Ironhold

Bumping - Got to checking the church website for some older Conference talks, and found that they have video of individual Conference talks going back to 1971. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/1971/04/love-of-the-right?lang=eng Curious now as to what audio or video recordings the church has managed to preserve in a state that they can be uploaded later on.

Or we have the situation that's unfolding here in Texas. Black teen stabs a white teen to death at a sports event. Crowdfunding campaign goes up so that the black teen can afford lawyers. His family instead uses it to purchase a Cadillac and a mansion, with the teen himself in public in a suit. Meanwhile, the family of the white teen has been SWAT'd *twice*. Folks are boiling, and not just in Texas.

It's also the whole "the powers that be say it must be done on this schedule, so it will be done on this schedule" mindset coupled with the often inferior quality of products they have access to and the lack of training & education that many of their laborers have. They can build massive highways and entire cities in short order, only for those places to either go unused because the powers-that-be misread the population movement trends or crumble around everyone because they were churned out too fast for the materials to properly set up.

To put it bluntly, the minute that Biden pardoned Fauci and several other individuals was the moment that the lab leak hypothesis and the truth about how dangerous the Covid vaccines were was functionally confirmed. I've been seeing people argue that Trump should end-run around those pardons and start holding hearings to determine who knew what when and if the government is guilty of both lying to & poisoning the public. As it is, the fact that the government basically lied to us about the Covid vaccines helped fuel the anti-vaccination paranoia that led to the measles outbreak here in Texas.

The big issue with much of modern entertainment, not just Trek, is that today's writers all too often don't have the deft touch that past generations of writers had. Look at TOS, TNG, and DS9. They understood when to make a point and when to just let the audience enjoy their space adventure. Same thing with the original Twilight Zone, classic Doctor Who, and so many other shows from back in the day. Now consider today's entertainment. Not only is the "message" front and center, it's about as subtle as a daisy cutter and typically delivered with far less precision. For example, this past Tuesday's episode of "FBI" ended with a female character boldly and disgustedly declaring that "incels" could simply choose to get over themselves & change, never mind the fact that a lot of people who that slur could be applied to are in fact dealing with mental health issues, social isolation, "othering", or other matters that are beyond their control to some degree and that their personal life is a mess despite their best efforts. Right now, audiences are voting with their wallets. This is how films like "Minecraft", "A Working Man", and "King of Kings" are making bank while Hollywood darlings like "Snow White" are roadkill, or why we have indie comic crowdfunding campaigns clearing $100K but mainstream comics helmed by brand-name characters are only clearing a fraction of that. People are sick of what's coming out, but the mainstream industry is absolutely refusing to learn why.

We get a new branch presidency / bishopric. They realize I haven't spoken in a while. I get assigned to speak. They remember *why* I haven't spoken in a while. They quietly decide not to call me again. We get a new branch presidency / bishopric. The ride continues.

There's a chance of rain starting tonight and going until Sunday afternoon. We actually *need* the rain, as we're in severe drought and the amount of rain we could get this weekend will go a long way to helping alleviate it.

There's a level of extreme paranoia in place. Some people are afraid that we've changed things up. Others are afraid that if people see we *didn't* change things up their flocks will realize we're not what they've been telling everyone we are.

Yeah, the only new mass release this weekend is "Sinners", about twin brothers from opposite sides of the law going back home and discovering that the place has been taken over by a cult. Fortunately, "The Amateur" is also being held over locally so I have that as an alternative to do for review.

"Sometimes, the easiest way to destroy someone is to just let them keep talking." - bit of internet advice. A lot of these "hate" groups and such were so very public in their actions through social media that it allowed everyone from local residents to watchdog groups to law enforcement the ability to see what they were doing and make plans accordingly. For example, at one point there were multiple channels on YouTube dedicated to cataloging the actions of these groups for the sake of providing information to the public about their activities. The crackdowns against these groups very often also snagged the watchdog groups and others who were trying to track & investigate them, and in general made it difficult for even law enforcement to continue tracking them. So as much as we might not like what Elon and others did by opening social media back up, it's actually allowed a greater level of surveillance and scrutiny while helping to remove the "forbidden fruit" aspects.

