BladeFederation

For what to look for, sometimes people’s priorities will be different, and unfortunately sometimes you may need to sacrifice usability to meet all your personal criteria. But this is what I look for.

FOSS (free open source software). The source code is open for everyone to read, and therefore you know exactly what the application is going, and security flaws will be noticed and fixed more quickly. There are sometimes exceptions for infrastructure. Back end software for services like email or cloud providers will not generally be open source for various reasons. E2EE (end to end encryption, it is encrypted from the moment it leaves my device and decrypted on your device). ZAE (zero access encryption) for services that store my info on a server, such as email or cloud storage. This means that the data is encrypted on the provider’s server, and they do not hold the encryption keys. Independent 3rd part audits. Privacy enthusiasts whose job it is to suss out problems are given free reign to inspect every part of the provider and see if they are really doing what they claim with privacy and security. Further proof may be shown by ethical hackers posting results of what they were able to do. Location: the Dev/provider has to obey local laws, so I trust if they are based somewhere that respects data privacy and are not authoritarian. If the company still seems a bit shady (certainly if they are closed source) but I want to use their product, I will carefully read their privacy policy. Sure, they may be lying, but you’ll be surprised at what some companies openly admit to. And if you’re not comfortable with what they state publicly, you should probably move on. To a lesser extent, I also prefer seeing open standards instead of proprietary ones (like PGP for encryption for example) and a strong choice for encryption because I know a little bit about that. No ads: self explanatory. Is the company/devs shady seeming in general? Also fairly self explanatory but more arguable.

Proton meets all of these requirements for all their products, with the slight exception that not every part of every project is fully open source. If it was, you could hijack their email or cloud servers and use their infrastructure with any amount of storage for free, for example. This is pretty common for service providers. No idea what you’re on about with the last part. They specifically have a no logs policy for their VPN that has been “battle tested” by governments subpoenaeing info. They don’t have that info, so they were unable to give it.

Yes, and it has quite a variety, including a ton of translations in other languages too. Do be prepared for your favorite version maybe not being there though. ESV and NIV for example require licensing fees apparently, which the dev opted to not pay because they’re not going to pass along the cost with ads or whatever. Personally I opt for a well respected literal translation like NASB, as well as a more simplified modern version like BBE (Bible in Basic English) to compare against if the syntax is a bit confusing or look at it from a few angles if I want to further extract meaning. And I have good old KJV just for the memories.

I have been deep diving into internet privacy and cyber security for a while now. I’ve noticed that any popular privacy related product will get haters for some reason. Obviously I am not going to support a privacy related product “no matter what controversy surrounds it”, in fact I have VERY specific requirements for that. And I get people being paranoid in that specific community, and that maybe people will be on the lookout for controversy. But people will be like “you use PROTON products? What a basic entry level choice” and it’s like do you not know WHY they are so popular in this space? Because they hit all the check boxes and are easy to use. One time I mentioned Signal and someone was like “isn’t that a CIA honeypot?” No. No it is not. There is no evidence whatsoever. And the code is right there, you can just read it. Just because some “normies” like a product doesn’t mean it’s a trick.

And people don’t seem to understand that it is sometimes not wise to completely avoid controversy. Who do you trust more, a group of devs (or even gasp a company) who has been around for 15 years, had a security flaw 3 years ago and patched it after someone noticed and passed independent 3rd party audits since then, or a brand new 1 man project that has no controversy (yet)?

So while I absolutely disagree with blind loyalty to anything, people are sometimes too quick to jump ship and end up being like the “yet you participate in society. Interesting!” meme.

AndBible from F-Droid. Free and open source software, no trackers, no ads, no versions requiring paid licensing, no internet connection needed except to download a version(s) the first time. Fast loading because of indexing.

RIP Benny

The what now?

Have you done a major version upgrade ever? That’s usually the only downside to stable distros, though Mint tends to manage them better than Debian and probably a few others I could think of.

Pacman is the PACkage MANager (lol get it?) for Arch based distros. It would be apt for you. Or, you know, just Mint’s graphical app store + update manager which I have never seen a reason to not use.

