NeuroTypical

Cameras and air time. Push outrage. That wins votes (allegedly). Same notion behind this fun one: Orange Man.

Politics 101: When you're not in power, you resist the person in power. Whatever they're for, you're against. Your job as elected official is to get re-elected and gain power back, and that requires votes. Sparking outrage is a way to gain votes, so the Dems are sparkin' away. Nothing unique to Dems going on here. It's just that Dems are still reeling from their historic unexpected loss to Trump, still being mostly clueless as to why they lost, are falling back on the habits of all politicians - when in doubt, resist. - Don't stand when Trump parades his people in front of the nation during his joint session of congress. - Complain about DOGE and stoke fear that old people will stop getting their monthly check. - Break the filibuster record for no real reason other than to grab a news cycle away from Orange Man. - Push the notion that OM is growing in authoritarianism and destroying our country by finding the best story you can in opposition of each of OM's agenda items. When it comes to deporting illegals, the best they can find is [checks notes] MS13 gang member illegally in the nation for a decade, but we've got a photo of him looking friendly with a kid, so we can spin it based on that picture.

I have a 20's kiddo, who just started working on her 401k within the last 5 years. We had a talk about how this drop is probably the best thing that could possibly happen to her, and if the market dropped another 50% it would be the most absolute best thing ever. Because as she continues to contribute over the next 5 years, she'll be buying more shares for cheaper with the same contributions. If the market had stayed high, she would be buying fewer more expensive shares with each contribution. Everyone in their 20's, 30's, even 40's who is saving for retirement should jump for joy at any market correction that lowers the price of the shares they're still buying. (Not understanding this is a common misconception. I picked it up somewhere along the path to my finance degree.) Trump seems unconcerned with convincing random Americans about how rigorous the due process has been. It's not a good look, I agree. That said, there is zero amount of evidence/proof that ICE could release that would possibly convince the left that -enough- due process had been given. If tomorrow, Trump declassified all the court records and evidence, and it was good, the narrative would simply shift to how Trump is a liar and ICE is evil and you can't believe anything either of them say. Like the anti-DOGE narrative, full of people who refuse to go to doge.gov and look at the giant wall of receipts.

Honestly, I'm of the same mind here. Trump is an interesting conglomeration of stuff I support and stuff that worries the crap out of me. I'm concerned about 3 of the 5 constitutional crises he's given us in the last week. Nah, no valid point there. There's nothing conflicting about exceptionalism AND strong borders. Or exceptionalism AND choosing to not let our enemies in to defend and advance the agendas of brutal murderous evil Hamas. Ouch - right in the Christianity! That phrase "the least" is big. What we do to the least of us, we do to Christ. But if we're going to look at who truly is "the least", I would be looking at the victims of those horrible people we pulled out of our prisons and sent to El Salvador. "The least" include our poorest and least advantaged citizens that have had to fight harder for resources after Biden let in 11 million illegal immigrants. Dealing with "the least" of those immigrants demands strong walls, wide gates, and reasonable laws that balance our charitable nature as a free and rich people, and our ability to remain a cohesive free rich nation. Here's a claim: The more you read about the history of human migration, the less deeply ashamed you'll be. If you're gonna toss a cheap shot, at least make sure it hits. This is my 401k as of today: I'm up 8% over the last 12 months, and 13% average for the last 3 years. My basket is similar to most working American's baskets. I'm not doing anything special. Heh - where were your potshots in 2023, or 2020, or 2019, when the market went down in similar amounts?

In 2024, we had 17.25M members. Today we have 17.51M members. 1.2% increase. We're not losing members, we gained 250,000 members in the last year. It is true that our yearly growth numbers continue to slow, but that's true for global population rates as well. 2025 saw only a .9% increase in humans, so we're growing at a faster pace than humanity in general. So yeah, Gator is right that almost all religions are declining in membership. Across the board. But not the Latter-day Saints - we continue to grow. I think most of it is growth across the world and not in the US. Probably why way over half of the announced temples are not in the US.

