Aedilred's Athanasiac Random Banter #241

[Keltest]

I very much hope nobody will ever judge you by the criteria you use here.

Why not? I fully recognize that my ability to fully extricate myself from practices and businesses that engage in behavior I disapprove of is limited, but I still try to, such as I can, and I encourage others to as well. Its a good standard to hold for yourself.

ETA: I'm not entirely comfortable with bandying about terms like "bordering on domestic terrorism" so freely.

I agree, but living in a college town where we do suffer actual damage to life, limb and property in the name of a bunch of idiots doing a "prank", in this particular case I think its correct.

[Rater202]

Peelee, there are people who think that rigging someone's mailbox to explode when they open it is a "prank."

That's on the border, I think.

Not all modern pranks are like that. That's why there's an "or" in between "be obnoxious" and "commit property damage" but still.

[Peelee]

Why not? I fully recognize that my ability to fully extricate myself from practices and businesses that engage in behavior I disapprove of is limited, but I still try to, such as I can, and I encourage others to as well. Its a good standard to hold for yourself.

I find that laudable. And I still. Absolutely stand by my statement (and also earnestly believe it, I'm not just making a sarcastic quip). And that's about as far as I'm going to take it on this forum.

I agree, but living in a college town where we do suffer actual damage to life, limb and property in the name of a bunch of idiots doing a "prank", in this particular case I think its correct.

That's crimes. Not domestic terrorism.

Peelee, there are people who think that rigging someone's mailbox to explode when they open it is a "prank."

That's on the border, I think.

Not all modern pranks are like that. That's why there's an "or" in between "be obnoxious" and "commit property damage" but still.

See above. Terrorism is big. It requires an attempt to influence a sizeable population by way of their crime (I'm simplifying but I think the point comes across). Referring to other crimes as domestic terrorism dilutes this. Attempted murder is still really bad. You don't need to call it domestic terrorism. That just creates a criminal version of the eupamism treadmill.

ETA: I have rather strong thoughts on domestic terrorism, most of which I cannot go into on here, and all of which played no small part in me going for the federal agent job.

[Rater202]

There's a reason why I said "borders on" and not "is."

[Fyraltari]

About the NFT discussion, I'm just going to recommend Folding Ideas' excellent 2-hour-long YouTube essay on the subject and move on.

There's a reason why I said "borders on" and not "is."

"Borders on" implies a distinction in scale, not in nature, though.

[Rater202]

"Borders on" implies a distinction in scale, not in nature, though.

If you're causing extreme property damage in order to impress your friends or get clout on TikTok then the only difference between you and a terrorist is who you're trying to influence.

[Peelee]

If you're causing extreme property damage in order to impress your friends or get clout on TikTok then the only difference between you and a terrorist is who you're trying to influence.

No. You're a criminal, but not a terrorist. There is a vast gulf between the two.

[Qwertystop]

Reheating NFTs: technologically, it's extremely impractical for them to have any contents beyond a short text string - so a password or URL or decryption key or similar. Theoretically it might be possible to make the payload something longer, but the work of making any transaction involving such a thing would be enough that you would be unlikely to be able to actually get such a transaction onto the chain without huge fees.

Secondly, the chain is public by nature - so whatever information is in the token would be nominally owned by you, but it would be available to anyone who cared enough to look.

Thirdly, the concept of "ownership", and anything else an NFT might supposedly be useful for, only exists in the context of an authority to enforce the ownership and provide those other features. So the whole "decentralized" thing is basically null; there might be a court that would uphold a claim of ownership based on an NFT but I doubt there's one that *wouldn't* uphold based on a plain old contact or bill of sale or other receipt. For other features, like the transfer of items in a game? The people making the game still need to implement it (both the transfer and whatever the item does), and they could do that anyway, and have done so for many games.

[Peelee]

Hey Fyraltari, just in case you havent heard yet..

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/2...-heritage-list

[D&D_Fan]

RE: Pranks
I think TikTok challenges are much worse. I made a list below of dangerous ones, because there are many.

I divide challenges into 3 categories as based on what harm they cause:

Spoiler: Chemicals and Biohazards

Show

The nutmeg challenge can make people hallucinate blue. The tide pod challenge can cause organ failure and brain damage. The Benadryl challenge can prove fatal. The sleepy chicken challenge is a massive dose. The vampire teeth challenge involves gluing fake fangs into your mouth with super glue. Super glue is not supposed to be ingested. The coronavirus challenge involved licking public bathroom stuff, door handles, and supermarket food. Nasty. The energy powder dry scoop challenge involves eating so much energy powder at once some people literally had heart attacks. The frozen honey challenge will just give you diarrhea much like how the sprite and banana challenge makes you vomit. The "male enhancement" cream challenge involves putting certain supplements onto ones face for beauty reasons. It has bad side effects on the blood vessels and veins in the face. The eye challenge involves literally putting bleach or hand sanitizer in or near the eyes to try and change eye color. Eyes don't work that way. You will just hurt your eyes by trying. The hyaluronic acid injection challenge is literally injecting acid under your skin. Sugar waxing can cause burns to the skin when attempted at home.

