It’s interesting to note that the Oliver Wendell Holmes metaphor of yelling fire in the theater was leveled against people protesting the draft and war in general, not people directly endangering others (by, say, inciting mobs of people to racially motivated vigilantism, which happened all the time). It’s so weird to…

I’m either misunderstanding you or vice versa or both. You have people who want to call you “they” when you prefer “he”? I’m really struggling to understand why people who are willing to use the singular definite they at all would intentionally use the wrong pronoun.

If people who know you consistently refuse to use your preferred pronouns, they probably aren’t the people of good faith I’m talking about. It seems like you might be describing the opposite of the people I’m talking about, in a way, since I meant people who just flat out struggle with referring to a specific…

The concept of an indefinite they as a singular pronoun isn’t new, but using it as a definite pronoun is most definitely new. That doesn’t mean NBs shouldn’t use it, but it does mean we need to be sensitive to people who have difficulty with it. If someone with special needs was struggling with it, I’m guessing you…

I think you overestimate people’s general facility with language, which varies and is deeply embedded in how they behave. My basic point is that we’re never going to get anywhere with this if we’re constantly alienating people, which we most definitely are.

I’m not defending the person who actually does seem to be feigning ignorance in this comment section, but I just think you’re wrong about how confused plenty of tolerant and loving people are by it. My best friend’s wife halfway believes he’s a bigot because he can’t remember to stop saying “thanks, man” to the trans…

I appreciate the fact that you said it. I’m not opposed to the singular indefinite they (which most people use whether or not they realize it) or people preferring the individual use of it, but people need to understand that language is mostly naturally expressed, not consciously willed. If you think you know…

I would unironically love it if I knew it was a bit and not a symptom of a problem.  There’s some solid references in there.  I don’t think we can call something word salad just because it’s weird or hard to understand.

Load times and frame rates made huge leaps in the PS3/Xbox 360 to PS5/Series X in general, but I just went from a One X to a Series X. Even though it’s only a half-generation, the difference was stark (even if I’ve only played Cyberpunk and Stellaris thus far).

Canceling has pretty much always been a phenomenon amongst the socially conservative and the stupid, and there’s a lot of both on the left and the right. I’m kind of surprised at your surprise. Homophobia in the audience at large was probably the main reason most people were shunned by the entertainment industry if…

Larry Wilmore tweeted pictures from the picket line; Kerry Washington posted a petition; and Mark Ruffalo, who only a week ago gave a hearty “Bravo” [to] Disney’s response, retweeted Washington.

I’m kind of wondering if the reference to a “finally trained instrument” was the person being interviewed or if it’s an error on the AV Club’s part. I read it as finely trained at first, which seemed odd to read in place of finely tuned but a fully understandable thing for someone to say.

Same.  Plus, they were guests on a pretty great episode of Comedy Bang! Bang! which further endeared them to me a decade later.

I think not caring about what people think of you can be a virtue. We honestly shouldn’t care about what people think of us most of the time, but I always have a hard time believing people who aren’t truly psychopathic when they say things like this. People who truly don’t care about what people think don’t need to…

Starting a sentence with so for no good reason is bad enough, but at least finish it.

I love Slate Star Codex.  I know that evidence-based medicine is subject to all the foibles of the humans who create it, but when applied correctly, the scientific method does have the capacity to positively affect those biases and temptations.  You have to be willing to be wrong, though, which is something I know…

I think there’s also the placebo effect, and the simple act of going to someone who claims they can help will improve that regression to the mean; i.e., healing with time (which isn’t going to happen with plaque in your heart, I’m guessing). I have people in my family who are chiropractors and many others who swear by…

I agree that it’s a weird photo of Kristen Wiig, but she looks great. I’m not even sure if the weirdness is surgical or stylistic (or if it matters).

I take your point broadly. I read a bit into Canadian multiculturalism specifically after reading your comment, and it’s kind of an interesting way that Canada really did make itself distinct from the US, starting in the 1940s.

I think it has less to do with assimilation being good or bad for different people and more to do with what we’re asking people to assimilate into. For more traditional/conservative people, assimilation is based on the idea of including diverse people in your own culture, but to my mind, multiculturalism is the…