- 107 Posts
- 443 Comments
58008@lemmy.worldto
Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world•What books are your favourite and what are you reading now?English
1·1 day agoCurrently reading Murderland: Crime and Bloodlust in the Time of Serial Killers by Caroline Fraser

The thesis of the book is basically that environmental pollution, particularly lead, might be the thing that caused so many serial killers to pop up during the period of the late '60s to the late '70s. Only half way through it so far, and not quite convinced by the theory yet. Although it’s indisputable that such pollution can damage brains to a severe degree, I’m just not sure how you get from “damaged” to “I’d better serial kill some women”. Random violence and anger management issues, sure. But the highly specific and MO-driven criminality of serials killers seems like something else entirely. We’ll see what evidence comes in later chapters!
EDIT: Finished. Yeah, sounds like complete bullshit to me. She was even attributing the existence of the Bloods and the Crips to smog, for fuck’s sake. It’s as though she’s genuinely unable to imagine any reason for any violence other than pollution-induced brain damage.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Technology@lemmy.world•UK culture minister quits X over ‘abuse and misinformation’English
7·6 days agoThat any government or public figure would subject the public to X’s cesspool in order to contact or keep up with them is as fucked up as the platform itself. It’d be less fucked up to paste government news bulletins onto the walls of a crackhouse.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world•Do you block accounts that post with very high frequency?English
7·7 days agoI think I blocked a couple of accounts years ago that were just reposting ancient memes from reddit in bot-like numbers. But it seems like the majority of content here falls under that category, so blocking seems futile. Can’t even use downvoting to correct the issue because our votes aren’t private/anonymous here and I don’t need a large account seeing that I downvote their content every time I come across it. It would have to feel personal at that point 😆
I don’t mind big accounts in principle, I just don’t want to see memes from 2018 being reposted every day with the same titles, and for there to be no other content from those accounts.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Not The Onion@lemmy.world•Man claiming world’s smallest penis says he’s booked enhancement surgery after public’s helpEnglish
14·7 days agoA brave man and a necessary conversation about the casual shaming of people’s genitalia.
58008@lemmy.worldto
PC Gaming@lemmy.ca•Steam Machine's "Red Line of Death" [dubbed as "major hardware fault" by Eurogamer] single occurrence, resolved by keeping unplugged for a night.English
5·7 days agoSomething went wrong, just wish we knew what.
I’ll be curious to see how the OP OP’s machine is doing a few weeks from now, and if the error pops up again.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Lemmy Shitpost@lemmy.world•This guy managed the movie theater I worked at in high school.English
5·7 days agoLookin’ like Vic Mackey’s stunt dummy.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Technology@lemmy.world•Google kills Tenor GIF API, forcing changes at X, Discord, and moreEnglish
37·11 days agoWhatever replaces Tenor needs to allow for more specificity in searching. If I search “lemur” and I see 3 orangutans, a chimp and a 12 gibbons, and maybe 1 actual lemur, I’m still happy to have simians, but I really needed a lemur, man. I was quite fucking specific in my search term. Had I written “monkey” but it showed me a series of apes, I wouldn’t mind that so much.
Also, “cat on skateboard” has fuck all to do with a poorly staged video of a dog playing Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater with a set of gaming bongos. Again, glad to see it, but where’s my skateboarding cat??
I think Morgan Freeman is his painting of Dorian Gray. That poor fucker was born looking like an 80-year-old man.
I had a hilarious dream just last night! Remember recently when Quentin Tarantino was talking shit about the acting skills of Paul Dano? I dreamt that Paul was in a new movie, and was acting hard, like, really giving it insane levels of energy, and after every line he delivered he’d glance at the camera with an expression of exasperation on his face, as if to say “is THAT good enough for you, ya cunt??” directly to Tarantino.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world•Are there any websites from the 90s that you can remember but can find no trace of now?English
5·11 days agoSome early shock/gore site discussion below, spoilered in case you don’t wanna read about such things.
spoiler
rotten.com - nasty website hosting bizarre and violent tableaus of human suffering, pretty tame by today’s standards though.
steakandcheese.com - another shock site, it hosted a clip that became quite infamous, showing a Russian soldier having his throat stabbed and cut by a Chechen rebel. I feel like that clip was a rubicon for the internet; after that, things got darker and more extreme, and now you can literally find clips of people being skinned alive. But that clip for sure ruined many a childhood.
