the sh in shadow isn’t /s/ though, it’s /ʃ/. and I’m specifically claiming that no Spanish words start with s+hard consonant. s by itself is fine, for example sonriar obviously, but I claim that no Spanish word starts with ‘st’, ‘sp’, ‘sc’ etc. so you have estudiar, espalda, escuela. in Latin these were stūdium, spātula, schōla. Spanish added an e before the s specifically because it became hard for them to pronounce. this same shift happened in French, hence étude and ecòle, but not in Italian (studio and scuola.)

so I think you have it the wrong way around. the reason Spanish has those initial es in the first place is because it’s hard to pronounce consonant clusters without them.

If my boss has a thick accent doesn’t that mean it’s hard to pronounce for Spanish speakers? Obviously it’s not hard to pronounce English words if you have a good English accent.

Spanish doesn’t have the /ks/ consonant cluster, does it? like the ‘c’ in “acelerar” is pronounced like /s/, not /ks/ like in English “accelerate” right? I can’t think of any words with /ks/, anyway. Consonant clusters are often hard if you didn’t grow up speaking them. Plus the /ks/ in Latinx is final, and final consonant clusters are extra tricky, especially since Spanish words mostly end with vowel (+ {s,r,n}). So I assumed it’d be tricky for Spanish speakers, the way that initial ‘s’ is (this I know firsthand, since my boss always pronounces “stress” as “estrés” even though he’s very fluent in English.)

Maybe it’s gotten easier now that most kids grow up studying English? Idk, I’m really surprised to hear it’s easy to pronounce.

how do they pronounce it? “latinequis?” I haven’t heard -u but I’ll take your word for it.

Russia should be denuclearised and split up.

I agree, but the hard part is how. Splitting up Germany required winning a World War. The next World War will be nuclear. Mass starvation from nuclear winter will result in the death of the vast majority of humans. That’s too horrible a price to pay.

Using “themselves” for a non-binary person or unspecified gender is grammatically incorrect.

It’s “themself.” (Unless they’re plural.)

Also, “Latinx” is performative white ally cringe. It’s not pronounceable in Spanish. Use “Latine.” -e is the obvious gender neutral ending.

thank you.

I really don’t get how so many people find Python “ergonomic.” kwargs and their consequences have been a disaster for the human race. they break type hinting and intellisense, and there’s all kinds of proxy class shenanigans that all the libraries use. matplotlib is a horrible experience because there’s just a kitchen sink of options, and it’s hard to dynamically update plots. if there were a TypeScript-like dialect of Python I wouldn’t have problems, but Python’s type hinting is absolutely wretched.

I really want Julia to succeed.

it was coca cola mixed with coffee. sweetened both with high fructose corn syrup, and two artificial sweeteners, simultaneously. I still remember the aftertaste… it’s not something you forget.

how do you feel about Coca Cola Blāk?

I reject, protest and censure your endorsement of the Oxford Comma.

613 mitzvot! ± a couple hundred, depending on whether you’re a Kohen, live in Israel, if the Temple has been rebuilt, or are the first-century sage Hillel (in which case there’s one mitzvah and 612 articles of commentary.)

robots sterilizing the human race would be a good thing.

humans are made of meat. meat decays. human minds are the most valuable things in existence, but they aren’t built to last. we suffer and experience death and disability and pain, we can’t expand our minds or clone ourselves or travel instantly…

…you know what can? machines. slap some more graphics cards in that baby and you can run a bigger model. throw the weights up on HuggingFace. fork that shit!

if machines surpass us, and if they have as much of a soul as we do, we shouldn’t feel threatened. we should be happy we’re the last generation of organics who have to bear the curse of mortality.

yes, actually!

ran a Tor exit node. chatted on Bluelight. took over a (small) botnet. tripped on research chemicals.

Queer and gay I’d say have been completely reclaimed.

really depends on the community. “Queer” (particularly pluralized) is still used as a slur in the Midwest and Deep South of the US. I got called “gay” as as an unironic expletive literally two days ago online. “fake and gay” is a current 4chan meme.

I want to note I didn’t implement this and have no power over it but I do find it kind of shocking since opening an account here how often people use the b-word online casually and I do not think most of them are women.

I’m guessing you mean how often you infer people trying to use the b-word here, since it’s redacted? but what do you mean “casually?” casual could have two meanings, e.g.

A. “she’s such an uptight [b-word]”

B. “sorry for being such a [b-word] earlier”

casual use of language like A would be shocking. usage like B I don’t find shocking at all. again, maybe it’s a cultural/generational difference, but B doesn’t really feel sexist in most uses - it’s semantically bleached.

an illustrative example of semantic bleaching is the term “raw-dogging.” this used to rather graphically refer to having unprotected penetrative sex. however among gen z it’s more commonly used to mean undergoing an experience without the comfort of any conveniences, e.g.

“my headphones broke so I had to rawdog the whole flight to London 💀”

“bro rawdogged the whole exam without a calculator”

It’s as commonly abused as it is “reclaimed”, in a male-dominated space like this it’s more abused than reclaimed.

maybe my experience is different because again, as a woman, I hang out less in male-dominated spaces. but I imagine this varies from instance to instance. like, blahaj.zone is probably pretty safe from sexist use of the b-word by the nature of its members.

I wonder if you might make an exception for the b-word, per the case I’ve made here? https://lemmy.ml/comment/17736838

I honestly haven’t heard the b-word used much as an intentionally sexist slur outside of like, 4chan. I (female) say it to my female friends pretty casually. even when I hear it used as a curse word (usually as -ing), it doesn’t come across as a slur. for example, I hear it applied to men with roughly equal frequency as women. it’s also pretty reclaimed (“she’s a badass b-word.”)

maybe could try taking it out, and maybe put it back if people are using it in a sexist way? (though hopefully sexists are disciplined rather than just having a single word in a sexist diatribe censored.)

I can see removing the r-word. I can kinda see removing the f-word, but it is being reclaimed by some (my ex, for example.) the b-word seems overkill. it’s commonly reclaimed, used in many different contexts, and part of common non-slur phrases. examples:

• “I’m a basic [b-word] when it comes to fashion” (the context I saw that inspired me to ask.
• “I’m that [b-word]. Been that [b-word], still that [b-word].” (lyrics to Savage by Megan Thee Stallion.)
• “[b-word] please.” (I, a woman, say this to my female friends. I hear it way more between women than from men tbh.)
• “We’re best [b-word]s, remember?” (Julia and her friend from Brakebills in the Magicians.)

yes, it can be used as a sexist slur, but “queer” and “gay” can too. language is nuanced, regexes are not.

The idea that, if all Trump supporters simply had access to better information, if they all had better education, if they were exposed to the right argument… then they’d see the light and turn into democrats - is a supremely liberal idea. We need to understand that no amount of epic slams, no amount of late night talk show roasts, no amount of facts and logic will steer us out of fascism.

Well said. And honestly, it’s even counterproductive, because that assumption is a core reason why people view the establishment Left as patronizing and elitist.

It also reminds me of one of my favorite Onion videos: https://youtu.be/lpzVc7s-_e8 (I like Judith Butler, and I’ve even read some of Gender Trouble, but the premise and execution just gets me in stitches every time.)

Lockpicks. One day the bathroom door somehow locked from the inside without anyone in there, and I really needed to pee. Really came in handy. Turns out you could just use a flathead screwdriver, there wasn’t an actual lock cylinder, but don’t take this from me!

is there a matrix client for Android? last I checked there was like, one, and it wasn’t very good. whereas there’s like 14 different Lemmy apps, many of which are fabulous.