I can agree with that. I think the discussions in the niche communities are way better than the ones happening at the top of my All feeds so I would encourage anyone to just stick to their favorite communities, understand what is or isn't acceptable there, and just lurk in the big communities.

I've been feeling like it's been getting better, not worse. But maybe I'm not engaging in the posts where my thoughts are seen as controversial anymore.

I was insecure about a lot up until about my last year of college. I didn't really overcome anything directly, but I did find a few things I could be proud of. I was able to look at myself and say I had a few things going for me, and so I began to like myself as a person, which I hadn't been able to say before. I still have most of the stuff I'm insecure about but it just doesn't affect me because I focus on the things I'm proud of.

Once you achieve that inner confidence, I believe it will display itself for others too, and you'll feel like less people notice or think about the things you're insecure about.

We also use it in gaming to say you made a silly mistake that costed you the victory.

Great point! I considered that when I started learning and have spoken to it with my colleagues here who are also learning the language as well as Basotho- native speakers. Basotho who speak English fluently mostly agree that English has a broader vocabulary.

I've observed that Sesotho relies on tone and emphasis on parts of words more than English. There isn't a whole lot of writing in Sesotho so I can imagine that the language hasn't needed to develop ways to be descriptive that couldn't be delivered with one's voice.

Moreover, when I speak with Basotho that aren't very proficient in English, I notice they very freely use words that a native English speaker would consider extreme, such as "perfect," for mundane things because there is no explicit difference in Sesotho between "perfect" and merely "very good."

The video I linked gets into it a bit that English is helped by being an amalgamation of several languages, and thus inherits multiple ways of describing a concept.

Gotten the hang of Southern Sotho at this point, and one thing that strikes me is how exact I can be with English and how I've always taken for granted how much access we have to things that allow us to give our words different meanings and implications. It just doesn't exist to that extent in many other languages. It's like when you hear the Eskimos have 50 words for snow or whatever. I don't know if it's true or not, but those words would describe different states or types of snow that speakers of that language recognize as distinct.

Also I watched this recently: https://youtu.be/NJYoqCDKoT4?si=Ppsm10i4ovI6M99g

To his credit, the trailer does make it look like Kevin Hart is making a genuine attempt to play Roland from the game. Still a weird casting decision.

May I ask where this is from?

So be it, I guess. If that turns out to be unrealistic I would just have to be careful about the content of the messages I send. Discord and WhatsApp have to go, obviously, but I think I could convince most of my friends and family to download Signal if push came to shove. Maybe I could look into hosting a small Matrix instance if I felt comfortable with whatever risks would come with that.

I don't think a second Trump administration is going to force me into complete anonymity, at least not overnight. I do want to commit to keeping my finger on the pulse so to speak, and staying a step ahead of whatever threats to my rights may be introduced. I have friends that would be much more threatened by Trump 2 than myself so if I can familiarize myself with these tools then I think I can help them feel safer.

First I'll do whatever I can to be sure my communications and whereabouts aren't trackable, tell my friends how to contact me, and recommend they use the same channels anyway.

Then I'll find protests to go to and local campaigns to support however I see fit, and I'll do that right up to the point where I feel unsafe, at which point I don't know how I procede.

Thanks, I'll have a look at both.

Could you recommend something to read?

Very cool. I've been a Wu-Tang fan for a while but I had no idea RZA wqs advocating for these things.

Eh, I'm trying to travel. Don't get me wrong I give my best effort to PC's missions but we're not really set up to do that which the general public might imagine we do.

Meanwhile I have about 7 months before I return to the US and the idea of finding a real job is so terrifying I thought to turn to askLemmy for inspiration lol

I really appreciate this take. Sounds like you've found a good situation. I'm sure there's not really a perfect job so you'll always have to compromise on something.

May I ask what you do? Or at least what industry you're working in?

Sort of? I'm on Peace Corps service for now and in some ways it's really awesome, but at the end of the day the actual work is with the government and it feels like actually doing anything out here is like trying to run with a ball and chain.

I like to give it a good drizzle but it doesn't use a significant amount of the ketchup. Nowhere near half the bottle.

Depends on the amount of mac, surely? Are we talking an aluminum pan for a party, or just a bowl for one person?

Either way if you can get your hands on some Whataburger Spicy Ketchup you should try using that.

It's not the wild west anymore. The politics are bad, but people are mostly the same as anywhere else. Maybe you should visit.