They migrated to Latvia, or any of the Baltic countries as part of Russian programs to asset dominance over satellite Soviet states. Similar to how China flooded Tibet with Han population and the British did in Northen Ireland.

Latvia isnt banning them speaking Russian but putting Latvia as the primary language in their own country when its been sidelined for decades.

Considering that those Russians are either immigrants or children of immigrants, it is not the cultural eradication that you claim.

My friend is one of those 2nd gen immigrants and in the many conversations we’ve had, it’s been clear that those ethnic Russians in Latvia have no intention of ever learning Latvian. She herself never learnt Latvian as she said “Why? Everyone speaks russian”. They have no intention of adapting to Latvian culture or it’s practices. They see themselves as a Russian enclave within Latvia.

Other friends, who are ethnically Latvian all speak at least 3 languages (English is usually the 3rd one) and grew up having to speak Russian most of the time when not at home, in school or dealing with who they knew to be Latvian businesses.

I moved a few domains to them in the middle of last year because my other host had raised their prices ridiculous amounts. Looks like I’ll be moving them again!

what’s the helmet situation in other countries, especially around ad-hoc rental scooters? I see scooters and bikes for rent here, but no buckets to wear, and I wonder the legality of that too.

Outside of Australia, helmets are not mandatory and data from there shows it has had a negative effect on not only the numbers of cyclists, reducing “safety in numbers” but also an increase in children with head injuries, because drivers are less risk adverse (“Mary Poppins effect” - drivers give more space & make less dangerous passes around cyclists in everyday clothing).

The most simple solution to increasing cyclist (and pedestrian) safety is to build better infrastructure. Design roads so that vehicles have to slow for junctions and roundabouts, especially where there’s mixed modal traffic. Prioritise active and public transport over inactive modes. Make cycle, walking & bus routes more direct and make driving routes more circuitous. Discourage driving into town centres and stop building out of town retail parks.

Back to the topic in hand:

If anyone wants to claim that “helmets save lives” then why aren’t they advocating them for vehicle passengers, who experience greater numbers and severity of head injuries than cyclists, or for pedestrians who have about the same number, possibly slightly more than cyclists?

Also largest owner of arable farmland in the US

As well as emotional regulation from an early age (would massively reduce male violence)

As they say

Reduce, reuse, recycle!

It’s beyond that. It’s surveillance software

Every Israeli is now a legitimate target

You forgot the Bill “now the largest owner of arable land in the US” Gates

They are supremacists that see everyone else as dogs to be abused and killed.

It’s why Israel has no future and needs to be wiped from the map and only spoken about as a shit stain on the underpants of history

They’re such a crybaby is it worth even engaging any further?

There are some that still give Israel the benefit of the doubt and showing that a humanitarian flotilla trying to deliver aid are kidnapped in international waters, strips away that.

Israel has, and will always be a piece of shit and definitely revel in it, but those who stand on the sidelines with their “two sides” arguments are now shown that they are morally complicit

• signal to noise ratio

It feels a bit like how Reddit was prior to the digg exodus when overnight pun & lyric threads, ascii art and terminally shit one word responses appeared.

There is the awareness to the benefit of building slowly will bring, rather than having a an uncontrolled mass exodus, that risks little to no integration to the current curated culture.

• Transparency

You can see who the mods are and a mod log and currently, people are giving time to grow the communities rather than welding power.

• Quality content

It’s not the same stories getting posted by karma farmers or by bots. It’s more curated.

• Interactions

They’re more conversational than adversarial

And some people can’t pull their head out of their own ass long enough to see that their problems aren’t the same as everyone else’s problems.

You’re just projecting here.

I merely pointed out that everything is politics and yet you respond with yet more bleating.

and their pet issues

And you respond further by shoving your head further up your own arse.

Your response being a great case study in how you can do exactly that while also implying that no one else even has problems to begin with.

Are you trying to make yourself out as the victim here?

What a fucking crybaby!

Every successive British govt had been too pig-headed to walk back any of their decisions

When can we stop inserting politics into every little thing?

When I see comments like this, it makes 2 things plainly obvious:

1. The commentor is naive and doesn’t understand that fundamentally ‘politics’ is the power dynamic in every relationship, be that between people, groups or with structures or things such as food.

It is in everything and connects everything. It defines your relationship and how you interact with the world and it’s relationship to, and interaction with you.

2. The commentor has enough privilege that they don’t have to worry about politics/power structures on a daily basis.

Some people can’t see the wood for the trees

And it’s about 10 years too late.

It’s about 5 years ago that they deleted comments from anyone saying “fuck the 5 mods”

No child chooses to be a bigot, a zionist or a fascist. It’s environmental.

We’re not the monsters!

After shoving their noses in it, they have to dig every body out of the rubble.