Well, we can't arrest any American anti-IDF protesters. Free speech and all. That's the valid analogy. But we can arrest and deport any illegals in those protests, and revoke the visas of anyone here legally who participates in them. Any guesses what happens to Americans who go visit, say, Japan or Germany, and decide to participate in protests against the policies of those countries? Any guesses what happens when you do it in China or Mexico or Chile or Russia or North Korea or Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia?

I keep seeing that phrase. Dude is an illegal immigrant citizen of El Salvador who crossed the border illegally in 2011, arrested in 2019 and detained by ICE. He then applied for asylum. A confidential informant pegged him as an MS13 member out of New York. An immigration judge denied his asylum request but did grant protection from being deported back to El Salvador. He's not a "Maryland man", he's an illegal immigrant from El Salvador who was denied asylum, but a judge said "we won't send you back to El Salvador". Calling him "Maryland man" looks an awful lot like a blatant attempt to manipulate the narrative with a falsehood. (I'm not accusing you @Phoenix_person, I'm guessing you're like me, a target of the attempt to manipulate. https://apnews.com/article/trump-deportation-salvador-maryland-abrego-garcia-7b17b702b77a24d92a28dd4be5755fdd Both sides are pushing him into the spotlight. Folks mad at Trump paint him as a family man trying to do good in America. Trump and ICE paint him as an MS13 gang member, foreign terrorist, who engaged in human trafficking, who is here illegally. And we're deporting such people as quickly as we can find them. One side is headlining a pic of him holding his kid looking like a dad. The other side (Trump and ICE) seem totally uninterested in presenting evidence to the American public to substantiate their claims. When it comes to swaying public opinion, Trump is losing. "Trust me bro" isn't selling well. But as of yesterday, the president of El Salvador is refusing to give him back. So what's left to talk about?

Nice. I saw a TikTok the other day: Guy said "I don't want to be rich, I just want to be able to pass by a sofa on the side of the road and not think "should I?" I really resonated with that comment. I'm a member of our ward's Relief Society facebook page, because the wives are so good at giving away their hubby's stuff! The used air compressor got a 2nd life with us for a full decade. Same with an entire home sound system, a sofa set, various tables and bookcases, and more than one TV. Probably my most fun story: We saw someone giving away a king-size bed /w frame. We drove into the richest area I think I've ever seen in my life, other than the palace at Versailles when I went to Europe. The guard at the gate buzzed the house we were directed to, got approval for us to enter. Marble driveway, IIRC. It was 9am and the lady had already started drinking for the day. She gave us a tour of her massive house and all the fancy stuff in it. Then apologized for the sorry state of the 1 year old bed, apparently it was dusty because they rarely used that particular guest bedroom. As we were loading it up, her neighbor showed up, even drunker than she was. Apparently we were quite the spectacle in the neighborhood, being neither idle rich nor hired staff. As I was bending over and grunting away at loading the mattress, I heard the dude slur out the words "oh, he works out". I can count the number of times someone has commented about my posterior on one hand, and that's still my favorite.

I think the traditional ways folks unrighteously judge each other's wealth, is largely appearance based. If you live in an area perceived as a "rich area" (usually defined as nicer/bigger homes than yours, or more land). Or if you drive a car perceived to be expensive. Or if you flash wealth in the form of 'nice' or 'spendy' clothing or jewelry. Throughout human history there is usually a thriving industry of things you can buy to make you look richer than you actually are. Beware, there is usually some sort of social penalty applied to those who are found out to be 'posing' and trying to make people think you have a level of wealth you don't actually have. So, it's less "how they know", and more "how they perceive". And yes, it goes in both directions. I've been a fan of thrift stores my whole life. I was confused at reactions from some of my co-workers when I found a nice leather bag at a goodwill for $12.99. After several comments, I looked up the brand and model and discovered it sold new for hundreds of dollars. They were looking at me like maybe they were needing to re-evaluate me in some way. Like my clothes and car didn't match my bag, and I was a question they needed to solve before they knew how to properly think about me. 15 years later I'm on the same bag, and nobody looks at me like that any more.

