Knightfox

@Knightfox@lemmy.one

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Knightfox, (edited )

… So was my great grandfather, but he was an old school Southern Democrat, he even voted straight ticket. I’d be willing to bet he wouldn’t be fond of modern Democrats.

People forget that the Democrats of the early 1900s aren’t the same as today. Remember that Republicans are the party of Lincoln, but I wouldn’t be surprised if modern Republicans wanted to bring back slavery.

Knightfox,

www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%…

It’s the same as the Shopping Cart theory. There are a few analogous theories, but they’re all the same. If you don’t return your grocery cart, pick up your pet’s poop, or hold your trash till you find a disposal then you’re an asshole.

Knightfox,

It’s as real as Kids requesting litter boxes in school because they identify as a furry, it’s just meme BS that a specific political group has latched on to and bitch about. It’s definitely not real.

Knightfox, (edited )

Until I joined Lemmy I would have agreed with you.

EDIT: Unless you are talking about the litterbox thing, I have heard this brought up as legitimate discussion before. I quickly squashed that conversation, but there are (stupid) people out there that believe it.

Knightfox, (edited )

While it’s true that it would be better for them in the long term, it’s also true that some people prefer convenience.

I have a coworker that pays the power company extra each month so that if her water heater dies they’ll replace it for her. Why the fuck does the power company offer this service and by the time she needs one she will have more than paid for one.

Lots of people don’t change their own oil in their cars, it’s easy and cheaper, but people don’t want to do it.

Coffee… that’s all I’m gonna say on that topic.

Renting is a service some people want, just like some people want to live in an HOA.

More people would probably buy a house if they could just pay the mortgage, similar to a rent to own setup, but that’s not an option available to most people.

Knightfox,

You are absolutely correct, but it still requires making calls, coordinating with a handyman, being available when they come by, etc. It’s the same logic for why some landlords hire property managers. If being a landlord is so easy you’d think they wouldn’t need to hire someone to specifically manage their properties.

Knightfox,

Yeah and I saw a recent post saying that roughly 66% of Millennials would like to buy if it were affordable for them.

Rental experiences all come down to the details, how expensive is it, what extra costs (can you have pets) and benefits (do you have laundry in the rental or is it a shared space), is public transportation more accessible, etc.

Back when I rented my washing machine broke and the rental company had a new one installed the same day, the bus route went right up to my building, and the Greenway trail was adjacent to the complex. They decided to increase rent by $100 so I looked at buying a house and found a condo I could afford. The condo was $300 cheaper (including the HOA fee) than the new rent, but the bus didn’t come to where my condo was, the Greenway trail was 10 min road biking away, and when the HOA decided we had to install new lights and doors I had to pay for that (luckily I was able to do the labor myself, but a lot of people couldn’t). Before I sold and moved the HOA was about to replace the roof on my building and we would have all had to pay out of pocket our portion (which equated to approximately 3.75x what I paid for the mortgage and HOA fee, so an extra 3.75 months worth of payments).

Also, a lot of places have more or less protections for renters which can impact things.

Knightfox,

Been a while since I was in school, but high school went from 8:00 am to 3:00 pm. The bus arrived at my house at 7:30 and dropped me off at 3:30.

The school day consisted of four 1.5 hour classes, we had three 10 min breaks between classes and a 30 min lunch.

Knightfox,

But Is he a good boss and is he a good person?

Knightfox, (edited )

You’re literally my parents. They were long term landlords, bought properties for nothing in the 90’s rented them for 20-30 years and then sold them. Most properties were long term rentals, people lived there for 5+ years, one lady had 6 kids in 10 years in one of their houses. Rents in their area are ~$1200-2000, my parents were still renting at $700 because the place was paid off and the people living there had been there for nearly a decade.

Side hustle landlords ain’t the enemy, it’s the corporate landlords that are the true problem. Unfortunately the people being oppressively fucked don’t see a difference and it’s hard to blame them.

Hope your side hustle works out for you and I hope you stay one of the good ones.

EDIT: My parents both have full time jobs, having rentals wasn’t a job for them. They rented to pay the mortgage and pay for upkeep. The long term plan for them was to sell the houses and retire, not live off rent for perpetuity. They rented the properties at a rate that allowed them to pay the mortgage off quickly and pay for landlord repairs (roof, HVAC, water heater, septic tank, etc).

