cream, and were figuring out our Finnish flavor list on their own very successfully since many of the words look similar enough, and only had to ask abt one flavor and confirmed that they deduced another one correctly, and then proceeded to place their orders, at which point they decide to start translating the words into English, at which point I just stood there basically going "no no no it's fine, you want the lakritze and you want the schokolade apfelsine, pls don't throw me off with your licorices and oranges, lakritsi and suklaa-appelsiini it is!"

jotainjotain-muuta

kaikki muut maailman kielet, kun englanti puuttuu keskusteluun ananaksesta

torillatavataan

#No siis englannin kielen puolustukseksi #Ananas = mänty omena ei ole edes kamalan huono kun ajattelee että omena/apple oli ennen niiden yleissana hedelmälle #eli ne käytännössä nimes sen mänty hedelmäks #ja ananas kyl muistuttaa vähän männyn käpyä joten nään nimeäjän logiikan #Ja on meilläkin putoja hedelmän nimiä vähän mutkan kautta #Esim meidän (ja saksan) sana appelsiinille tarkoittaa kiinan omenaa #Muistaakseni kiinan omena oli myös tovin ihan virallinen nimi sille

royalty-nobility

Equestrian Portrait of Charles XII

Artist: King Stanislaus I Leszczynski (Polish, 1677-1766)

Date: n. d.

Medium: Gouache on wood

Collection: National Museum, Stockholm, Sweden

Charles XII of Sweden

Charles XII (1682 - 1718), was the king of Sweden from 1697 until his death in 1718, notable for his military prowess and absolutist rule. Born into the Vasa dynasty, he ascended to the throne at the young age of 16, quickly demonstrating a strong-willed and ambitious character. His reign is most prominently marked by the Great Northern War (1701-1721), a conflict initiated by Peter the Great of Russia, where Charles initially showcased his military genius, earning him the title "Lion of the North." Despite early victories against Denmark and Poland, the war eventually took a significant toll on Sweden, culminating in Charles's defeat at the Battle of Poltava in 1709.

Throughout his reign, Charles spent the majority of his time away from Sweden, focusing on military campaigns rather than domestic governance. His single-minded pursuit of glory led to the decline of Sweden's absolutist monarchy and the rise of parliamentary power, as his sister Ulrika Eleonora assumed leadership in his absence. The war concluded with the Treaty of Nystadt in 1721, which saw Sweden lose significant territories and marked the decline of its status as a great power, paving the way for the emergence of Russia as a dominant force in Northern Europe. Overall, Charles XII's reign represents a complex interplay of military ambition, personal sacrifice, and political transformation that shaped the future of Sweden.

#omg Staszek you were an artist???#I can only imagine the discussion between the two like “omg Stanislaus stop drawing me swagged up you know I don't wear that anymore!!”#max and karl

wtf am I being recommended here (disgusting man content, below the cut)

#personal

riverlarking

15k likes?

its-terf-or-nothin

“Why do you keep your body hair?” because I’m an ape and apes are supposed to have hair on their bodies, hope this helps. 👍

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