Awhile ago, a user on r/casualuk posted a list of UK based stuff that was either free or cheap (food/entertainment/etc). They mirrored it in a few places and I bookmarked the github mirror. Doesn’t look like it’s been updated for a year or so though and I ain’t prepared to head to reddit to check the original.
It’s an isolationist policy. The US military doesn’t have military bases/presences across Europe (and elsewhere) out of the goodness of its heart or to protect Europe. They also do it because their military realises that its much, much better to have bases somewhere where they can strike an international enemy quickly from. It’s a militarily mutually beneficial arrangement.
So, the US would lose that early strike capability. They’d also lose all the intelligence benefits having people on the ground brings with it. Also, should it happen and Europe was successfully invaded, US businesses would either temporarily or permanently lose access to one of their biggest trade export blocs and a large amount of access to imports too.
Religion is not interchangeable with theism. Many people, including me, are religious whilst also being atheists. Depending on the source, religion can be defined as a supernatural based idea (god/gods) or (the way I see it) more like Emile Durkheim saw it “a unified system of beliefs and practices […] which unite into one single moral community called a church, all those who adhere to them.”
So, for me, religion gives me a sense of community, support and a structure to guide me. It doesn’t rule me and I don’t have to worship or pray to a supernatural being that doesn’t exist. So in my (biased) view, I get the good bits of religion without the shitty awful bits such as telling everyone only my religion is right, telling everyone what to do based on what I think and generally being an arsehole.
Most people like some type of community because we are, at bottom, social creatures. My own religion allows me to be both individualistic and also part of a community and I think a lot of people feel that their religion gives them that sense of community. A more worrying aspect of religion is theistic religion - worship of a supernatural being/beings - because that is irrational, which is not in itself a concern, but when whole societies are controlled via theism then people suffer.
GoT because I’d read the first two books and got bored of a medieval soap opera where the writer substitutes misery porn for a plot.
Breaking Bad because Bryan Cranston vaguely irritates me (I don’t know why, I’m sure he’s a lovely man).
Zombie related stuff because seriously, it was non-stop shit zombie movies for almost a decade and I’m bored of it. It’s just become another lazy trope. Exception: Zombieland.
Lots of people and countriesare claiming Russia is committing genocide and are investigating that possibility.
Several nations and legal institutions have also classed China’s actions against the Uyghur as genocidal.
However, as far as I’m aware neither Russia or China are signed up to the ICC so there’s not much point in using that body to penalise them.
Israel is though and your claim there’s no proof is literally true (in the sense you used the word ‘proof’) but there is plenty of evidence that Israel certainly has genocide very much in the forefront of their minds when members of the Israeli government suggest nuking Gaza, or creating ‘no go’ areas for Palestinians in recognised Palestinian areas that just so happen to be where Palestinian farmers grow and harvest food. Israeli historian of the Holocaust Omer Bartov warned that statements made by top Israeli officials “could easily be construed as indicating a genocidal intent.”
I’ll recommend (as I always do, being a satisfied customer) Filen - scroll down that page and you’ll see the 10gb free tier.
All you need is a working email - get an anonymous forwarder here or here. All the apps are open source, everything is E2EE, the website doesn’t track or fingerprint you and if you decide to upgrade to a paid acct, they accept Monero.
I’ve been using them for nearly 3 years now and never used (or even knew they offered) email support.
Not ideal they use GMail of course but they could be using private keys (as most business users do I believe) which means Google couldn’t see a thing anyway.
Unlike most, I don’t believe its possible (or even a very good idea) to ignore the news. What I do is limit my news source to two places a day, BBC and The Guardian which I know are not perfect but I believe they can be largely trusted. Other than that, I read the odd link on here but I won’t doom scroll.
I also do things that have a tangible effect for people who have it worse than me. Hands on in my immediate locality, and via donation nationally and/or internationally. I have a list of charities that I support and donate to two for 6 months then switch to another two and repeat. Doing this means that most importantly, people are helped in some small way and less importantly it offsets the shitness of life a bit. If I can feel a bit happy that I’m doing something, that’s a good thing.