I used to be disgusted, and now I try to be amused.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by SEC_Chick

I am very sorry for your loss.

I have experienced pregnancy loss in several ways: a missed miscarriage after we had seen the heartbeat, an ectopic, one of the chicklets had a twin that we lost towards the end of the first trimester, and more early losses than I can even recall. Diagnosed with recurrent pregnancy loss. Support for those who have experienced pregnancy loss has become one of the primary charitable causes we support.

I didn't make it to my D&C with the missed miscarriage and that was without a doubt the worst day of my life.

Thank you. I'm also very sorry for your losses. It's awful to go through.

[Icky Thump]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Yes, what he said. Very sorry to hear this.

I am also so sorry for this.

[ferrets_bueller]

A comment on the Forsetti piece posted by Thurgreed.

There is far, far more truth in the article than most people realize. I qualify as a coastal elitist. I am the poster boy for coastal elites. Born in NYC suburbs, Ivy education, career in Washington.

Oddly, my closest lifelong friends are the thirty or so people who passed through my combat platoon lo these 45 years ago. They are, by and large, flyover state people who are utterly incapable of realizing that the government is the only reason they have even a semblance of middle class life. They scapegoat. They blame the government for their failure to move up the economic ladder, notwithstanding that virtually every one of them that did get a college education got it at a state university for a pittance. They cannot understand the enormous changes of globalization. They only know that they are worse off than their parents, they don't come home to an Ozzie and Harriet marriage, and their kids have even fewer prospect than they did.


Generalizations are always flawed, but even those in this group who aren't fundamentalist know nothings have a willful blindness to the causes of their situation. In the run-up to this year's reunion, these men who I love were vehement Trumpeteers on social media. My closest friend in the group, a Californian, decided it was best if he didn't attend. I agreed, and stayed away.

There is one point in the Forsetti article I would personally disagree with. I WOULD come for their god damn guns, in the sense that civilians should not have AR 15s. I would tighten penalties on gun owners who don't secure their weapons. I know, first hand, what these machines can do. If your unemployed, bullied, meth addled son gets your semiautomatic rifle and sprays his high school it, you have committed murder. But that's just a coastal elitist view.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

This is an awful story. I'm sorry you had to experience this ordeal (including thinking about terminating).

TM

This. And also thank you for sharing. Somehow () in inherent difficulty in these choices doesn't seem to get much focus.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Huh. And, fwiw.

Yeah, that's making the rounds, but no, she shouldn't be challenging the results. How would that even work?

[Adder]

Originally Posted by SEC_Chick

I am very sorry for your loss.

I have experienced pregnancy loss in several ways: a missed miscarriage after we had seen the heartbeat, an ectopic, one of the chicklets had a twin that we lost towards the end of the first trimester, and more early losses than I can even recall. Diagnosed with recurrent pregnancy loss. Support for those who have experienced pregnancy loss has become one of the primary charitable causes we support.

I didn't make it to my D&C with the missed miscarriage and that was without a doubt the worst day of my life.

I'm also very sorry you guys had to go through that.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

their kids have even fewer prospect than they did.

Here's the things (aside from robots that are going to make us all destitute while awash in cheap robot-produced goods): they don't have to be. Move to a city. Teach those kids languages. See if they can do STEM stuff. Those kids can/will have lots of chances.

I WOULD come for their god damn guns, in the sense that civilians should not have AR 15s.

I was thinking this morning about what would have happened at gun control been premised on an individual right to bear arms, but expressly predicated on the need for a well-regulated militia. Like, aim for the court reading the 2nd amendment as prohibiting regulation of guns that places an undue burden on organizing a militia for the defense of the nation.

A militia might need an AR 15, but it likely also would need the person bearing it to be registered and trained and the weapon and ammunition for it closely tracked and it's storage secured. I could live with a broader range of civilian weapons being available if they have to maintained similar to how I imagine (with little basis or experience) they are in the military.

Probably wouldn't have changed the outcome or appeased the gun nuts in any way, but likely is closer to the spirit of the founder's intent (if one cares about such things which one probably shouldn't).

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

A comment on the Forsetti piece posted by Thurgreed.

There is far, far more truth in the article than most people realize. I qualify as a coastal elitist. I am the poster boy for coastal elites. Born in NYC suburbs, Ivy education, career in Washington.

Oddly, my closest lifelong friends are the thirty or so people who passed through my combat platoon lo these 45 years ago. They are, by and large, flyover state people who are utterly incapable of realizing that the government is the only reason they have even a semblance of middle class life. They scapegoat. They blame the government for their failure to move up the economic ladder, notwithstanding that virtually every one of them that did get a college education got it at a state university for a pittance. They cannot understand the enormous changes of globalization. They only know that they are worse off than their parents, they don't come home to an Ozzie and Harriet marriage, and their kids have even fewer prospect than they did.


Generalizations are always flawed, but even those in this group who aren't fundamentalist know nothings have a willful blindness to the causes of their situation. In the run-up to this year's reunion, these men who I love were vehement Trumpeteers on social media. My closest friend in the group, a Californian, decided it was best if he didn't attend. I agreed, and stayed away.

There is one point in the Forsetti article I would personally disagree with. I WOULD come for their god damn guns, in the sense that civilians should not have AR 15s. I would tighten penalties on gun owners who don't secure their weapons. I know, first hand, what these machines can do. If your unemployed, bullied, meth addled son gets your semiautomatic rifle and sprays his high school it, you have committed murder. But that's just a coastal elitist view.

Understanding them is a worthwhile endeavor, I guess. But isn't it more productive to find ways to properly message them? Trump just manipulated them without a hell of a lot complex marketing. One would think the Democratic Party, with far more resources, could similarly do so.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

A comment on the Forsetti piece posted by Thurgreed.