It is not about people’s lives being privileges, I resent you saying that. I thought I made it clear that I support trans people and do not tolerate bigotry. Everyone matters. Even if in a theoretical situation “just” 1% of the population is getting genocided, it is still genocide. I don’t value you or anyone else less than anyone else. I simply disagree with your premise, which I believe to be a false dichotomy. The statistics do indeed say there is a higher percentage of suicide rates for trans people. And why is that? In my opinion from looking at the evidence, I do not believe it is primarily or even very much at all related to bottom surgery being expensive. A lot of trans people are not even interested in that at all. It is because trans people are under a spotlight and a microscope, often scapegoated, and it really wears on somebody to be hated all the time and not know where it is safe to be themselves. And why is there such a spotlight? Part of it will always be bigots and right wing politicians deflecting blame. But part of it is self inflicted.

And that’s what I mean by the “taking over spaces” part of my comment. You are perfectly welcome in Lemmy as far as I concerned. You shouldn’t have to “hide” that you’re trans or avoid talking about issues that concern you. That’s not what I’m trying to say.

Think about it like this: imagine the trans spam was literally anything else. Say like…it was about India. I have Indian friends and coworkers, Indian food is great, Hinduism is kinda foreign to me but I find the concept and ethos very interesting, traditional Indian clothing is pretty and cool. Positive opinions, neutral at worst. Now imagine if Indian people refused to shut up about India. Screenshot of a movie with a character wearing a white shirt, orange light from a sunset and green grass “OMG GUYS THE COLORS OF THE INDIAN FLAG, ARE THEY IMPLYING THAT THIS RANDOM CHARACTER IS ACTUALLY INDIAN?!” Every food or cooking sub is taken over by Indian food, people comment on non Indian food “why not just make Indian dish?” Any random brown person “yeah it’s giving Indian vibes” Comment on a pretty girl’s Instagram : “So cute! Glad to see a fellow Indian be loud and proud” “Actually I’m not Indian” “Not yet ;)”

I think you can imagine people would start to have more negative opinions on Indian people if this were the case, or at the very least find them immature. Except this actually makes a lot more sense because there are literally a billion of them, and there are nowhere near that amount of trans people.

This, combined with the false dichotomy makes the movement come off as immature teenagers to a lot of people. I have not found that to be the case from trans people i know in real life, but that is the perception.

Even if I were to believe the false dichotomy of “pay for trans surgeries with taxpayer money or trans people will die”, that’s not any more convincing than it was when my ex girlfriend threatened to kill herself if we broke up. Me having sex with her is not healthcare because of her potential actions. I think it is important to be precise with language. And to be clear, I would vote for covering trans stuff with universal healthcare if it got on the ballot, as long as there were legal protections from something like a mentally ill parent forcing transitioning on their child.

Lastly, you say “politically convenient” as if I’m running for office. As previously mentioned, people die every day because they can’t afford healthcare, and it’s only getting worse. I know someone who divorced his wife so she won’t have to pay his medical bills after he got cancer. After burning through his life savings that he worked hard on and made sacrifices for, for THIRTY YEARS. Not only does he not get to enjoy any of the money he saved by working overtime, but he can’t even die young in peace knowing that his wife will be supported. He now has to worry that debt collectors will sue her after his death if they suss out that their divorce was due to debt. That is dystopian, a nightmare. And that is not “my problem vs your problem”. It can happen to you. And it is probably more likely to happen to you, as transitioning can be hard on your body. I’m not a fan of politics, I just recognize the reality. To some, people, being trans is an affront on god himself. It sure is stupid, but they will vote against their own self interest just to spite you. There is no universe where we will be able to jump to “trans people should get whatever they define as healthcare paid for by someone else.” from absolutely nothing being covered. Not anymore than we should have campaigned Frederick Douglas for president of the United States before we, you know, got rid of slavery. Could he have been a good president in a vacuum? Yes, he was an intelligent and wise person. But you knowing that, and me knowing that doesn’t mean it would have been a good idea. And NOTHING exists in a vacuum. Ever.

I think this is well said. You should be proud to be who you are, and sometimes bigots need a reality check, but it gets to a point where it is counter productive. I remember a few years ago when people were upset about the Proud Boys militia, and leftists made memes about gay dudes wearing banana hammocks being our “proud boys” because of gay pride. And, uh…no. First, it’s just not funny, so it fails as a meme. Second, being gay does not make you the representative of leftist/progressive ideals, I’m sorry. And third, I don’t particularly want to see a dude’s dick imprint on my home page either, please stop.

