A Sick Giant
waitbutwhy.com
A Sick Giant
1–10 of 138 posts
Re: A Sick Giant
#2> I recently engaged in a fun, joint Psych Spectrum roller coaster with a stranger on an airplane. We were on the runway, getting ready to take off, and I was doing my typical “I know the flight attendant said to turn all phones onto airplane mode but the whole policy is really quite inane so I’m just gonna keep texting until we take off and I lose service” thing, and a woman next to me decided I was an asshole and loudly told on me to the flight attendant, who was busy and didn’t hear her. So I did the only reasonable thing—I stealthily turned my phone onto airplane mode, re-opened my texts, and very out in the open, started typing a long text. The woman—my new eternal arch-nemesis—took the bait. She saw me texting and again got the flight attendant’s attention, saying, “Excuse me but he’s still texting.” When the flight attendant asked me to turn airplane mode on, I showed her my phone and calmly explained that airplane mode has been on this whole time and I just like to get some texting out of the way during flights—texts that don’t send until I land and re-connect to the internet. The flight attendant said, “Oh then that’s totally fine—my apologies.” I replied, “that’s okay,” and did a little “it’s amazing how awful people can be right?” sigh. Satan watched the whole thing and then just sat there silently, hopefully very embarrassed. It was an unbelievably satisfying, triumphant moment.
Not the main point of the article obviously but man, the writer makes himself sound like a bit of an asshole with this story. Didn't encourage me to listen to his other opinions.
Edit: I kinda regret making this comment since I think it detracts from discussion of the article itself, which is very thorough and thoughtful in general. Maybe this is a meta Psych Spectrum commentary.
Re: A Sick Giant
#3everyone on HN should read the entire series.
It's a commitment, but there is no better writing happening right now.
Re: A Sick Giant
#4> I recently engaged in a fun, joint Psych Spectrum roller coaster with a stranger on an airplane. We were on the runway, getting ready to take off, and I was doing my typical “I know the flight attendant said to turn all phones onto airplane mode but the whole policy is really quite inane so I’m just gonna keep texting until we take off and I lose service” thing, and a woman next to me decided I was an asshole and l…
Does he? Not sure I agree.
Re: A Sick Giant
#5TL;DR: political polarization in the USA has measurably increased, and this is bad for the country and its citizens.
However, some data suggest that that two-thirds of Americans fall into what they call the "Exhausted Majority", people who are fed up with both major parties, and politics in general.
Re: A Sick Giant
#6> I recently engaged in a fun, joint Psych Spectrum roller coaster with a stranger on an airplane. We were on the runway, getting ready to take off, and I was doing my typical “I know the flight attendant said to turn all phones onto airplane mode but the whole policy is really quite inane so I’m just gonna keep texting until we take off and I lose service” thing, and a woman next to me decided I was an asshole and l…
Literally the next paragraph he writes:
“But that’s not what happened, because her aggressive tattletale move immediately threw my Primitive Mind into a rage, plummeting me down the Psych Spectrum. This banished my Higher Mind to the closet of my subconscious, allowing my Primitive Mind to come up with a genius-yet-psychotic plan for revenge. Which worked, and made my Primitive Mind feel deeply satisfied in a very not-grown-up way.”
His entire point is that the average person acts like an asshole some of the time and like a kind person some of the time, and that it is incredibly easy to cherry-pick examples to paint someone in a bad (or good) light.
Which is exactly what you have done here, proving his point!
Re: A Sick Giant
#7> I recently engaged in a fun, joint Psych Spectrum roller coaster with a stranger on an airplane. We were on the runway, getting ready to take off, and I was doing my typical “I know the flight attendant said to turn all phones onto airplane mode but the whole policy is really quite inane so I’m just gonna keep texting until we take off and I lose service” thing, and a woman next to me decided I was an asshole and l…
Does he? Not sure I agree.
I knew someone would disagree, but it just sounds really antisocial to me. Sure, the woman should have asked him to put his phone in airplane mode instead of going straight to the attendant, but he could have also replied with an "oh, sorry" and put his phone on airplane mode when told off about the rule he was in fact breaking.
Re: A Sick Giant
#8> I recently engaged in a fun, joint Psych Spectrum roller coaster with a stranger on an airplane. We were on the runway, getting ready to take off, and I was doing my typical “I know the flight attendant said to turn all phones onto airplane mode but the whole policy is really quite inane so I’m just gonna keep texting until we take off and I lose service” thing, and a woman next to me decided I was an asshole and l…
Literally the next paragraph he writes: “But that’s not what happened, because her aggressive tattletale move immediately threw my Primitive Mind into a rage, plummeting me down the Psych Spectrum. This banished my Higher Mind to the closet of my subconscious, allowing my Primitive Mind to come up with a genius-yet-psychotic plan for revenge. Which worked, and made my Primitive Mind feel deeply satisfied in a very no…
I'd like to think most people would act more civilized initially in that situation. In fact the most civilized thing to do would have been to simply follow the rules in the first place, knowing that most passengers will believe they must be important.
Re: A Sick Giant
#9> I recently engaged in a fun, joint Psych Spectrum roller coaster with a stranger on an airplane. We were on the runway, getting ready to take off, and I was doing my typical “I know the flight attendant said to turn all phones onto airplane mode but the whole policy is really quite inane so I’m just gonna keep texting until we take off and I lose service” thing, and a woman next to me decided I was an asshole and l…
Agreed. However that is the point he was making - in the next paragraph he goes on to explain that he was being “a bit of a cock about it” and why
Re: A Sick Giant
#10This is a long and interesting article that, because it is attempting to preserve the system, ultimately misses the mark:
My obsession over the past three years has been trying to figure out how our national immune system works, where it draws its strength from, and how we can get it working again.
There is no national immune system because there is no nation. The US has never been a nation. It was a loose amalgamation of many nations on a huge continent under a commercial republic, then a warring set of nations, then an oligarchic industrial powerhouse that finally matured into a financial/military empire. All of the internal conflict we see benefits the ruling class and, therefore, will continue and, in all likelihood, get worse.