When the internet was first introduced to me in around '97 or so, in IT class in high school, the only thing I really did was look for URLs on products around the class or in my pockets. For example, Pepsi had a website, Peperami had one too. I also created an email account on Hotmail.com, and I believe we did some chat room stuff in IRC or ICQ or one of those things.
One day during a lunch break at the same school, I looked up porn and actually found some, although I have no memory of what the site was called. I got scared though, and closed the browser as soon as I saw nudey ladies. I’m sure the teacher checked the browsing history (something I had no idea about back then) and saw what I was looking at, but he never said anything to me about it. Legend 🫡
58008@lemmy.worldto
Not The Onion@lemmy.world•Texas makes Bible passages required reading for millions of public school studentsEnglish
14·15 days agoThat book is filled with rape, genocide and lots (and I mean LOTS) of genital mutilation. I don’t know why they’d want kids reading it. Especially when the people forcing it on students are the same ones trying to ban books about being kind to gay people.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world•What TV shows are absolutely worth watching?English
9·15 days agoI’m sure the obvious picks are already mentioned, so I’ll try to think of some stuff that might not be well-known:
Shane Meadows has produced 2 TV series worth watching. One is the This is England collection. It starts with This is England (2006), which is a film, then 3 miniseries (This is England '86, This is England '88 and This is England '90) that continue the story. All of it together is about as good as TV gets. Might wanna check for triggers before watching on something like doesthedogdie.com.
He made a second miniseries called The Virtues. It’s a difficult watch at times, but it’s a masterpiece. And it’s another one you might wanna look into before watching.
There’s a show that was very popular in the UK and Ireland back in the '90s called Cracker. It stars the late great Robbie Coltrane (you probably know him better as Hagrid from Harry Potter). He plays a psychologist who works with the police to find and interrogate various kinds of pathological killers and sex offenders. It’s really, really good. Unfortunately I don’t think it’s ever been released on anything but DVD, so you’ll be stuck with SD quality.
Say Nothing is a recent show that does a really nice job of dealing with ‘the troubles’ in N. Ireland. It’s based on real events, the most central of which is the abduction, murder and ‘disappearing’ of a widowed mother of 10 children by the IRA. Jean McConville is one of 17 people who were disappeared in this way, and is by far the most notorious given her circumstances. The story - based on the book by Patrick Radden Keef - follows Dolours Price, a female IRA member who was a significant figure in the conflict and who was involved in Jean McConville’s abduction. One of the better shows I’ve seen generally, and probably the best bit of media on the N. Irish troubles (there’s so much junk about this place, it’s refreshing to see something half-decent for once). If you need a palate cleanser after watching it, Derry Girls should do the trick!
58008@lemmy.worldto
Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world•What's one highly extolled piece of media that you absolutely cannot stand in any way shape or form.English
1·16 days agoI agree about Ricky Gervais. I actually liked him in The Office, but in everything else - before and after - he is just fucking awful. Talk shows, stand-up, speeches, podcasting, he is a desperate, strained and insecure performer. When he’s telling a joke, it’s like every word has had to be pressed out of a gland with a clenched fist before the next word can be milked free; it’s clear he’s just saying the words in the correct order, and not performing it. He is never present and ‘in the moment’, and seems to be in a perpetual state of panic about his own inadequacy. If he were actually a decent person instead of whatever the fuck he has become, I wouldn’t be saying this about him. But he’s a cunt, so, yeah. His imposter syndrome (which is entirely deserved in his case) makes the media he’s in unbearable to consume.