Granted, I am in more leftist spaces than most people, but I see the trans flag more than any flag, even the US flag. Even during the world cup where every country was patriotic, I still saw more trans flag spam than anything else. And that is absolutely ridiculous to me, especially for a cause such as being trans, whose identity is generally “I want to be seen as the other gender and I’d prefer people don’t make a big deal about it”, not “my identity is being trans and I will never let you stop thinking about what’s in my pants”.

I hear you with healthcare but in most cases, “my cause or your cause” is the same cause, even if it doesn’t specifically apply to you. If life saving medicine is free, we all win, period. Nobody is like “fuck people with type 1 diabetes, my tax dollars shouldn’t go to them getting insulin which would be negligibly cheap in a socialized system” unless they’re just vehemently anti-socialized medicine in general. Trans “healthcare” is, ultimately, not health related, it is cosmetic surgery or changing your body for cosmetic reasons. Mental health related? Arguable, and I do agree that it is personally. But VERY arguable, and not a lot of people support it. So leading the charge on socialized medicine by making it about trying to psy-op people into thinking “trans rights=human rights, and trans rights=access to expensive treatment paid by tax dollars” only hurts everyone by being an easy scapegoat. Not to mention the whole related psy-op of trying to convince people being trans, particularly “girldick” is hot in porn and whatnot, which is a whole other can of worms. Trying to trick people with thinly veiled propaganda is not the move if you’re trying to start a serious movement. And it makes the trans movement, which is already polarizing and on shaky ground, come off to outsiders like a fetish, ESPECIALLY if you don’t personally know a trans person and only see what’s online. Which is a lot of people, since trans people are like 1% of the population, Trump is president so it is not popular to come out, and many trans people i didn’t know were trans until years of knowing them, because once again, the idea is to be quietly accepted as the other gender. Which makes all the trans spam even more perplexing. Who is actually posting all of this? LARPers? Well meaning supporters? Russian trolls trying to flanderize the movement?

I’m with you on this, but I’m also against the opposite: the blind praise and promotion of being trans for some reason. Look, if you have something wired in your brain different that makes you present as another gender, go ahead. Present yourself how you want, I can’t imagine why I’d give much of a shit. It’s a free country. But why do people have to constantly yap and take over every non right wing chud internet space to make it about being trans or related like talking about how hot femboys are. It’s like…I mean honestly? A trend. And something major and life changing like that shouldn’t be a trend. I’m sorry but that is dumb. Have your own spaces where you can talk about your own issues, sure. Don’t be afraid to mention it in other spaces, sure. I’m cool with that. But maybe don’t take over everyone else’s spaces and make everything about you. Being annoying on purpose just doesn’t work in your favor.

Also related, if psychologists and such agree that the best way to treat gender dysphoria is hormones, that’s cool. But like maybe don’t push socialized treatment for that so hard when we have literally nothing else socialized in healthcare. Priorities, you know? People are dying, every day, and cosmetic appearance for something a lot of people find weird and off putting is too easy of a target to keep healthcare terrible. I’m not saying it’s right, but you have to pick your battles sometimes. Just like if you want to make someone not racist towards black people, maybe show them something like jazz or soul first, not hip hop. Is hip hop art? Absolutely, one of my favorite genres. But it’s going to be an immediate turnoff if you jump to bad language and drug dealing and bitches and the other rap tropes. Should you have to cater to someone racist or transphobic? No, but that’s the world we live in. Everyone gets to vote. and everyone starts somewhere with understanding people different than themselves.

Trans rights are human rights in the sense that you should be free to look and present how you want and not be harassed about it. But that doesn’t mean you get to have everything you want, for free, and everyone has to not only treat and react to you exactly how you imagined it in your head, but also praise you for being different. That’s not how the world works, for anything.

Are you me?

It’s usually pretty subtle. People will quietly lose respect for you and shut you out over time, or just gossip about you behind your back.

That being said, I dont give a shit about people’s perception of my manliness or sexuality. I’m straight, trained in martial arts and boxing, own guns and know how to use them, can fix things around the house decently well, moderately know my way around car repairs. But I’ll be sensitive and open with my feelings if I want to, which is frequent. I cry at weddings, funerals, sad movies, and even when I think about how lucky I am to have my wife. I joke about kissing the homes goodnight, and flirt back with gay dudes that hit on me (without leading them on).

I’m often DISAPPOINTED in people for how they react and judge sometimes, but always happier when those people remove themselves from my life. I don’t fawn after the approval of random assholes, be they male or female, and I never let it affect who I am. That’s what manliness actually is about: self actualization.