Spoiler: Bodily Harm

Show

The skullbreaker challenge is as awful as it sounds, and can lead to severe head injury. The milk crate challenge requires a level of physicality not everyone has, and when it goes wrong, bones may be broken. The punch a teacher challenge is just literally hitting someone. The throw it in the air challenge is throwing something in the air and trying not to get hit by it. I swear, some of these challenges are just asking for a head injury. The corn cob on a drill challenge caused people to lose both hair and teeth. The Cha-Cha slide challenge is literal reckless driving. The blackout challenge involves not breathing long enough to black out, big problem if you don't start breathing again after the video ends. Scalp popping makes a funny noise or something, but it's hurting your scalp when you do it. Filing down your teeth is permanent tooth damage. The stand up challenge is walking on top of someone's back and shoulders, and a mistake could cause serious damage to that part of the body. The basketball beer challenge is tame compared to some of the others on this list, but it can still end in a bruise if the beer bottle bounces into the face of the person who dropped it.

Spoiler: Others: Firehazards, Property Damage, and Psychological Harm

Show

The penny challenge involves sticking a coin on the prongs of a power cord and plugging it in. The fire mirror challenge is literally setting something on fire, just use a filter for a fire effect instead.
The devious lick challenge. Some kids were stealing sinks and toilets out of the walls, breaking the pipes, and stealing electronics from their schools and other public institution. Some idiots failed the challenge by getting caught and charged.
The verbal abuse challenge. I don't even know why this exists. The Nutella fake poop challenge is also nasty, mean to small children, and rude to adults and the elderly.

If anything, I think these tiktok challenges are the closest to real terrorism. They prey on the less-than-wise people, but can be incredibly dangerous, more dangerous than even a lot of pranks, I think.

If we speak out against pranks for going too far, we should also lump in challenges as well, they need to stop too.

[LaZodiac]

About the NFT discussion, I'm just going to recommend Folding Ideas' excellent 2-hour-long YouTube essay on the subject and move on.

Damn, beat me too it.

Can someone tell me when the definition of "prank" changed from "practical joke" to "be an obnoxious annoyance in a public place or commit acts of vandalism and property damage that border on domestic terrorism?"

I blame the show Jackass, honestly. And a little bit of Chris angel ~Mindfreak~. The both of them popularized this idea of inflicting violence upon each other and yourself is Good Content. This has lead to other folk trying to cash in on this; typically this being one of two types of people;

1: Weirdo freaks like Mr Knoxville and Chris who are perfectly adept and okay with the idea of "I could walk away from this sans a finger" who try and fail to get popular due to a number of different factors.

2: Opportunistic people who will do anything for money except hurt themselves in ways that aren't serious... but have absolutely no moral compunction about who THEY hurt. This leads us to modern folk like "Mr Best I think is his name I don't know" and "that one ****er that went to the Japanese Suicide Forest and filmed a dead body and did lol epic memes about it".

On the whole the first group is concerning (I knew someone in that. His friends had a game where you're obligated at any time to run one of the others over if you see'em on the street in your car, and unsurprisingly this guy is currently in intense care after many many many broken bones and nerves over the years.

The second group are who should hold your ire, and if I could dunk them all into a gravity well to be trapped for eternity I would. Monstrously cruel people.

EDIT: Basically every single one of those Tiktok "challenges" pre-date Tiktok to some degree, and also are extremely Never Happened. I'm sure some people have done them, but they're not nearly as prevalent as they appear.

[Fyraltari]

Hey Fyraltari, just in case you havent heard yet..

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/2...-heritage-list

I kind of assumed that went with the inclusion of French gastronomy in 2010, but... Neat.

[Rater202]

RE: Pranks
I think TikTok challenges are much worse. I made a list below of dangerous ones, because there are many.

I divide challenges into 3 categories as based on what harm they cause:

Spoiler: Chemicals and Biohazards

Show

The nutmeg challenge can make people hallucinate blue. The tide pod challenge can cause organ failure and brain damage. The Benadryl challenge can prove fatal. The sleepy chicken challenge is a massive dose. The vampire teeth challenge involves gluing fake fangs into your mouth with super glue. Super glue is not supposed to be ingested. The coronavirus challenge involved licking public bathroom stuff, door handles, and supermarket food. Nasty. The energy powder dry scoop challenge involves eating so much energy powder at once some people literally had heart attacks. The frozen honey challenge will just give you diarrhea much like how the sprite and banana challenge makes you vomit. The "male enhancement" cream challenge involves putting certain supplements onto ones face for beauty reasons. It has bad side effects on the blood vessels and veins in the face. The eye challenge involves literally putting bleach or hand sanitizer in or near the eyes to try and change eye color. Eyes don't work that way. You will just hurt your eyes by trying. The hyaluronic acid injection challenge is literally injecting acid under your skin. Sugar waxing can cause burns to the skin when attempted at home.