Yeah, I'm not a fan of class warfare. Whether it's folks with more judging those with less, or folks with less judging those with more. Like any demographic, you can find good'uns and bad'uns in both places. When I seek for worthy principles, "other than bare minimum safety nets to preserve life, keep the federal government out of the poverty business" has seemed like a worthy principle. States can do what they want, and I'll either be happy with it or not.

We're supposed to impart our substance and ease the sufferings of the poor and needy. But when we assign those tasks to the govt to do things for us, that's when lucifer enters the chat. Here's a list of things being done by govt in the name of helping the poor and needy. Please tell me how many of them you support: - "Safe injection sites", where drug addicted folk can get government aid in taking their illegal substances. - Taxpayer subsidized abortion on demand. - Subsidizing single motherhood which encourages absent fathers, and has all but succeeded in America's black communities. - Taxpayer funded gender-affirming care for trans people.

Those kind of jobs are unpleasant-no one says “I want to wait tables and clean garbage cans when I grow up.” But they teach valuable lessons. You work hard to get out of them so you don’t have to live your life working terrible jobs! The emptying garbage job was my first job during high school. 17 yrs old and earning minimum wage of $3.05/hour! Small family-owned store, with endless family drama and unfairness. I worked my way up from garbage to chocolate clean-up, to making the chocolate. By the time I graduated college, I was running the production department. That sounds more impressive than it was. I was making barely $20k/yr. It had much unpleasantness to it, mostly the boss and his kids. But like @LDSGator said, I learned a crapton of valuable lessons. Plus, I earned enough to pay for half of college while living at home.

I emptied garbage cans at a candy store and then started making chocolates to pay for about half of college. The other half was pell grants.

Yes indeed - that was my story. After High School, it's like all those horrible people just disappeared out of my life permanently, and I was suddenly surrounded by a smarter higher caliber of human, and the 'rule of the jungle/survival of the fittest' crap seemed to be a thing of the past. In the decades since, I've reached out to two people to apologize for my bad behavior towards them. Both gave versions of "don't sweat it, we were all dumb back then". I remember trudging through high school hoping "I sure hope all these morons finally outgrow all of this evil stupidity." I know I did. I'm always amazed to hear statistics about how a large number of people just go on to live their lives in the same area, sometimes the same house, as they grew up. I couldn't wait to get the crap out of Dodge.

plus ?

Sheesh. Never heard of DEH, so I read the plot on wiki. Didn't expect to get transported back to the traumas of middle-school. I was not an impressive child by anyone's standards for various reasons. Maybe 15 years out of that crap, I learned that one of the kids who used to torment me was dead. Looking into the comments folks were making, I was surprised to learn dude apparently led a tormented and troubled life. It was a bit of an eye opener into something I've since learned from a lot of different sources - it all tends to roll downhill. Tormentors/bullies/abusers tend to have learned it from somewhere. The cycle repeats itself until someone stops it. Not sure if this guy had an active role in his death or not, but just reading between the lines I'd have to say the odds are probably yes. Reading this thread got me interested enough to google up another demon from my past. In 30 seconds I think I found the guy. He apparently still lives close to where we went to school. Running a gofundme for himself to pay legal bills due to a messy divorce, he talks much smack about his ex and apparently doesn't get to see his kids any more. A public comment from 2018 on his mylife.com profile says "He is a psychopath who ruined my life. He stalked me and held me hostage." Dang. Even with 40 years of distance and 25 years of actively trying to follow Christ's commandment to love my neighbor and forgive my enemy, it was more of a stretch than I'm comfortable admitting. But I got there. I'm sad to hear the evil demon 14 year old who caused me so much pain and fear might not have grown out of it like the rest of us. I hope his kids are ok, and whatever made him that way didn't get passed on to them. I think I'll probably skip experiencing DEH in play or movie. I'm not a fan of looking back into the darkness unless there's a good reason.