Knightfox, (edited )

I wouldn’t put climate change as one of them. Having it be a specific point makes it seem like Climate change had a definitive start or end point. It’s just kinda floating in the background.

Depending on which end of millennials you are really impacts things as well. I would say events going from 1990 onward would count for older millennials, but you millennials might not count anything before 2005.

Knightfox,

It’s kinda always been there, just that the urgency has really ramped up in recent years. It went from scientists saying this is coming to the general populace screaming IT’S TOO LATE WE’RE FUCKED.

Knightfox,

You might like this video, youtu.be/LX3n4XIwHZo?si=9KC7upiLOFaR0ddN

At 8:50 the guy says that traditionally one person with a spear was roughly as good as two equally skilled persons with a sword.

Knightfox, (edited )

I don’t think that was his point. He’s simply saying that the benefit of reach and leverage makes it so that equally skilled and unarmored combatants would make it so you need 2 swordsmen to reliably fight a spearman.

That being the case doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t have multiple weapons for multiple circumstances, and it doesn’t mean that the appropriate armour wouldn’t impact it.

Finally, battlefield usage is a totally different situation as you have regiments with mixed skill levels.

I think the only thing he was trying to say is that if you have two guys with similar skill and fitness, unarmored, the guy with the spear has a large advantage.

Also, I think he’s a bit more than an Enthusiast. His resume is fairly impressive (www.matt-easton.co.uk/about).

Knightfox,

I’d like to propose a thought.

1.) God makes rules

2.) Following those rules is good

3.) Breaking those rules is evil

From the perspective of God the delineation between good and evil is a human perspective, not necessarily God’s.

A similar point of view would be if a person sets a rule for a child or maybe a pet. The person strictly enforces this rule, but openly breaks the rule because it does not apply to them. The child or pet meet feel that they are being treated unjustly and categorize breaking of the rules as being wrong. Making the child go to bed at bedtime or not allowing the pet to eat certain foods.

What many atheists do not understand is that human logic does not apply to God(s), just like the feelings of my dog wanting a slice of pizza do not apply to me.

Is God evil, probably, what is evil? What is good? Is God just? In application to others if you’re following Christian ideology he theoretically is in the long term, but in application to their self definitely not.

The biggest problem I have with Atheist logic is that if there is a god that it should follow human logic and because there is suffering and issues in the world there must be no god or that God isn’t worth following. If after life beliefs are correct do you think it matters if you took a moral high ground against an unfair god?

If you’re an atheist because you don’t believe there is a god then cool, but if you are an atheist because you think God should follow our rules idk what to say for you.

The same goes for religious people, you have to accept that God let’s bad things happen to you.

Knightfox,

Tell that to the self proclaimed atheists that use the morality of God as a reason why there is no god. To be clear I agree, but I’m tired of hearing the argument.

Knightfox,

Hey, that’s chill. I’m not trying to appeal to people to change their opinions on whether there is a god or not. I’m simply arguing that if what is said about god is true, then taking the moral high ground because you’re the better being doesn’t really mean anything.

“Hey what did you do that landed you up in eternal pain and suffering?”

“Oh, I’m just morally superior to the being that put me here.”

The same goes for religious people blaming the bad things in their life on anything other than the same all powerful being.

Knightfox,

I’m not trying to make an argument in support of religion or god, I’m making an argument that moral (subjective or objective) rationales do not validate or invalidate the existence of god. If god exists, then they do so whether you believe in them or not. If god exists and the supposed outcomes of not following their rules is true, then whatever judgements about them you have is irrelevant.

Is god evil because it allows bad things to happen? Yeah and so what? You can think god sucks and is unfair or unjust, be the better person and refuse to worship or believe all you want. If you don’t meet their magic requirements for the good ending then you get the bad ending no matter how much more moral you are.

I think that trying to have a philosophical debate about the morality or ethics of god(s) is asinine since if a god exists your objections to it have literally no value.

Knightfox,

IDK, I was going for the more extreme groups of religious groups. In some religious beliefs your belief in god has less effect on your post death outcome. Maybe in those you become a cat rather than burn in eternal pain for not believing in xyz god.