Spoiler: Bodily Harm

Show

The skullbreaker challenge is as awful as it sounds, and can lead to severe head injury. The milk crate challenge requires a level of physicality not everyone has, and when it goes wrong, bones may be broken. The punch a teacher challenge is just literally hitting someone. The throw it in the air challenge is throwing something in the air and trying not to get hit by it. I swear, some of these challenges are just asking for a head injury. The corn cob on a drill challenge caused people to lose both hair and teeth. The Cha-Cha slide challenge is literal reckless driving. The blackout challenge involves not breathing long enough to black out, big problem if you don't start breathing again after the video ends. Scalp popping makes a funny noise or something, but it's hurting your scalp when you do it. Filing down your teeth is permanent tooth damage. The stand up challenge is walking on top of someone's back and shoulders, and a mistake could cause serious damage to that part of the body. The basketball beer challenge is tame compared to some of the others on this list, but it can still end in a bruise if the beer bottle bounces into the face of the person who dropped it.

Spoiler: Others: Firehazards, Property Damage, and Psychological Harm

Show

The penny challenge involves sticking a coin on the prongs of a power cord and plugging it in. The fire mirror challenge is literally setting something on fire, just use a filter for a fire effect instead.
The devious lick challenge. Some kids were stealing sinks and toilets out of the walls, breaking the pipes, and stealing electronics from their schools and other public institution. Some idiots failed the challenge by getting caught and charged.
The verbal abuse challenge. I don't even know why this exists. The Nutella fake poop challenge is also nasty, mean to small children, and rude to adults and the elderly.

If anything, I think these tiktok challenges are the closest to real terrorism. They prey on the less-than-wise people, but can be incredibly dangerous, more dangerous than even a lot of pranks, I think.

If we speak out against pranks for going too far, we should also lump in challenges as well, they need to stop too.

Keep in mind that a number of TikTok challenges aren't actually a thing: The Tide Pod challenge, for example, was a bunch of people making a joke. No one actually ate any Tide Pods until after the news took the jokes out of context.

Same with the recent Nyquil Chicken thing.

For every dumbass thing people do on Tiktok there's one that was made up by people who want to get views by making fun of stupid, self-destructive millenials(ignoring that millenials are all middle age or rapidly approaching it now)

[Form]

About the NFT discussion, I'm just going to recommend Folding Ideas' excellent 2-hour-long YouTube essay on the subject and move on.

Damn, beat me too it.

I've been wanting to link it, but wasn't sure I could...

[Anonymouswizard]

I honestly just assumed that everybody here would have seen Dan Olson's brief forray into the subject by now.

His followup, a quick dive into what he calls 'contrepreneurs' is also great.

He now has that personal aesthetic best described as 'hipster dad', and I am sadly old enough to be uncomfortably turned on.

[D&D_Fan]

Keep in mind that a number of TikTok challenges aren't actually a thing: The Tide Pod challenge, for example, was a bunch of people making a joke. No one actually ate any Tide Pods until after the news took the jokes out of context.

Same with the recent Nyquil Chicken thing.

For every dumbass thing people do on Tiktok there's one that was made up by people who want to get views by making fun of stupid, self-destructive millenials(ignoring that millenials are all middle age or rapidly approaching it now)

Some challenges are clearly fake, nobody is actually doing the "drive as fast as you can in the dark with your headlights off challenge" but with TikTok, more people are trying the simple ones like skullbreaker, milk crate, cha-cha slide, nutmeg, etc.. becasuse they think they'll get famous. aAd even if some videos are fake, there will always be children who don't know about it being fake and do it anyway. It's just bad things waiting to happen.

[Peelee]

In unrelated news, apparently my friends put up on our discord chat a trailer for the film Cocaine Bear, presumably about Pablo Escobear, the animal that ate an unbearable amount of Cocaine and then acted as one might imagine.

[Keltest]

In unrelated news, apparently my friends put up on our discord chat a trailer for the film Cocaine Bear, presumably about Pablo Escobear, the animal that ate an unbearable amount of Cocaine and then acted as one might imagine.

I saw that that existed. I'm not sure why it exists, but it sure exists.

[Peelee]

I saw that that existed. I'm not sure why it exists, but it sure exists.