To see just how truly awful the man is, watch that Talking Funny documentary. It’s him, Jerry Seinfeld (the least-funny paedophile in the world), Chris Rock and Louie CK all in a room together talking about comedy. Ricky is obviously feeling the full force of his imposter syndrome throughout. It’s probably the most glaring example of what I’m talking about.
I simply don’t get his success. Like, I can understand the success of paedophile rings, but I can’t fathom how Ricky has made it so big. One of life’s great mysteries, I guess.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Ask Lemmy@lemmy.world•Whats the most disgusting thing you've ever put in your mouth?English
841·16 days agoMy girlfriend-at-the-time’s dirty, dirty ass. Thought it would be like in my fantasies, where it tastes like candyfloss and smells like a Yankee candle. Nope. Shit. Just shit.
If you’re curious, shit tastes exactly as it smells. I wish I didn’t know that. Although I’m happy that now you, too, know that.
And she had the nerve to dump me later. I deserve a Nobel peace prize for not recoiling in horror and instead just powering through in silence like a fucking GENTLEMAN.
On the bright side, it became a great way to ensure future partners were cognisant of the issue. I’d drop it into the usual “what was your ex like?” gossip sessions that come with new relationships. It’s like saying “please wash your various holes if I’m gonna go rooting around in them like an ant-fiending aardvark” without actually saying it. A cautionary fable from days of yore to guide the next generation.
P.S. I’m still pro-anilingus. Just… clean the fuckin’ thing first. I don’t need to be picking dingleberries from between my teeth, thanks.
58008@lemmy.worldto
Patient Gamers@sh.itjust.works•Weekly Recommendations Thread: What are you playing this week?English
31·17 days agoSubnautica: Below Zero, the underrated and I would argue superior semi-sequel to Subnautica (not referring to the recent Subnautica 2 Early Access game):
https://store.steampowered.com/app/848450/Subnautica_Below_Zero/
And another run of Dave the Diver in prep for the recent DLC drop:
58008@lemmy.worldto
Technology@lemmy.world•Wikipedia Cofounder Larry Sanger Banned From Site for ‘Canvassing’English
35·18 days agoI read his “contributions” to the Gaza genocide article’s talk page, along with the equally mealy-mouthed hand-wringing of Jimmy Wales. Total bellends both, although for different reasons. Jimmy is pressured into being an annoying grandstanding dickhead by Israeli interests, whereas Larry’s pressured into being an annoying grandstanding dickhead by his childhood.
Bowfinger!
58008@lemmy.worldto
Technology@lemmy.world•Former Unreal Engine 'lead evangelist' Sjoerd De Jong leaves Epic Games, says the industry is reaching a 'pivotal' moment that he must 'come to terms with'English
31·19 days agoWas there ever a time when PC Gamer wasn’t utter shit? Like, what the fuck is this article even saying? And what justification do they have to tag the end of Sjoerd’s LinkedIn quote with info about UE’s move into AI slop?
Is this what games journalism is now? Stalking LinkedIn pages and reporting when 2 lines of text are edited? And then drawing conclusions not at all supported by said text? 😒
I think what he did was heroic. I don’t know for sure that his motives were pure, like I can’t see into his soul, or know what his relationship with Russia was before doing it, but all in all I think what he revealed had to be revealed. The NSA were untethered by any sort of oversight or accountability to the public, and they proved beyond any doubt just how completely and totally an agency loses it’s fucking mind when no one’s watching. I doubt anything changed in that regard - they’ve probably just strafed into a different shadowy part of the landscape and are continuing with new/improved tools - but it at least taught us all that, yes, the government really is both capable and motivated to spy on every bowel movement and armpit sniff you perform, whether or not you’re a suspect in a crime. The mere affirmation that this sort of thing really goes on is worth having.













I really want to know what “science” he was banking on here. Like, how does this injection work, according to him? I assume he chose gold (as opposed to lead or tin) because he has gawdy Trumpesque notions of success and opulence, but what the fuck does injecting it do (again, according to him)? 🤔