Check your local movie theaters. I just tried checking the site for my local multiplex. It was sluggish to load, as if they were still in the process of updating everything, but it seems that "King of Kings" is getting a second weekend.

I've seen individual observers suggest that Trump himself doesn't expect to survive long enough to finish his term, and in fact there's a popular internet meme claiming that Trump has only made it thus far because he's being protected from the other side by the late Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe. As it is, you've got to wonder what the events of the last 5+ years have done to Trump mentally.

OK. I saw it yesterday. From a Bible standpoint, it's basically the Cliffs Notes (C) version of the Gospels, which isn't surprising as it's meant to be a one-off family-accessible movie. From a movie standpoint, it's a masterpiece of voice acting and cinematography, which Hollywood should feel really bad about as it's putting a lot of their recent live-action releases to shame in that regards.

The college I was going to for graduate school was a branch campus of a larger network of colleges. As a result, many of my classes were actually virtual classes taught by professors located at one of the larger facilities. Well, one of my finance professors wanted us to do all of our homework and tests through a particular online portal operated by the publisher of the textbook. Given that I wasn't making a whole lot, I was buying my textbooks used. The professor was assuming that we were all buying our books new. Because he assumed that we were all buying brand-new textbooks, he neglected to inform us that each book when purchased new had an individualized access code that we would *specifically* need in order to access the *specific* content he was using for the course as we needed to use that code to register ourselves individually and get directed accordingly. It took several weeks and multiple e-mails - including a few to my academic advisor - for me to actually get through to him and explain to him that because I purchased my textbook used I didn't have that code and so didn't have access to the specific content. By this time, we were deep enough into the semester that if I tried to withdraw from the class it'd have been an automatic F under the college policy. Fortunately for me I'd made enough noise via my advisor that some of the upper echelon realized I was about to get messed over through no fault of my own and brought some thunder down upon that professor. This led to the college officials offering me a deal: I would get an "incomplete" for the class, a code they use to indicate situations where a person is forced to withdraw through no fault of their own and so shouldn't receive any sort of academic punishment provided they retake the course within a designated amount of time. They had already lined up a professor to teach that class in person at the branch campus the next semester, and so they would guarantee me a slot in his class. PS, that textbook and the online portal were about to go bye-bye for good. Problem is, that "incomplete" put me below the minimum threshold of credit hours needed in order to receive the aid, and because the system was automated nobody bothered to actually check to see if the appropriate exemption I should have gotten was put through. Well, it wasn't, and so by the time the financial aid department got the official notice from the computer that I no longer qualified for aid, it was too late for me to reapply or petition for reinstatement. I was thus stuck paying out of pocket for an entire academic year.

Oh that was pretty miserable at times too, but for far different reasons. ...Like how I had to pay for an entire year of B-school *completely out of pocket* because of a snafu on the part of the college's financial aid department which I wasn't notified about until it was too late for me to appeal it. That wasn't cheap, and I was paying for it on the wages I was making delivering newspapers.

When I was in high school I was half feral due to the combination of undiagnosed mental health issues and what was, for all intents and purposes, neglect. I only had a few friends, and they were all outcasts like me. Yet somehow, in spite of everything, it was still expected that I be the best at everything *and* follow perfectly in whatever plans were laid out for me. To this day I question if anyone other than the family cat we had at the time would have shed tears over me. This is why I loathed the movie so much, as even when I was at my lowest I still wouldn't have done what Evan did, nor would I have tried to use it as an excuse to justify anything. And yeah, he rather skated after everything he did when by all rights there should have been some sort of redemption arc in which he had to *earn* the goodwill of the community again after his lie was exposed.

Saw the movie version for review, and TBH I loathed every moment of it. My big thing is that Evan suffered no true negative consequences for his deception even though what he did was heinous and possibly even illegal since he used it to fundraise.

