I had a unique upbringing. My father was an illiterate dyslexic (and maybe autistic himself) and he is fuckin weird - to put bluntly. That side of my family never really understood neurodivergence per-se, but they understood that everyone’s a little weird - but we embraced that we’re VERY weird. Hanging out with my dad’s extended family is a lot of flailing, weird humor, and zany shenanigans and they embraced every moment.

My mother by contrast was more “abled” but she relished the “weirdness” that my father had in spades. Her own family had a bit of a zany streak as well - with my maternal Grandfather very obviously being undiagnosed autistic and having his own brand of severely understated and jump-scare humor.

Masking was entirely unnecessary in my family - and I can recognize the state pretty easily. It’s more mentally relaxed, less hypervigilant, and generally more comfortable.

It was great not having to mask in my childhood - until I went to school and it suddenly wasn’t a good thing.

Learning my masks was an absolutely agonizing process because “being myself” wasn’t acceptable “out there”. I felt so out of place compared to my peers. I was also bullied relentlessly to the point of PTSD. My masks eventually became automatic through the tumultuous times. It wasn’t until my diagnosis in my early 30’s that I even began to understand what it all was, and start deconstructing the masks.

Unmasking was as easy as accessing a “younger” me and simply not caring about the social results. (to a point)

For my echolalia, I don’t hold back my vocal stimming anymore. I used to feel embarrassed and self conscious around it. Now I embrace it and have fun with it. Will you get movie trailer voice me or death metal voice me? Who knows!? Will I throw a random phrase using an English accent into an otherwise monotone statement, yoooouuu bet!

For my special interests, I LET my excitement bubble over. Sure, I might need to regain my composure from time to time, but hiding my excitement about these things nearly destroyed me. I try not to be hyper-focused though so as to allow natural conversational flow, but I also don’t overly police myself anymore.

There’s a few other things, but it’s hard to reflect on them all.

Ultimately I’m unsure how helpful my experience is to others - it’s a bit unique having a deep family culture of being really weird. I think that really helps me put my guard down and unmask. If I didn’t have these memories, finding my unmasked state would be a LOT harder.

Even on Windows, Proton drive is hot garbage. It never syncs my files correctly. Has a tendency to leave half encrypted uploads just lying around. Eating up desk space.

Don’t even get me started on how long it takes to upload anything. Got a 1 GB file? Good luck!

And that’s before getting into the fact that it’s proton’s third product. It was announced in 2019. 5 years and they still don’t have proton drive as a working product.

Another gripe I have is that the Linux VPN client still doesn’t support wireguard. Sure, you can download wireguard configuration files. And they work just fine. But changing servers is a pain in the ass because of it.

It’s made me seriously consider dropping my visionary plan and moving to a more competent provider.

That being said, proton mail has been fantastic. And I have a ton of domains on it. So it would be a pain to move. I guess I’m just in a stalemate.

Oh yes, totally understood. I’ve seen families destroyed from sports gambling and other, less boisterous forms of it.

If I like anything, it’s scratchers and it’s because they’re soooooo satisfying to “play”. But it’s only something I indulge in occasionally.

Anyways, I tried to get into MMO’s back in the early days with all my friends. I tired of it fairly quickly. I guess the novelty seeking part of my brain overwhelmingly rejects typical “gambling” mechanics. Loot boxes don’t do anything for me and never have.

More recently I’ve grown completely frustrated with franchises like Forza Horizon and their little slot machine / skinner box mechanic. I love racing games, but it made me stop playing.

I can be addicted to things, but it just isn’t gambling for me somehow.

I do resent MMO’s for destroying so many of my friend’s lives though. Weird to lose people to that ecosystem, it’s the video game equivalent to losing someone to an MLM.

Also fuuuuuck, MLMs, almost did the “vector marketing” (cutco cutlery) and “rainbow vacuum” thing - the only thing that saved me was that Youtube had existed for like 5 years by then and there was enough people out there with their stories.

I never understood this one. I have ADHD and autism and I find gambling boring as hell. With maybe the exception of blackjack. Where my autistic brain tries to count cards.

I remember the day I turned 21. I decided to try out a casino. I spent $50 there and promptly left. Maybe I just lucked out and they didn’t hook me with an easy win early on?

I’d much rather spend $50 on a video game that I can entertain myself with for hours.

One unique tip that I have is to go to a CBD/Hemp store and snag some CBD heavy strains to mix in with your normal bud. Making sure to increase the % of CBD each time you grind.

It might not help immediately, since CBD is supposed to be a calming substance, not a stimulant. But quitting smoking is a whole lot easier once you are mostly on the CBD stuff.

Definitely avoid the CBG heavy hemp as that’ll just give you the gnarliest munchies you’ll ever have in your life. Some people swear it’s “smart weed” - but for me I can’t think straight when munchies are knocking.

I’m really surprised no one mentioned Terra Invicta!

Basically if the Three Body Problem series was a Grand strategy game.

In terms of grand strategy it is quite grand. So massive and complex that even 100 hours in, I haven’t completed a game.

That being said, it’s so addicting. I haven’t really played any other Sci-Fi games where you can take over multiple countries on Earth, take over other bodies in the solar system, and field space Navy to defend the planet.

I understand the sentiment… But… This is a terribly reasoned and researched article. We only need to look at the NASA to see how this is flawed.

Blown Capacitors/Resistors, Solder failing over time and through various conditions, failing RAM/ROM/NAND chips. Just because the technology has less “moving parts” doesn’t mean its any less susceptible to environmental and age based degradation. And we only get around those challenges by necessity and really smart engineers.

The article uses an example of a 2014 Model S - but I don’t think it’s fair to conflate 2 Million Kilometers in the span of 10 years, vs the same distance in the span of the quoted 74 years. It’s just not the same. Time brings seasonal changes which happen regardless if you drive the vehicle or not. Further, in many cases, the car computers never completely turn off, meaning that these computers are running 24/7/365. Not to mention how Tesla’s in general have poor reliability as tracked by multiple third parties.

Perhaps if there was an easy-access panel that allowed replacement of 90% of the car’s electronics through standardized cards, that would go a long way to realizing a “Buy it for Life” vehicle. Assuming that we can just build 80 year, “all-condition” capacitors, resistors, and other components isn’t realistic or scalable.

Whats weird is that they seem to concede the repairability aspect at the end, without any thought whatsoever as to how that impacts reliability.

In Conclusion: A poor article, with a surface level view of reliability, using bad examples (One person’s Tesla) to prop up a narrative that EVs - as they exist - could last forever if companies wanted.

Yeah, we suspect my sister is either Borderline or NPD. This is exactly the post she might make equating acceptance for neurodivergent personalities with her own traits that actively hurts others.

And it’s to the point that many posters fell for it. I saw this thread much earlier and just couldn’t view this as a good-faith statement to even start from - so I didn’t engage.

Kinda wish the rest of the fediverse didn’t engage with it - I certainly don’t view it as an “important conversation” it’s laughably manufactured and in bad faith. I have a sense that Beehaw’s admin response artificially inflated the importance of this as well.

Quick question, who in the heck is benefiting from this discussion? To me it looks like the trolls are getting the most out of it.

I have personal experience with these “churches” after my time in Portland. They were far and away worse than the homeless. They will harass and abuse you on the street ESPECIALLY if you dare express cynicism towards their spiel.

They will follow you, and verbally abuse you unless you bee-line straight for a police station too.

Why these charlatans are able to masquerade as a religion I’ll never know…