Need to let loose a primal scream without collecting footnotes first? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid: Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful you’ll near-instantly regret.

Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.

If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cut’n’paste it into its own post — there’s no quota for posting and the bar really isn’t that high.

The post Xitter web has spawned soo many “esoteric” right wing freaks, but there’s no appropriate sneer-space for them. I’m talking redscare-ish, reality challenged “culture critics” who write about everything but understand nothing. I’m talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. They’re inescapable at this point, yet I don’t see them mocked (as much as they should be)

Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldn’t be surgeons because they didn’t believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I can’t escape them, I would love to sneer at them.

(Semi-obligatory thanks to @dgerard for starting this)

  • bitofhope@awful.systemsEnglish
    4·
    4 months ago

    When pressed about the kind of system he could invent, he says STAR voting.

    Has anyone asked Mark Frohnmayer if he also used the eating a bowl full of paper and vomiting technique when creating the STAR system?

    I could invent a state of the art cryptographic hashing function after half a litre of vodka with my hands tied behind my back. Coincidentally the algorithm I’d independently invent from first principles would happen to be exactly the same as BLAKE3 so instead of me having to explain it, you can just skim the Wikipedia page like I did.

    • Soyweiser@awful.systemsEnglish
      3·
      4 months ago

      Well there is something to be said for just trying to make a new system yourself, as a hobby/thought experiment. So I’m not totally opposed to creating something that already exists. It is just weird he thinks he has something new and shining and good here, and not babbies first attempt at creating a voting system. (insert ‘wow things are complicated’ xkcd here).

      Him not realizing (or not caring) about him being completely unoriginal while thinking he is hot shit is funny though. Shit having a certain amount of sycophants must suck so much, as it removes any ability to truly judge if you are being dumb or not, as there will always be a revolving door of those who kiss your ass.

      • bitofhope@awful.systemsEnglish
        4·
        4 months ago

        It’s not that he invented anything, even something that was already invented. He claimed he could invent a new system if he wanted to and when asked to deliver, just namedropped an existing system.

        • zogwarg@awful.systemsEnglish
          4·
          4 months ago

          Also a subjectively bad one at that—given his america-brained position on wanting to maintain a single executive not that suprising but:

          • Why do you even need to default to winner-take-all?
          • Under winner-take-all dont you inherit most of the downside of FPTP? Sure there might be less wasted votes, but doesn’t actually make harder for 5% parties to get representation, since dominant parties have less of an incentive to negotiate and/or coallition build. (Though I guess subjective given Yud’s apparent dislike of many party working together in a coalition)
          • For a “runoff” system, the STAR system has the dubious distinction of allowing the condorcet loser—a candidate that would lose 1 vs 1 matchup against every other candidate in the field—to win, because a very enthiusastic minority can give a bunch of 5-star ratings.
          • At least FPTP has simplicity going for it, and not trying to arbitrarily compare not completely informed star ratings from voters.
          • bitofhope@awful.systemsEnglish
            6·
            4 months ago

            I think it’s less america-brained and more just straight up cryptomonarchist.

            For what it’s worth STAR looks like something Yud wishes he would design, or would design if he could. A complicated system that assumes a highly informed electorate and allows for counterintuitive victory conditions sounds exactly like something appealing to him.