> I was completely flabbergasted because, to me, discussing "What questions did you have?" was always part of the collaboration between students
When I was a student, professors maintained a public archive of past exams. The reason was obvious: next time the questions would be different, and memorizing past answers wouldn't help you if you don't understand the core ideas being taught. Then I took part in an exchange program and went to some shit-tier uni and I realized that collaboration was explicitly forbidden because professors would usually ask questions along "what was on slide 54". My favorite part was when professor said "I can't publish the slides online because they're stolen from another professor but you can buy them in the faculcy's shop".
My uni maintained a giant presence on Facebook - we'd share a lot of information, and the most popular group was "easy courses" for students who wanted to graduate but couldn't afford a difficult elective course.
The exchange uni had none of that. Literally no community, no collaboration, nothing. It's astonishing.
BTW regarding the stream of consciousness - I distinctly remember taking an exam and doing my best to force my brain to think about the exam questions, rather than porn I had been watching the previous day.
It was also very smart of them to send their citizens to US universities and companies and exfiltrate research and IP to grow their own tech industry...
The problem is that most businesses used to be local. This naturally limited competition and gave your business a chance, even if it sucked. Nowadays the competition is global.
People don't really care to address that most of the mom and pop businesses that went out of business because Walmart/Amazon weren't offering better products or services. They got their products through the same retail suppliers, just at higher costs and the variety of choices was much lower. They also had much less generous return policies.
There's a personal touch that people opine for but I think that's rose colored glasses. I remember some local retailers where I liked the owners but more often they weren't anything special and sometimes they were downright unpleasant.
The thing I like about Amazon is that I can get my shopping done quickly at home then I can go socialize with people I choose to.
This is just an example if retail but I think it applies to most industries that people think have been decimated by big companies displacing local companies. The whole attitude reminds me a lot of the whole "Make America Great Again" idea. Opininig for a past that never really existed.
> People don't really care to address that most of the mom and pop businesses that went out of business because Walmart/Amazon weren't offering better products or services.
In a local mom and pop store, the mom and pop owned the store and were invested in the community, Their money was spent back in the same place it came from. They had a personal stake in their reputation and knew the customers, and the customers knew them. This is how a community operates. You are thinking about it as a dry 'products and services' offering, when it is much more than that. You don't live to buy products and services, you live to do other things, and a community fosters that part of your life. The 'spending money to get things you need or want' part is to facilitate the rest of your life, not the other way around.
> They also had much less generous return policies.
Why is this an issue? People who consistently rely on generous return policies are either buying shoddy goods or abusing it at the cost of everyone else. Figure out what you want before you buy it and then it won't be a problem.
Walmart employs a bunch of people in their stores and their profit margins (the money that leaves the community) are slim. That money is more than likely offset by their ability to offer lower prices than mom and pop places. Mom and pop places go out of business because they can't compete with economies of scale.
If Walmart was really extracting so much money from the communities they operate in, those communities would wither and the Walmart would eventually collapse as well. Walmarts rarely close.
> Why is this an issue?
Because customers prefer better service over worse service.
You're flipping the script on this criticism. Walmart offers better service (returns) and your saying it doesn't matter. Usually people argue that The mom and pop places offer better service but can't compete on price.
In the previous comment I was about to say it but then stopped myself: the same thing happened to human relations. Competition isn't local, it's global. In dating you aren't competing against the rest of your village, you're literally competing against the whole planet, because the cute girl you see at the office can get a Tinder match from a guy in Australia and there's nothing you can do about it. Similar thing happened to friends - why would you be friends with your neighbor if instead you can be friends with a guy who lives one hour away one way but he's more fun.
Obviously, it's great to be on the winning side and bad on the losing side. If you're rich and charming then globalization has zero downsides for you. If you're not, well, welcome to capitalism.
