L Phillip Lucas

#SPOILER The first three boots of #SurvivorAUvsTheWorld are those whose games rely most on pawns and herd mentality, but there are no goats in this cast and they didn’t adapt accordingly. #Survivor #SurvivorAu

AEST really came through with that extra hour when I needed it most #Deadline

The higher standards you have, the more accustomed you become to lowering them.

Literally couldn’t stay in my seat for those first twenty minutes of #WheelOfTime season 3. Sooo fucking goodddd

Sharing for all my curious bleeps who aren’t on Reddit www.reddit.com/r/survivorau... #survivorau

Why improve things for people when you can generate solutions-oriented outcomes for all relevant stakeholders?

I know I’m supposed to love the drama and ‘good television’, but really I just find myself wanting them to cut the early-game ‘nuts’: Kent, Rich, Indy and Nash. What on earth was Komodo mantis Kent’s game owning up to the hat arson out of nowhere? #SurvivorAu

Indy clearly doesn’t know anybody’s names 😅 #SurvivorAu

Can Google please fuck off with insisting that I use my old (dead) phone to verify it’s me trying to sign into my new phone? THAT’S WHAT PASSWORDS ARE FOR

Probably long overdue for this soak to be fair. It had to take drastic action.

My drink bottle just fucking nosedived off the shower screen ledge perfectly into the fucking toilet somehow.

Only six days into the new year and it really said it’s had enough.

Dutton: How can we be united as a country under more than one flag? We have one national flag.

The Australian flag: Literally has two flags on it

Note to self: if you’re going to stupidly self-prescribe antibiotics for a persistent ear infection, remember to check they’re not made of the one thing you know you’re allergic to.

Peaceful Solutions On respectable and profitable human-suffering engines, the murder of a CEO, propriety in a land where life has been cheapened, and some good news for those who seek peaceful solutions.

I wrote about the reaction to the shooting of a CEO.

"It seems to me that when you create a world where human life has been made as cheap as possible, you will eventually find you live in a world where your human life is deemed by others to be cheap, too."

www.the-reframe.com/peaceful-sol...

Elon’s Law: The first tweet that appears when you open the app looks for half a second like the most interesting thing you’ve ever seen before the feed auto-refreshes and it is sucked away into the void, never to be seen again.

When I opened my animal cracker petting zoo, people laughed. No one’s laughing now. I lost everything. My job, my house, my marriage. I live in a tent in my uncle’s backyard

Trying to find some joy because I'm responsible for protecting it in others, but I will never get over seeing what I have seen on my screens this year. Watching a genocide in real time colours everything I do and see. I don't know what 'normal' is anymore, but it's not this.

You don’t need to drink fish milk.

Dairy is not the milk you’re looking for. 😜

bsky.app/profile/lefa...

The reaction to the UnitedHealthcare CEO assassination reminds me of a person getting out of a toxic relationship after way too long. Like yes, you *should* feel bad, but you burnt out on empathy for them so long time ago that you just can’t.

These two are 1000% both living out a misogynist kink fantasy that denigrates women and obsesses over men as a way to express homosexual desire without ‘being gay’.

I suspect men in similar situations are an underestimated nefarious force throughout our culture.

I've already had one instance of 'de-influencing' myself like this, and it's kind of satisfying. But it worries me how little we are talking about this, and how little I trust others to have the time, skills or inclination to police their belief formation like this.

But I do intent to make an effort to pay more attention to when I feel my baseline shifting, my mind changing about something based on things I see on social media. I might even note it down and, once it reaches a certain level of confidence, actually look into it with skepticism.

So what now? What can we even do? When you read about addressing social media (mis/dis)information, the advice always rings a little unrealistic to me. As if you have endless time to devote to researching every slowly accumulating belief building up in the back of your head through osmosis.

A comment exchange between L Phillip Lucas and TikTok creator Doode, where Lucas says: 'I like your takes but when you get to predictions, I would consider a bit of moderation instead of confidently declaring that X will happen. Even just 'I think/believe'. And maybe the reason too. And Doode replies: 'No. Republicans have been wrong about everything, and you tirn around and put guardrails on what I can say? No. Be quiet. I've been right about almost everything and I will not change my approach.'

I was actually moved to leave a comment along these lines, and his response was, I think, as concerning as it was defensive. 'No. Be quiet. Don't make me self-reflect. Don't hold me to a standard higher than those I oppose. I am entitled to make irresponsibly confident statements about the future.'

Tommy, for example, is already back at it. After two minutes of spot-on analysis and context about Trump’s planned mass deportations, he blithely asserts that ‘most of America is not going to react well to this … People are not gonna like it.’ Says who? How can he know? vt.tiktok.com/ZSjCqFeaD/

Leftists and progressives should be concerned about an internet filled with overconfident predictions and pronouncements lacking nuance that water down reality, contribute to media bubbles and erode trust. But instead, many of these pundits seem to be carrying on with reckless abandon.

In theory, the reason they are worth listening to when Republicans and their propagandists and co-conspirators aren't is that they have some commitment to truth rather than distorting or overstating their positions for their own benefit.

But the real reason is often likely nothing more than our algorithmic overlords' prioritisation of strong takes like this over, say, the carefully hedged and qualified assertions of academia. But these aren't Fox News hosts. They are progressives and leftists arrayed against post-truth Trumpers.

And so, your personal cloud of beliefs, suspicions, hunches and speculations on what is likely and possible shifts, incrementally but steadily, with the unconscious supposition that so many people speaking so confidently can't all be wrong. They must have a *reason*. It must be based in truth.

In 2024, I am convinced, our brains are simply not equipped to rationally process such a quantity of sensible-sounding takes that we *want* to believe. When consuming dozens of TikToks a day, there isn't time to dig into the credentials behind every one.