You seem to mistake what a liberal is. A liberal is not necessarily a Far left communist It looks like we're having a bit of a language issue. Here's my take on what reality looks like: On the scale of left-of-center political thought, you have the following, listed from least extreme to most extreme: Center-left folks Democrats Liberals (not the classical liberal, but the self-proclaimed liberals of the last 30 years) Progressives Leftists Fascists There can be a lot of overlap with the first 4, as you can find both liberals and progressives in the Democrat party. Socialist thought is sprinkled throughout, growing in importance and extreme as you go down the list. None of them want to think about how Fascist is the most extreme form of leftist thought, the natural extension of socialism/communism/marxism, but it is. Leftists might claim to be anarchists or ANTIFA, the 'occupy democrats' tend to be leftist. They tend to be more radical, more extreme, more prone to organizing. I've had several leftists (including Mr. PhoenixPerson who occasionally stops by this board) state quite openly that they are NOT the same as dems/libs/progressives. Leftists, for example, often loathe Hilary Clinton and think AOC is a misguided twit. So, when you say: I have to disagree strongly. We can argue about whether He'd support the tax-and-spend policies of Democrats or liberals. We can argue about whether He'd support progressive causes like open borders or using government power to make healthcare and education free. But no, there's really no serious argument to be made that he would be a leftist. Anyway, that's the color of the sky in my world. Your sky color may differ.

I'm interested - why come to an anonymous chat room looking for answers? What are you looking for from us? Is it validation for your hurt? Is it an excuse to get divorced? Are you looking for hope for your marriage? I get that you're reeling and lost. I'm not challenging or demanding answers or criticizing, I'm asking you to reflect on my questions and tell us what you're actually looking for. You might not know. I'd suggest that answering those questions is worth your time. Do you want to stay married or not? (not a gotcha question, a genuine question) You are hardly alone here. I've heard countless stories from countless people who's spouses have done such things. You might do well to consider a bit of counseling and maybe some group support in an LDS setting. You're not alone.

That comment is SOOOO 5 hours ago. Yep, you called it. 👍

I work in the high tech industry where I walk past an inspiring wall of patents on my way to my desk. We design chips, and that means you have to build a special thing for a million bucks that makes the chips, and the first time you try it, it fails, and you toss the million dollar thing in the trash and start again with a new one. Sometimes 2-3 times. We have competitors that pretty much all of their R&D spend consists of buying one of our things and trying to reverse-engineer it into something that probably doesn't work as well, but is way cheaper. Our proprietary stuff is bleeding edge fastest and bestest, but whatever got invented 5 years ago is somewhere between 20-50% as good and you can get them cheaply. Someone occasionally comes home from a visit to china with one of our products, except it isn't one of ours. They tend to look the same on the outside, same name, but the serial number will either be stolen or fake. On the inside it's like someone took a few boxes out of a Radio Shak dumpster and shook it around in the box until the pieces all fit. Anything that makes it harder for countries like China to do stuff like this, will absolutely help us sell more of our things. Because our customers won't be getting their stuff from wish.com and then getting mad at us when it doesn't work right.

Part of the Ham Fam here. I don't understand why folks don't see art in Hamilton. This didn't make it into the publicly released stuff, but the song where Angelica rips Hamilton a new one after he made his affair public? A top-tier masterful portrayal of the betrayed woman building up and releasing a volcano of smackdown. Second only to that one time I screwed up with my wife and she let me have it. There's absolutely an art in portraying betrayed feminine critical energy directed at a lover as a rap. I liked this song so much I memorized it, and in doing so understood women better.

I must have missed the chapters where Jesus sought to redefine gender, institutionalize radical theories of pronoun use, seek to destroy government institutions he considered systematically racist, and rejoice in cancel culture and the criminalization of raising your own children. I heard "render unto caesar" and thought I understood things pretty well. Or maybe you need to think a bit more on the definition of "leftist" and how it differs, sometimes violently, from "liberal" or "progressive".

Yep, the pregnancy rates in 'all female' prisons that allow transgender folks is hilariously tragic. The data is there, but I haven't seen it gathered together into a story yet. It's a good time for that story to come forth. In other news, two men defeated all the women and will compete against each other for a women's professional Pool championship title in the UK.

If you get there before I do, please put in a good word for me. Plenty of us sticking around could use a bit of help.

This TikTok kid with the blue hair is worth his weight in gold in historical analysis. This is one of the first things that has made sense to me. v14044g50000cvqhtm7og65mq024c3qg.MP4