It's a fun little story, if a bit crazy and dystopian and not very bear-friendly. But I can't imagine it as a movie. They basically have to build an unrelated plot that happens to feature Pablo Escobear.

[LaZodiac]

It's a fun little story, if a bit crazy and dystopian and not very bear-friendly. But I can't imagine it as a movie. They basically have to build an unrelated plot that happens to feature Pablo Escobear.

Real ****, find a way to figure out how the bear got it, the aftermath of the bearscapades, and have it all narrated by Werner Herzog and we've got Grizzly Man 2: The Cocaining.

*Herzog, in his most delightfully deadpan and gentle voice* "This is the bear that will get high."

[Peelee]

Real ****, find a way to figure out how the bear got it, the aftermath of the bearscapades, and have it all narrated by Werner Herzog and we've got Grizzly Man 2: The Cocaining.

*Herzog, in his most delightfully deadpan and gentle voice* "This is the bear that will get high."

Oh we know exactly how the bear got it. But I'm 100% down for Werner Herzog to be involved in it.

[Rater202]

My mom found a box of assorted pre-cut cubes of cookie dough for making Christmas cookies.

Ironically, sugar cookies have the least sugar.

[Peelee]

Today I learned about casu martzu cheese, the most dangerous cheese in the world. And I kinda regret learning about it but it was pretty interesting.

Rater, as the biggest cheese afficianado I'm aware of on these board, if you ever have the chance to have this cheese, I strongly recommend against.

[Rater202]

Today I learned about casu martzu cheese, the most dangerous cheese in the world. And I kinda regret learning about it but it was pretty interesting.

Rater, as the biggest cheese afficianado I'm aware of on these board, if you ever have the chance to have this cheese, I strongly recommend against.

Peelee, mia amiko, I won't eat hotdogs, mayonnaise, or meat off the bone.

Do you seriously think I'm gonna eat live maggots?

[Fyraltari]

Peelee, mia amiko, I won't eat hotdogs, mayonnaise, or meat off the bone.

Do you seriously think I'm gonna eat live maggots?

As a form of pre-emptive revenge, I think you might.

[Rater202]

As a form of pre-emptive revenge, I think you might.

Would you care to clarify this?

[Peelee]

Peelee, mia amiko, I won't eat hotdogs, mayonnaise, or meat off the bone.

Wait really? Even Hebrew National? Them's good hot dogs. And mayonnaise is (arguably) a mother sauce all its own, and is delightful in general. Especially for grilled cheeses. And as for meat on the bone, even putting aside how that tends to make meats taste better, that means you don't eat ribs? Ribs, man! Smoked low and slow for fourteen hours until they're so tender that the meat just falls off the bone, rubbed with the finest of sauces, and you're telling me this culinary creation of pure joy is a bridge too far?!

I think I might need my fainting couch.

[Fyraltari]

Would you care to clarify this?

Maggots will eat you in the end, probably.

[Rater202]

Wait really? Even Hebrew National? Them's good hot dogs. And mayonnaise is (arguably) a mother sauce all its own, and is delightful in general. Especially for grilled cheeses. And as for meat on the bone, even putting aside how that tends to make meats taste better, that means you don't eat ribs? Ribs, man! Smoked low and slow for fourteen hours until they're so tender that the meat just falls off the bone, rubbed with the finest of sauces, and you're telling me this culinary creation of pure joy is a bridge too far?!

I think I might need my fainting couch.

Let m tell you about the time I tried sushi.

Was a simple one, one of those cuts of tuna or salmon on a bed of sticky rice(don't remember which) and it was absolutely desliscous.

Physically could not make myself eat it. It tasted fine, but something about the texture... I literally tried to force myself to swallow it, I could not.

If something does not smell right, does not taste right, does not look right... I can't eat it.

Hot dogs? The smell. Mayonaise, texture and appearance. Both absolutely disgust me.

Meat on the bone... I don't actually know why, all I know is I can't.

I think it's got something to do with the autism but I'm not 100% sure.

[Peelee]

Let m tell you about the time I tried sushi.

Was a simple one, one of those cuts of tuna or salmon on a bed of sticky rice(don't remember which) and it was absolutely desliscous.

Physically could not make myself eat it. It tasted fine, but something about the texture... I literally tried to force myself to swallow it, I could not.

If something does not smell right, does not taste right, does not look right... I can't eat it.

Hot dogs? The smell. Mayonaise, texture and appearance. Both absolutely disgust me.

Meat on the bone... I don't actually know why, all I know is I can't.

I think it's got something to do with the autism but I'm not 100% sure.

You can't even eat sushi?! What a horrid thought.

Also,if it makes any difference, what you had was a sashimi. Many sushis have cooked fish, if the cured fish texture was the issue (can you eat smoked salmon? If not, it was the almost certainly the texture) you could probably still eat other types of rolls.