There is far, far more truth in the article than most people realize. I qualify as a coastal elitist. I am the poster boy for coastal elites. Born in NYC suburbs, Ivy education, career in Washington.

Oddly, my closest lifelong friends are the thirty or so people who passed through my combat platoon lo these 45 years ago. They are, by and large, flyover state people who are utterly incapable of realizing that the government is the only reason they have even a semblance of middle class life. They scapegoat. They blame the government for their failure to move up the economic ladder, notwithstanding that virtually every one of them that did get a college education got it at a state university for a pittance. They cannot understand the enormous changes of globalization. They only know that they are worse off than their parents, they don't come home to an Ozzie and Harriet marriage, and their kids have even fewer prospect than they did.


Generalizations are always flawed, but even those in this group who aren't fundamentalist know nothings have a willful blindness to the causes of their situation. In the run-up to this year's reunion, these men who I love were vehement Trumpeteers on social media. My closest friend in the group, a Californian, decided it was best if he didn't attend. I agreed, and stayed away.

There is one point in the Forsetti article I would personally disagree with. I WOULD come for their god damn guns, in the sense that civilians should not have AR 15s. I would tighten penalties on gun owners who don't secure their weapons. I know, first hand, what these machines can do. If your unemployed, bullied, meth addled son gets your semiautomatic rifle and sprays his high school it, you have committed murder. But that's just a coastal elitist view.

Take their guns all you want, but don't take my drones. They'll defend my home and castle against all those neanderthals with AR 15s.

[greatwhitenorthchick]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

I was pregnant with monoamniotic-monochorionic twins right before the Texas 20 week ban was passed. My pregnancy was extraordinarily risky. Basically, the embryo split AFTER the amniotic sac was developed and so both twins were in the same placenta. If I had carried them to viability, they would have been delivered prematurely via C-section at 32 to 34 weeks. But their chances were always very, very small. As soon as I found out what sort of pregnancy I was dealing with, I knew that termination at any point, including past 20 weeks, was something I may have to consider. It was a heartbreaking situation to be in, but it was one that belonged to me and my family with the advice of our doctors. Why the legislature (who didn't even get that their "20 week ban" actually means 22 weeks by thew way we count pregnancy because the first two weeks are BEFORE fertilization) needed to be involved I'll never know.

Fortunately(?), their hearts stopped beating around 9 1/2 weeks and I didn't have to make any decisions other than D&C or wait for natural miscarriage. I went with D&C.

I haven't been able to get pregnant since.

I'm so sorry for what you went through. When I was 19 I had a D&C to remove an embryo whose heart had stopped and I was so wracked with grief I literally didn't move from the couch for 2 weeks after. My sister finally got me up to rejoin the world. I was grief-stricken, and even though there was a huge part of me that didn't even want the baby in the first place, I didn't feel any relief.

I can't imagine what it would be like if you were actually happy to be pregnant. Big hugs to you, RT. That is heartbreaking.

[Abortion was not legal in Canada at the time -- would become legal later that year]

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Adder

Yeah, that's making the rounds, but no, she shouldn't be challenging the results. How would that even work?

This is a follow up: https://medium.com/@jhalderm/want-to...0ba#.jghzkl2y3

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

Concerning the abortion graph: This is a cultural clash that will never, ever be settled. Nor does it appear to me to be an issue that will decide a national election, unless and until Roe v. Wade is overturned by sending the issue back to state legislatures.

I proffer a different issue, and a graph, that I find depressing to the point of existential despair. According to Larry Summers: A simple linear trend suggests that by mid-century about a quarter of men between 25 and 54 will not be working at any moment.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...-american-men/

(I lack the skills to copy the graph itself into this text.)

Sure, others may quibble, but if he is even close to correct the trend will tear American society apart.

Yeah, but why should we discuss this when we can argue about about the "war on women," the "war on Xmas," who should use what bathrooms, whose "religious liberty (whatever the fuck that is) is being violated, who needs trigger warnings and safe spaces, who's a sexist, who violated email protocol, who had ties to Putin, what constitutes "cultural appropriation," or what the cast of Hamilton thinks about a VP who believes gays can be "cured" of their genetically wired sexual persuasion.

See a trend? We'll do almost anything - divert ourselves with every form of decadent and frivolous debate possible - to avoid looking at the graph you posted.

What elephant? I see no elephant. Let us stop talking of this elephant. It's getting in the way of me asserting all of my grievances!

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Frankly, I'm sick of going back and forth with you. I would question whether you think the negative press Trump generated by himself based on the shit he actually said every single day should be offset by a manufactured "corruption" issue that the press seized on like a dog with a fucking bone. I would question whether you think the timing of (bullshit) negative revelations makes the relative amounts of negative coverage irrelevant. But you'll probably tell me about how the Democrats didn't address robots enough and Trump promised imaginary jobs.

TM

"Should" is like "deserve." You've seen the end of Unforgiven.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Understanding them is a worthwhile endeavor, I guess. But isn't it more productive to find ways to properly message them? Trump just manipulated them without a hell of a lot complex marketing. One would think the Democratic Party, with far more resources, could similarly do so.

I'd rather the Democratic Party focused on concrete ways to make their lives better, and then communicated that.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Donald Trump, speaking Sebby's language:

“You know what solves it? When the economy crashes, when the country goes to total hell and everything is a disaster. Then you’ll have a [chuckles], you know, you’ll have riots to go back to where we used to be when we were great.”

Bannon too:

“I’m a Leninist,” Bannon proudly proclaimed.

Shocked, I asked him what he meant.

“Lenin,” he answered, “wanted to destroy the state, and that’s my goal too. I want to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of today’s establishment.”

I hope this person is wrong.