Real, honest question here: how are they defining “hardship”? That’s a huge range of subjective circumstances there.

To be clear, I’m not going to fire back by saying “well, that’s justifiable”. Rather, I’m curious where said “shitstains” are coming from and how they frame their choices. I only have the broad strokes here, and would love some more nuance to this story, however anecdotal. Cheers.

I blame the system.

There are parts of the country that prop up a rather sinister dichotomy: live here and flirt with the poverty line, or enlist and better your economic prospects (and maybe take a bullet). You can see these outcomes in the faces of the homeless, the working poor, and veterans that are functional members of society. Our society does the rest by having almost no social safety net, lavishing the wealthy with praise, and vilifying poor people, all at the same time. Lastly, recruitment targets 18-22 year olds, which are people whose brains are in the final years of their developmental cycle, and have not yet begun to understand how the rest of the world works. This all operates together to push people towards putting on a uniform.

Solve any of the problems above and the comic will start to look like a thing of the past.

Edit: While we’re on the topic, the IT industry has a tidy white-collar equivalent: You can make more money and get more job security, but you have to be indifferent about how your work is used. Usually, the more ethically grey (or outright evil) the job, the more it pays.

Goddamn. That might actually be worth it.

Well, now I wanna know. How much money is worth life-altering injuries, including a concussion?

Yeah, all I know are the occasional bits and pieces that wash up here on Lemmy. I knew he was bad news, but I didn’t know he was a trumper. Wow.

IMO: pack as much of your day with “active novelty” as you can. Even if it’s small stuff.

Kids experience time more slowly because everything is new to them. As adults, much of our world becomes familiar and, frankly, forgettable. It’s the lack of newness that lets time just pass by in our minds since the day’s memories get pruned to hell, letting entire days just get black-holed.

So my advice is do more than just touch grass; live life fully. Don’t just follow your favorite streaming programs, engage with other fans. Get out and join a club. Go to more parks, museums, live shows, craft fairs, summer festivals. Invest in the people in your life. Host and attend more movie nights, cocktail mixers, holiday parties. Listen to new music, listen to new podcasts, read new books. Double-down on hobbies or take on new ones. Finish projects on that todo list. Engage with nostalgia, but mix it up with new things too. Find new challenges and try new things to make sure that is or isn’t for you.

Every time.

I have left this as an exercise for the reader.

Fixed:

These are the same ppl I drive down the highway with

PSA: it’s now practically Winter here in the northern hemisphere. Be aware that everyone you see driving with their front, side, and/or rear windows covered in ice, is someone that thinks that full visibility in those directions is optional. If you’ve ever wondered why it seems like you’re sharing the road with crazy people, take a moment to observe the portion of the population telling on themselves. Stay safe out there.

I feel like there’s room for a youtube series about how this is all around us.

“Good Enough: how engineering works in the real world.”

Honestly, I kind of needed this. Thanks, OP.

FTA:

Many of the passages are longer than 600 yards (550 meters) and tall enough for an adult to walk through without bending.

Checks out.

I cannot overstate the impact the mid-nineties had on GPAs across the board.

This picture doesn’t even show the full depth and breadth of the PC market at the time. Arcades had some strong offerings at this time, too.

This one: https://www.youtube.com/@NotJustBikes

What in the actual three-ring-fuck is going on in this picture?

I know that church doesn’t have to be as solemn as a funeral, but still… unless these production levels are generating millions for charity, I can’t imagine how people are just okay with this.

I really don’t understand why.

Anti-Microsoft ideologues, mostly. Giving MS any quarter is antithetical to their chosen axe to grind. Pay them no mind.

I’m waaaaayyyyy too orange-pilled for this. Both images are wrong.

But we do have a QA department. I’ll leave it to the reader to decide if that’s humane or not.

Honestly, a Japanese-style capsule hotel and net cafe would probably do very well in a university environment.

Granted, that’s still charging people for homelessness, which doesn’t help any of the underlying problems. It’s just slightly less dystopian since it’s cheap.