> Europe cant afford to have enemies on both sides
Neither can the US. Imagine Europe supporting China in exchange for China backstabbing Russia - entire Ukraine and Belarus and maybe even Kaliningrad suddenly are up for grabs for EU while China gets Russian territories that it has historical claims to. Then China gets access to European technology (ASML and Airbus) which means that the US stops having massive technological advantage and suddenly the conquest of Taiwan starts being more realistic. China and Europe are too far away physically to come in direct conflict, especially as EU doesn't care about being a superpower.
This is unimaginable right now, but the more EU decouples from the US because of its unreliability, the more it might actually work out.
No one wants Kaliningrad now because it's 100% Russian. Annexing it means adding a Russian fifth column to your country.
I'm surprised by this, but my general opposition to ethnic cleansing has been weakened by understanding how Russia uses Russian migration to subvert nations from within. Transnistria, an independent Russian dominated portion of Moldava, exists entirely because Russians moved there in large numbers with the support of the Russian government to give them an ethnic wedge. Were I in charge in Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Poland or the Baltics, I would seriously consider expelling all ethnic Russians.
No I didn't. Nuclear missles are only relevant when the existence of the country itself is at stake. But when the war is at the edges of the country, then losing territory is preferable over nuclear war.
Think about it - in case shit hits the fan, would you rather cede some territory like Alaska or Guam, or would you start nuclear war which results in complete annihilation of all major US cities?
This framing is exactly what led to the election of Trump in the first place. You're asking for empathy from people who already have too much shit of their own. You'll be much more successful if you manage to explain why current actions of ICE are bad for everyone, not only Latinos.
This is not what OP said, at all. OP doesn't have to explain anything, or be "successful" explaining to you what the world is watching unfold in horror.
It is factually and correctly stated that any non-white, non-100%-perfectly-English-speaking person is a suspect in ICE views, detainable with no recourse. They said it themselves, the administration said that themselves, and there's ample evidence online of them enjoying doing it.
It is why people like me, who have legal status and business to conduct in USA are not gonna risk detention and deportation while ICE/DHS is operating. I'm Italian, my name is of Spanish origin, and I lived most of my life in Brazil so my accent is Brazilian. I have zero odds of convincing and ICE agent my passport isn't fake.
So, I'm out of going to Vegas, or doing talks, or anything else I have enjoyed doing in the USA in the past.
The answer is obvious: abandon civilisation, join the Amish. Big Tech cannot ruin your life if you simply don't participate in the capitalistic market. I mean sure, it's difficult to live completely off-grid, but in modern world, it's a long way before you starve to death.
What I'm saying is, I have a cozy bullshit job that gives me the perspective of someday not being in the working class anymore. But if that wasn't the case, I'd 100% fuck that and look for alternative lifestyles.
> Big Tech cannot ruin your life if you simply don't participate in the capitalistic market. I mean sure, it's difficult to live completely off-grid, but in modern world, it's a long way before you starve to death.
You still have to pay taxes, and doing this means giving up on a lot of your existing human connection, joining a community in no small part comprised of crackpots, tanking your quality of life, and losing your influence over the future of broader society.
Furthermore, it's a personal solution to a systemic problem. It'll work for a few people, but it's not a fix.
"Bro I can't wait to go back to being an UberEats delivery driver without any insurance living below minimum wage working all day every single day just to afford to rent half a room and small instant ramen"
When I was a student, professors maintained a public archive of past exams. The reason was obvious: next time the questions would be different, and memorizing past answers wouldn't help you if you don't understand the core ideas being taught. Then I took part in an exchange program and went to some shit-tier uni and I realized that collaboration was explicitly forbidden because professors would usually ask questions along "what was on slide 54". My favorite part was when professor said "I can't publish the slides online because they're stolen from another professor but you can buy them in the faculcy's shop".
My uni maintained a giant presence on Facebook - we'd share a lot of information, and the most popular group was "easy courses" for students who wanted to graduate but couldn't afford a difficult elective course.
The exchange uni had none of that. Literally no community, no collaboration, nothing. It's astonishing.
BTW regarding the stream of consciousness - I distinctly remember taking an exam and doing my best to force my brain to think about the exam questions, rather than porn I had been watching the previous day.
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