I do all I can to avoid ads on my devices and networks.

However, I sometimes have to use devices I don’t own. Or work-provided hardware I’m not permitted to install anything on. Or I can get exposed to ads if a friend shows me something on their phone, or if I’m in a classroom/work and someone wants to show a YouTube video as part of their presentation.

And even if I somehow managed to never get exposed to ads, it doesn’t mean ads don’t suck and I’m not allowed to complain about their existence. Additionally, sure uBlock, DNS, alternative front-ends and all other ad-blocking methods are simple enough for computer nerds on Lemmy, but the vast majority of people aren’t computer nerds. If I told my friends to “just get uBlock and a DNS-level filter”, half of them would look at me like an insane person. The vast majority of people who use computers have little to no understanding of how they work and can’t do much more than Facebook, YouTube, and email.

As a species when we’re divided we are arguably at our worst.

Agreed, but it’s ignorant (at best) to suggest that trans people are responsible for social division rather than the right-wing groups actively trying to eradicate trans people.

It’d be like blaming Jews for socially dividing Germany in the interwar era.

Trans people making everything about themselves? What the fuck are you talking about? I only ever hear about “trans issues” because of the right. Trans people just want the right to exist.

If you think the trans community trying to defend ourselves from constant attacks equates to “making everything about them”, you lack so much empathy that I honestly don’t even know where to start.

If your idea of leftism includes disregarding the ongoing genocide of oppressed minorities, I have to question what the hell do you think is “leftism”?

There are only two people who ever ask me for tech help. One is my father, who is decently tech-litterate for his age, helping him usually revolves around media piracy. I very occasionally lose patience with him because sometimes I’ll tell him to check something, he’ll say he did it, and I keep trying to figure out his issue only for him to realize half an hour later he didn’t actually check what I told him to.

The other is an older lady who used to be my neighbour, we became friends and still keep in touch since she moved. I absolutely adore helping her out, since it’s usually something silly that takes literally less than 30 seconds to figure out/fix. She’s always immensely appreciative and acts like I’m the smartest person in the goddamn world. It’s honestly a welcomed ego boost, plus it makes me feel great to see how genuinely thankful she is.

I think, especially with older generations, you really have to keep in mind how much the world has changed since they got here. My old neighbour didn’t have electricity or running water growing up, and now we expect her to understand GUIs, OSes, settings, accounts, networks…

I get much more upset when I see people around my age (late twenties to early thirties) who can’t understand the basic functions of a desktop operating system. I understand that not all of my generation were tech-obsessed kids/teens like myself, spending their free time figuring out stuff like upgrading from Vista to XP or partitioning the hard drive on the family PC to dual boot Linux distros, but you’d think they’d at least understand the basics of a filesystem and how to change settings.

Seriously, I’d take someone new to driving in snowy/icy conditions over someone who has a bunch of misplaced confidence in their driving skills because they’ve “been driving in worse than this for decades!” in a heartbeat.

The newbie is much more likely to actually adapt to the conditions and drive more cautiously.

Shit you must have massive glutes

The “left”, insofar as it seeks to limit speech, usually tries to limit hate speech towards minority and oppressed groups.

The “right” usually limits speech to restrict the voices of those same minority and oppressed groups. Equating the two is absurd at best.

I’m a barista, coffee houses were a relatively new thing in 1700. People from the Middle East and East Africa would probably understand “I make coffee”, and maybe some very trendy Europeans as well (Wikipedia says the first coffee house in Europe opened in 1645 in Austria.)

If they weren’t familiar with coffee, I’d say I make a beverage with the opposite properties of beer. It’s hot and perks you up where beer is cold and dulls your senses.

(Random thought: how did beer refrigeration work pre-industrial revolution? Were our ancestors chugging lukewarm beer?)

This is a great comparison for people who are aware of racial issues but aren’t as informed about LGBTQ+ stuff, I’ll definitely keep it in mind!

Most queer people I know and have talked to agree with you. I certainly do, labels can be useful but as a society we clearly focus way too much on them.

Where queer people might take issue with your comment (I’m definitely lightly irked) is that cishet people never say “I wish we would stop focusing on labels” unless the discussion is about queer labels.

People will straight up say “omg we need to chill out about labels, we’re all the same” then turn around and say shit like “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” or “boys will be boys”.

I smoke weed every day. Casual marijuana consumption is definitely socially acceptable here (I’m in Canada where it’s legal) but I’ve been high more often than not for the past 8 years or so.