Matthias Hirsh

This is what authoritarians do - use the powers of the state to humiliate and degrade their opponents in public so that others will not challenge them

Us trying to buy a washing machine in Germany and the sales person giving a monologue into Google Translate.

I need to know what this is supposed to mean.

I wish there was someone between his age and AOC/Mamdani who could run for president in three years.

I wish he was 20-25 years younger.

Probably if it’s connecting neighborhoods that aren’t mostly white or the construction workers aren’t mostly white.

I don’t think ppl understand the whole “who cares if nobody likes it! make content for yourself” is extremely dismissive
Bc we ARE making the content for ourselves but it feels /bad/ when people don’t engage or show interest. You can care about both at the same time

Remembering Star Fruit Books publisher Matt Haasch, 1990-2025 - The Comics Journal Zack Davisson pays homage to the late Haasch, who died of cancer on Sept. 6.

A personal remembrance of Matt Haasch.

www.tcj.com/remembering-...

This is exactly it.

I’ll repeat myself again!! I asked Ryukishi07 point-blank if Silent Hill f was meant to be a feminist game a few months back and he said yes lmao. These losers can suck it.

Florida Woman is so much more pleasant to hear about than Florida Man.

oh it's time to post the Tetris story again. (short version: reporter goes to cover early e-sports, discovers that his wife is, unknowingly, the greatest Tetris player in the world)

archive.boston.com/news/globe/m...

Shounen manga.

Or Steve and Bucky.

Chewing on some right now myself.

TFW you have a last name Japanese people saw in textbooks.

I considered asking my husband if we’d want to take each other’s names, like a compound last name, but then remembering the paperwork from changing my first name, plus needing to change my business email too, I quickly decided against it.

I have my suspicions that this isn’t really 24k gold…

David Bowie, wearing dark glasses, sitting down with his fingers laced. He looks vaguely like Gendo Ikari from Evangelion.

Neon Genesis Evangelion (1995)

lillie from pokemon dressed as utena and holding mallow's hands, with mallow dressed as anthy

it's so funny that due to the passage of time utena is a retro anime pokemon referenced, despite being exactly one day younger

A picture of a person that shows their muscular system, holding a plank pose (prostrate with toes and elbows on floor). Caption says "What it feels like for ADHD people to listen to someone finish a sentence they already understood within the first few seconds"

It explained why I get frustrated listening to people use so many words to explain something when my brain is like, Got it! Next! 🏎️

I love fashion, but I think expensive, artistic clothing for pre-adolescent children is absurd and ultimately more for the vicarious self expression of the parents than the child.

Truly in awe of how bad this shot from the new Cat's Eye anime looks. LIDEN Films, you always meet expectations.

The nu-net: "We need more weird people on the internet! The net's not weird or fun anymore!"

You guys literally chased all the weird or fun folks away then started stalking them until they either killed themselves, retired or stopped expressing themselves because you thought they were too weird. :P

As someone fluent in Japanese and assimilated into Japanese culture, I will analyze some core things about Japanese culture that English-speakers have trouble understanding when trying to integrate into Japanese society. Linguistic diversity In the English-speaking world, linguistic diversity is the norm and people generally accept others who speak English with different accents and different cultural-linguistic backgrounds. However, this tolerance of linguistic diversity doesn’t exist in Japan, and English-speakers find it hard to adjust to the intolerance. If your Japanese requires Japanese people to pause to process what you just said or ask you to repeat yourself, it will absolutely prevent you from assimilating. Companies will refuse to hire you. People will avoid interacting with you since speaking with you takes extra effort. In the English-speaking world, it’s enough that you speak a version of English. In Japan, you cannot just speak your own version of Japanese; you need to speak the same Japanese as spoken by Japanese people. Many English-speakers don’t understand why they are being rejected and excluded even when they can speak Japanese. They cannot comprehend the fact that they are being rejected because they speak their own versions of Japanese instead of Japanese as spoken by Japanese people. They are looking for a tolerance of linguistic diversity that doesn’t exist in Japan outside very specific niches.

Cross-cultural communication This is like suffering from success, but English-speakers are too good at cross-cultural communication to understand the difficulties from the Japanese perspective. I have noticed that many English-speakers cannot understand the idea of cross-cultural communication being simply too exhausting and difficult for average Japanese people. It’s like people who grew up using computers not understanding how using PowerPoint is incredibly difficult for those who didn't grow up using computers. Not only do many Japanese people have a much lower tolerance of linguistic diversity, they also have a much lower tolerance of multicultural ideas and perspectives. I don’t mean that they will hate you for having different ideas and perspectives. What I mean is that since they aren’t regularly exposed to foreign ideas and perspectives, they can’t engage with them in any meaningful way. When Japanese people come into a conversation with someone who presents foreign perspectives and ideas, many of them can’t process the perspectives and ideas into something that’s meaningful in their mind. It’s like if you know nothing about physics, and someone presents to you ideas and perspectives in theoretical physics; you just cannot process the conversation into something meaningful, so you just tune out and don’t engage. It’s not that you hate the person for talking about theoretical physics; it’s just that you cannot engage so you find the person inapproachable and exhausting.

Moreover, if you are raised in a multicultural environment, you have that natural curiosity and motivation to keep engaging in a multicultural conversation even if it's difficult. For example, when you converse with a foreigner, even if you find her language and ideas difficult to understand, you have a natural motivation to keep trying. However, Japanese people aren't raised in an environment where they learn that behavior and mindset, so often times their default reaction is to shut down instead of keep trying. Your way of handling complex multicultural interactions is learned through growing up in a multicultural environment, and you cannot expect that behavior from Japanese people. Japan’s reluctance to interact with foreigners is not only about racial hatred. It’s also about the fact that many of them just genuinely do not have the ability to process foreigner perspectives even when explained in Japanese or the skills to handle challenging multicultural situations. You need to understand this is what people are like when they are not raised in a multicultural environment. To be accepted in Japan, you need to speak like a real Japanese person about things that Japanese people understand. You also need to discuss things from perspectives that are common in Japan. This requires that you consume enough Japanese media to know what topics and perspectives are common in Japan. P.S. My Patreon has all my writings AND many more videos than my YouTube channel!

Why being an English-speaker makes Japan uniquely difficult

Full post on Patreon for unpaid members
www.patreon.com/posts/139931...

Indie director Barbara Marques has been kidnapped by ICE. She is legally married to a U.S. citizen & was at a green card mtg when she was abducted and prevented from seeing her lawyer. Her husband Tucker May does not know where she is. Please spread the word so he can find her /1

Is it as not as widespread as I was lead to believe that “most” people got their wisdom teeth out in high school or college?

Anything being $2 at the Container Store does indeed sound like fantasy.

The Funi dub from the 2010s is pretty solid too.

Para celebrar el 30º aniversario del anime de Fushigi Yūgi, a partir del viernes 3 de octubre, el canal de YouTube de Studio Pierrot va a tener disponible los 52 capítulos de la serie por tiempo limitado (probablemente solo se podrá acceder desde Japón).

Bro