Oh yeah it absolutely is bullshit, I'm not saying that. Or, well, it is true they're likely collecting tons of data but it's not like US companies don't do it too and for reasons that are probably just as bad. This is why I tend to think that if you're going to ban TikTok for collecting data, you can't ignore Meta, Amazon, Alphabet, Apple et al

Well, they're totally different platforms . The rationale behind the TikTok ban (and I'm not saying I'm in favor of it or opposed to it) is that they can do spooky spooky things with your personal data and your attention – your opinions can be nudged once there's enough data on you and your eyeballs are on the app half the day. And just to repeat, I'm not saying I agree with the ban (well, not with banning just TikTok anyhow…)

Temu and AliExpress have their own problems (like the absolutely mind boggling waste of finite resources) but nobody's worried Temu is radicalizing boys or collecting tons of your personal data. And yes even Temu does collect data just like everyone else nowadays, but it's a shopping site; compared to a social network there's not all that much you can get out of your users or too many ways to really influence them outside of making them spend more money

So, incest?

Knowing the sort of person JR is, I absolutely wouldn't be surprised. He's a shit human

Yeah I fully believe we as a species deserve what's coming in the near future with climate change and all the instability and chaos it'll bring.

Humans are by and large fucking terrible.

And unfortunately that's going to probably lead to a whole lot of deaths in the near future

Great question, that'd really would be pretty interesting to know. The actual study results are linked in the article so you can check it out of you have the energy. I read parts of it but I can't remember what the question set was

Check out the poll, it's linked in the article. You might be surprised; here's the percentages for "IMPORTANCE OF LIVING IN A DEMOCRACY Percentage of respondents per country who say it is important to them to live in a country that is democratically governed"

They are not.

Conservatives are currently an existential threat to humanity, and they're winning because they're literal psychopaths

Not after >10 years of conservatives gutting education funding and blaming leftists for the inevitable decline of the system. Ditto with public healthcare, we have a legitimate healthcare crisis going on but they're still going to cut more. Naturally with tax cuts for the rich that are going to be offset by decimating welfare, selling government property & state-owned stock of course.

The previous all-leftist government had to take 10bn€ in loans to help deal with COVID, and at the time the right was even calling for it so they could give money to businesses.

Now they're claiming our current economic problems are purely the left's fault and the spending was irresponsible (despite having previously wanted to take on more loans), and after less than half a year they've already confirmed they'll be taking more than 10bn€ loans, just so they can give tax cuts to the rich and literally destroy the welfare system. So where leftists spent 10bn over 4 years to keep the country operational during a pandemic, the reich-wingers spent 10bn in half a year to make rich people even richer.

Conservatives are fucking evil.

I unironically do blame the internet and especially social media. Used to be that shitty people often got either "lectured" or shunned by the society around them, which seems to have created more opportunities for them to go "what the fuck was I thinking, I was so wrong". Now they go online and find millions of even worse people and feel like their ideas are actually accepted and valid in general and not just among other shitheads.