This Friday, there is going to be a new movie in theaters called "King of Kings". It's an animated faith-based movie in which a fictionalized version of Charles Dickens tells his son the story of Jesus. Check your local theaters to see if it's going to show up, as faith-based movies of this nature often don't last very long outside of major cities and/or massive multiplex facilities.

That's my point.

There's a song out there called "You're Gonna Go Far Kid" by The Offspring. It opens with the line "Show me how to lie / you're getting better all the time / and turning all against the one / is an art that's hard to teach" and goes from there; note that the version you hear on the radio is actually censored for airplay. I've tried to play that song for people, or at least show them the lyrics, as a way of explaining to them that years of having to deal *with* manipulative people & what I've learned about how to turn things around on them has basically trained me to do very horrible things to people. I can destroy someone through words alone, and back during the bad old days of the internet when people would come for my scalp just for being a member of the church I would do just that; I could actually tell when someone's sanity was on the verge of cracking and whether or not pressing my counter-attack would do the job. It's from this experience that I know how things are done, which is why I'm trying to warn people about how it can happen to them.

Whenever you're mocked like this, write it down in a notebook that you keep on your person for safety. Note who said it, what they said, when it was said, and if there are any witnesses who can confirm. Here in the United States we have a concept called "Hostile Work Environment", wherein the words and actions of individuals make the job site toxic and unsafe for people who are members of various protected groups... which include religious minorities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hostile_work_environment Given how uptight the UK is compared to the US, you more than likely have some form of "Hostile Work Environment" regulations in place. If the company you work for doesn't have a human resources department, then look up your country's version of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. EEOC claims and the like do tend to burn bridges, but if these people are smarting off to you to their face they'd gladly do the same to others. Sometimes the only way they'll learn is if they face consequences. A good lawyer will likely be able to advise you on how to proceed under UK law, so it might be worth a few quid for a consultation.

It's not much better than littering leaving hate literature lying around in your wake as you go shopping. If you do, truly, really want to share the gospel, you first must be living your life in such a fashion that your life *is* a part of your testimony. This is because once people so much as come to suspect that you're a member, everything you say and do will be under scrutiny. You need to make it so that there's as little to hold against you as possible. That being said, you also need to understand discretion. There's a time and place to bring the church up in a conversation, and knowing the difference can make or break your efforts to talk to a person about it.

Remember, between my MBA training and what I got from the School of Hard Knocks I have a de facto minor in psychological warfare, with an emphasis on how to determine points of failure within a system. I was essentially trained to do the kind of thing he was warning about. That's why I'm doing what I can to warn people without coming off as the Boy Who Cried Wolf. As it is, a *lot* of people who identify as "educated", "woke", and "progressive" have chosen to ignore me because what I'm trying to tell them would force them to engage in the kind of self-reflection that by definition they feel they aren't required to do.

Organizers? The modern Antifa movement is shot through with anarcho-communists who believe that violence is an inevitable part of the "revolution" that will destroy capitalism and so they use that as an excuse to be violent. They fail to understand that their decision to engage in violence in order to suppress and destroy alternate viewpoints and those who express them makes them the fascists by default. One of the fastest ways to get an anarcho-capitalist screaming at you is to confuse them with an anarcho-communist, as anarcho-capitalists and anarcho-communists *hate* each other despite both being anarchists at heart. There's also no love lost between the anarcho-pacifists and the anarcho-communists.

Already seeing at least one individual on social media bringing the fire and brimstone because one of the speakers said missions were essentially a commandment. The person in question was calling anyone who didn't serve wicked, sinful, slothful, and the like, then started trolling anyone who called them out over the matter or noted that there are in fact valid reasons why some members might not be comfortable with wearing a name tag (such as being neurodivergent to the point that they'd struggle to function in a formal mission environment). I have a very bad feeling that this talk is going to be weaponized and do a lot of damage accordingly.