SSJMarx

Saw similarly strange pizzas when I lived in Japan. I think in Asia generally they just have a different idea of what to do with pizza.

Same here. I'll drink whatever's on tap but I don't like Pepsi as much cuz it's too sweet.

There are so many regional differences even if the recipe is 99% the same. Denatured coca leaves aren't a thing outside the Americas, different bottling plants will use different types of sugar, water of differing quality will affect the taste, etc etc.

Buddy Holly In My Ass

Yes, but as a specific exercise, the US government wants to spy on US citizens because if gives them the power to arrest you. You could be committing crimes right now and not realize it, but if you ever become a person of interest they will use them against you.

Of what use is specific data from specific nationals to a foreign government? They don't have anywhere near the same level of power over your life as your home government does, unless you're a defense contractor or a government official or something, all of that information is just fluff to them.

And not for nothing, but the original conversation was about Discord, which is partially owned by Tencent but partial ownership by a private Chinese firm does not give the Chinese government any kind of special control over the platform.

Power to do what, exactly? It's not like China is going to get non-citizens extradited from their home country to punish them for saying bad things about the CPC. Believing in vague generalities doesn't help anyone, you've got to be specific.

Why exactly do you believe the Chinese government wants the messages of non-Chinese citizens? Because Discord is blocked in China proper.

the democracy index

a fake statistic that elevates bourgeois democracies and denigrates any country where the people have power.

They defeated the Nazis by throwing conscripts into a meat grinder regardless of whether they even had a weapon, and by threatening to shoot them if they tried to retreat.

Enemy at the Gates is not a documentary, it's a propaganda film. In true fact while the Soviets did have a large number of conscripts and did suffer supply issues early in the war, at no point were they sending under-equipped battalions into the front line to die for no reason, and the thing about shooting those who retreated only applied to officers who ordered a retreat without proper cause (you'll find that every other army in World War 2 had a similar protocol).

Gulag in Siberia

Except during the years of World War 2, the Gulags had a better quality of life and lower risk of mortality than contemporary prisons in many much wealthier and more developed countries. Despite the enduring cultural legacy of the fiction novel Gulag Archipelago, the truth of the matter is that after the revolution the Communists reformed the Tsarist work camps into what were at the time the most progressive rehabilitation regimes in the world.

It's such an apt metaphor. A horrifying tentacled mass called "capitalism" is puppeteering every society on the planet. Read a bit of leftist thought and you'll start seeing it everywhere - read a bit more and you'll perceive precisely how its tentacles are manipulating you. Try not to go mad as your perception broadens with every theory you imbibe.

A few societies are aware of the being. They know its tentacles are upon them, and they've declared their intentions to throw off the beast and finally slay it. But whether their plots and schemes for defeating the monster will bear fruit or not, for the time being they can only overcome its influence in fits and starts.