In high school I wrote a paper about the dichotomy of religious beliefs portrayed in Beowulf. My paper was about how the embracing of a new religion was personified by the acts of good being attributed to god, but the acts of evil were attributed to the non-biblical and villainous entities being portrayed by pagan representations. Essentially, as new cultures adopted Christianity they had a core issue in assigning blame to god for the ills in their lives so they were instead assigned it to something else that was still familiar (another cultural belief). This lead to a short period in which these peoples earnestly believed in both religious pantheons.

Knightfox,

Dude, you’re literally inventing shit. I never said that,

“that god can and will always be good and just simply because he may exist outside of any human measurement is absolute bullshit for all the reasons I listed above and more. The belief of god and the claim the god wills or controls every action and event can be tested.”

I’m making the statement that if you think that god doesn’t exist because god doesn’t meet your definition of good or moral, you’re missing the mark. If god exists they exists outside of whether you believe in them. If god exists and their power is what is attributed to them then your opinions, however morally well founded they may be, are completely worthless.

The idea that you can test god’s will or that god controls our every action cannot be tested unless you assume that god is a benevolent being. If god doesn’t care that you kill your neighbor as long as it doesn’t effect their long term plan then killing your neighbor doesn’t disprove there is a god.

If god turns out to be a 7th dimensional being playing around with a 3rd/4th dimensional ant farm, that can just destroy us in a snap then all your moral high ground is for shit. If god is real our relationship to it is the same as ants in an ant farm to the guy outside the glass wall. If they fry us with the magnifying glass it makes no difference if they are good, evil, just, unjust, right, or wrong.

If you don’t believe in god then cool. If you think god is unworthy of worship and belief then cool, but if so you’re not an atheist because you believe in god. If you believe in god, but think they are unworthy of worship you opinion doesn’t matter because you’re an ant in an antfarm. The lesson here is either stop believing in god or fucking shut up about it.

Knightfox,

Not really, the images and travel descriptions you’re reading here are the exception, not the rule. The US has great infrastructure, just not for public transportation as there isn’t enough centralized usage and the locations are far apart. It would take me 4 hours to go to work by bus, but it takes me 25 min by car.

Knightfox,

It is to a point, but when you reach that point it’s just not feasible to have public transportation. The city I work in has a light rail train, it has a robust busing system, but people also travel from 20+ different small towns around this one and at a certain point that system breaks down. If I were to take the bus I would still need a car to get to the next small town where the bus stop into the large town is.

The fact is that the most of the US isn’t designed like old world cities which were built with public transportation and foot traffic in mind.

Knightfox,

Infrastructure can apply to different things, you can have great infrastructure for cars, but not trains. You can have well maintained power lines, but poor internet connectivity. You can have a robust water utility, but a mixed storm and sewer system.

If you’re gonna point out one bad part of infrastructure and say all of it’s bad then idk what to say for you.

You can go from London to Edinburgh by car (412 miles) in 7.5 hrs or by train in 5.5 hrs.

You can go from Richmond to Charleston by car (432 miles) in 6 hours or by train in 13.25 hrs.

Knightfox,

I’ll direct you to another of my posts rather than having two going.

lemmy.one/comment/3795505

Knightfox,

It really depends on the nature of the rental and your area. If instead of building a house you build 4 closely stacked duplexes and charged each one double what the mortgage would be you’d definitely make money, but you’d also be an extortionate leech. In my area someone built 4 nice duplexes on a double lot (probably around 1.5 acres) and is now renting them at $1800 each. The land was probably less than $55k and the cost of construction was likely less than $1 mil. At 5% interest on a 30 year loan their monthly payment would be $5,600, but they’re bringing in $14,400 per month.

$1800 for rent is an extortionate price in my area (it’s big city apartment rental prices, with a pool and gym), even after interest rates went up.

On the other hand, I knew a couple who were landlords for nearly 20 years. They rarely raised the rents and even in 2022 they were still charging <$1000 per month for a full house because that paid the costs and for them it was an investment, not a source of income.

They finally sold their rental homes and made about $70k over what they originally paid on each house. Doing the math that comes out to be a roughly 8.5% annual percentage return without counting the rent gained each month. That’s a fairly solid investment without being a sucky person.

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