I don’t remove responsibility from the people, but don’t pretend that companies don’t spend piles of cash on marketing when it has absolutely no influence on their customers’ purchasing decisions. Also, don’t pretend that marketing isn’t pandering to appeal and not function.

You can buy a bottle of sparkling wine for $20.

So what you’re saying is that marketing provides a sober, unbiased presentatiin of the benefits and drawbacks of the products they’re trying to sell, and people make rational, informed decisions? No, like you said, most people behave little better than monkeys, and marketing caters to that, further skewing the norms and pushing people to buy things based on perceived benefits while ignoring the real drawbacks. Next you’ll tell me the prescription opioid epidemic wasn’t exacerbated by the claims that the new opioids were less addictive and pharmaceutical companies incentivizing doctors to prescribe them more than necessary, a lot of words that boil down to ‘marketing’.

You also ignore the role marketing has to play in convincing people that they need those things. Most people don’t need an SUV, let alone a truck, yet I see plenty of people driving these, and even thinking they’re safer than sedans. But they cost more money, which means more profit, and why would it be surprising that people who sell something with a relatively inelastic market want to maximize profit dollars per sale?

The only thing I like cooked spinach for is spinach dip. It’s acceptable as a layer in things like lasagna, but I won’t complain if it isn’t there.

240v wiring is common in Canada and the US, just not all outlets, and until recently not usually in garages. I expect 240v outlets in garages to be more standard in the future.

But, creepy or no, posting on a public forum and not using throwaway accounts and then being surprised that people actually reference your posting history is hopelessly naive.

A lot of things happen in the developed world that serve no purpose besides economics. Phones could be made to last twice as long, and aren’t getting dramatically better from one generation to the next. We could build houses to last a century instead of 50 years for little more cash. We could make clothes that last longer, but then fashion would have to take a back seat to function. We have much more efficient lighting, but they are also designed to break more often than they could so more light bulbs can be sold. Cars could be made more efficient, and non-car transportation could be incentivized. We could fix food supply/distribution issues so there is less food waste. We could use more efficient, non-fossil methods of heating and cooling our homes, which should also be better insulated so they also cost less to heat or cool.

We may not be able to have 8 billion people living in the lap of luxury, but we could have 8 billion people with a place to live, food to eat, access to a green space to enjoy the outdoors, and access to the rest of the world through modern communications.

The cello work in Barenaked Ladies’ The Flag is so soothing for such a sad song.

Their navy does need to be enlarged…

And to that, I’ll reiterate my second paragraph previously.

There are certainly issues with sport categories that are designed to be for something other than the elite in their field, but I don’t expect nuance from the same groups that banned a boxer because she wasn’t sufficiently attractive.

So this test probably won’t catch someone who is XY, but missing the SRY gene. I’m not sure if it will detect a mutated SRY gene, and I don’t pretend to be an expert. I also can’t be sure if thos test will catch someone who is XX with an SRY gene, which is also a thing, nor if it will catch XX/XY mosaicism. And those are the easy ones.

The fact of the matter is, internationally competitive athletes are a group of 0.1% or less, and people with abnormal sex genes, let alone abnormal genes in general, fall into the 0.5% to 1% category. What do you think the overlap is in two groups of outliers?

Edit: Extra reading. Note the 24 genetic variations (that we know of) that count as intersex.

Sure, but do you think that’s the test they’re doing? Are they testing for the various SRY mutations? Multiple X chromosomes? Multiple Y? Genes that impact hormone regulation?

There are certainly issues with sport categories that are designed to be for something other than the elite in their field, but I don’t expect nuance from the same groups that banned a boxer because she wasn’t sufficiently attractive.

I don’t, but I can provide an article with the infographic included.

Because numerous people around the world have been using cutting edge research for decades to study these things, observing their effects in actual people, means that I honestly don’t give a fuck if you “buy the idea”. Your feelings, opinions, and armchair assessments on this topic are worthless.

Just because the words are too big for you to understand doesn’t mean what they’re describing isn’t real.

The French, at least in Canada, put the currency symbol after the number.

Spoken language is already inefficient, which is why we use so many shortcuts in it. If I’m texting someone about an upcoming event, I might also just use the day of the month or the weekday (wings on Fri?). But if I’m writing an email, signing a document, or doing something else that might be referenced weeks, months, or years in the future, ISO 8601 is the way to go.

Be the change you want to see. I use month names or ISO 8601 in anything written, have been for a year to the point where using month names is more accidental than anything else. If anyone asks, I mention it’s government standard. Hopefully, the ambiguous date forms die out faster than the Imperial system.

Looks like I need to post this again.