The Nazis also didn’t sterilise all foreigners. I guess it is stereotypical for the US to do everything bigger and louder than everyone else…

They somehow manage to top the Nazis

I stopped playing games in German for that exact reason, at least initially. I didn’t even care about lip sync initially (that was more a thing with movies).

By now, it has become a matter of habit, with very few exceptions that are originally German-made and have reasonable texts (like the X series of space sims or the older Anno titles). For a time, I also held on to games I’d played in German initially because I couldn’t bring myself to trade away nostalgia (like Skyrim, which I eventually switched to English for mods).

By now, I wonder how many translations might be shoddy AI slop without any native or at least deeply immersed editor to look it over.

What little contact I do have these days is because my wife tends to play in German and I occasionally catch a translation. I’ll have to check the game she’s currently playing again to look for examples, but I recall shaking my head a few times.

Valve invented the “we can violate copyright laws because it’s on a computer”

That stunt was invented by the music industry first. It was a hit with publishers. Valve helped the publishers do the same shit with video games and it’s still awful, but they weren’t the inventors.

It boils down to the same issues of predatory copyright laws that have been perverted into a twisted mockery of the good intentions they were initially supposed to serve.

What’d those fuckers do?

I mean, there’s no real individual contract negotiation. The conditions are standardised by the framework agreement. They use a standard format where they note what pay class you’re paid by according to that agreement and that’s that.

I understand the desire and reasoning to separate into “deserves the benefits of our negotiaton” and “doesn’t support us, doesn’t get anything”. For my employer, the potential advantage of individual contracts doesn’t seem to offset the added effort, so they just throw the rest in with the majority.

As for negotiating power, last time they announced a one-day warning strike after a round of negotiations failed, our CEO was quick to pay out a lump sum to everyone and assure us that they’re committed to finding a fair solution and all. Allegedly, he wasn’t actually opposed to the union’s proposition, but as I said, it’s sector-wide so other employers have to agree as well and apparently didn’t. Still, that even the threat produced a reaction (and there was no full strike after it either) indicates that the union has plenty of power.

I think many of us are aware that, member or not, we wouldn’t have these benefits if we didn’t have the union and just sign up on principle. Most of the sector is blue-collar, and I assume that a majority of them are indeed members.

Idk, isn’t arranging different employment contracts for members and non-members kinda difficult? You’d have to set up a new contract when someone joins or leaves the union.

To be clear, the overarching part the union is responsible for is a framework agreement defining paygrades, holidays and such for all the employees in the sector.

I fudged and conflated the workers’ council with the union, because ultimately, they have similar objectives in protecting workers and my point was to emphasise that good worker representation makes for a stable and pleasant enough working environment.

Unions are awesome.

I’m working in the IT department of a heavily unionised non-IT company. The contracts the union negotiates with that company (and others in the same sector) apply to all employees in those companies, including those who aren’t themselves union members.

I gotta say, pay might be better elsewhere, but I don’t have to fight for a yearly salary increase. I also don’t worry about being sick. I don’t worry about performance, because they’re not allowed to monitor it. I don’t worry about getting everything done in time either. If I’m overworked, I tell my boss and he has to see about reducing my load. Sure, might just be a good boss, but I’m pretty sure it’s also a workplace culture resulting from knowing we can’t be fired without good reason, and poor performance isn’t one (and might also land you in trouble for monitoring performance).

Many of my coworkers have been there for 20+ years, through ups and downs and management changes and structural changes and all. It’s a good, reliable employer, and a solid union helps keep it that way.

I mean, if Satan is portrayed as the Lord of Hell, him punishing people that haven’t died yet makes even less sense.

Besides, the cases of people being punished for sin in life (like drowning damn near everyone, smiting Sodom and Gomorrah or striking down Ananias for a stupid lie) I’m aware of are still all God. If anything, the Serpent would be the tempter leading people to sin.

In some places (notably Rev. 12), Satan is the accuser. That would make him part of the sinners’ punishment in the afterlife (unless Jesus intercedes on behalf of his faithful). However, I don’t think I’ve seen that framing used much in popular depictions, and it still wouldn’t make him a lord of anything.

So I don’t know of any biblical source that would make any of the entities typically conflated with the Devil the Lord of Hell and the punisher of sinners

To die for?

If you need an army of assassins, I’ll allot a lot of alots to you.

Inferno has the Devil frozen at the heart of hell, struggling in vain to break free, his beating wings producing the freezing wind that keeps him trapped. Not my idea of a ruler, to be honest.

It’s some weird misconception that, like heaven, hell needs to have some sort of ruler. Naturally, the intuitive thing is to pick the mightiest entity in there and declare it the king, because that’s kinda how we perceive kingship. Aside from the fact that literally all the entities in there are convicts imprisoned by the final judgement, at which point there’s only one eternal king left:

It’s a fucking sea of fire, what the fuck are they gonna rule?

Without knowing what else went down, a lot of diplomacy hinges on otherwise minor gestures to signal intent. Stuff like the head of state summoning the ambassador to receive an admonishment on behalf of their country isn’t technically a big deal, but it’s a safe, nonthreatening way to express discontent. It doesn’t threaten sanctions or worse, but it does demand the other take it seriously.

To extend your hand is a token of trust and good faith, or just basic respect for the other party. Snubbing it is then an act of disrespect, a breach of protocol that could end up sabotaging negotiations. Why should I trust you to negotiate in good faith, if you refuse even the most basic gesture of good faith?

But Iran clearly isn’t worried whether the US will take offence or trust them. That is the part that makes it clear who’s desperate: Iran believes and signals that belief that the US has no choice but to trust them. They can afford to be rude because the US has no effective recourse. The negotiations are going to happen on Iran’s terms, because the US needs them to happen at all.

It’s kind of a bully move, but Iran can’t exactly afford to choose the moral high ground and the US doesn’t have a leg to stand on to complain about bully moves either.

Edit to add, upon reading the article: The same logic applies to making the US delegation wait. It’s not polite, but the US needs the negotiations and accordingly their delegation will grit their teeth and wait rather than making their indignation clear by walking out.

Doing it for the event would set a precedent. Next you know, they’ll expect that to continue when it’s over. How am I going to make them bend over backwards for customers and bear all kinds of abuse with an apologetic deference just so they don’t risk their income? People might stop coming in to hurl insults at my employees while giving me money for the opportunity.

Thanks for the added details!

The image says “It is now safe to turn off your computer”

Disobedience takes a lot of courage. Unfortunately, that seems to be in short supply right now.

Any rule (legal, moral, social) is only ever worth as much as its enforcement. Beyond that, it’s a mere suggestion. If people obey him, whether his commands are legal is academical. They certainly are effective.

In this case, it probably is “Domain Specific Language”. If you’re unfamiliar, that means it’s created for a very specific context, unlike other, more general languages. That means you can keep the set of features small and save a lot of time making complex stuff work that isn’t relevant to that context.

Loops are complex stuff. If you don’t really need them, you’re better off just keeping your language linear.

On the other hand, they’re neat. Can’t be that bad, can it?