[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Mezla PigDog, on 31 January 2024 - 07:13 PM, said:

It's kind of empowering when women historically get paid less for the same work and typically settle for less than men in the corporate space. Plus the male domination of the music industry. Like, why shouldn't she own her own talent? I don't think Madonna is that famed for giving away cash - she uses it to buy brown kids, if memory serves.

I am curious to wonder if she was male and making similar career moves would she by regarded in the same negative way?

Aside from a feeling of empowerment by proxy, I've seen no evidence of her materially empowering other women or artists to do anything similar. Most women and most artists can't do what TS actually did, though I'd suppose they could be inspired to take analogous actions. It would be interesting to study whether and to what extent that actually happens, relative to other forms of capital investment in women's empowerment.

'Regarded in the same negative way'---by the media? She's not 'regarded in a negative way', just the opposite:

Quote

[...] near-universal critical adoration of Swift in the media – perhaps most notably for her re-recording series. [...]

But while Swift's re-recordings could have been a demand for collective change, in reality they seem like little more than an exercise in egotism and greed, repackaged as "empowerment". The blazing light of her moral crusade is dimmed considerably when you look at the myriad ways Swift profits off the exercise, which include encouraging her fans to buy multiple vinyl and CD editions of the same albums in different colours to access "collectible artwork" (read: flimsy printed inserts) and bonus tracks, and charging £15.99 to rent (not buy) her latest tour film. Add to this the opportunistic merchandise sold through an online shop specific to each re-release: musical snow globes, acrylic knitwear, £25 keyrings. No one is obligated to buy these things – but Swift is calculated in framing herself as a wronged party, and her fans' purchasing power as the only way to right said wrong. The gilded veneer of feminist empowerment that hangs over the project is nothing but scratch-card foil, easily rubbed away to reveal the grubby industry-standard capitalism underneath. And yet we're expected not to acknowledge this – and so is the media.

[...] despite his dominant commercial position, the mainstream music press would never laud a hugely successful artist like, say, Ed Sheeran. Sheeran, despite his international fame and popularity, simply doesn't inspire the kind of fervent dedication that would lead a fan base to seize on all mentions of his name, whether they're in euphoria over a positive review or Eumenidean wrath over a snub.

For those pop stars who do, there can be no critical insight, no oversight, no examination.

Taylor Swift's hollow empowerment narrative - Hannah Williams - New Statesman

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 31 January 2024 - 07:33 PM

[Mezla PigDog]

Regarded in the same negative way by people in this thread 😀

And when did a celebrity doing something "empowering" ever translate into something tangible for ordinary humans? Pretty much never. I mean The Spice Girls anyone? The only impact their Girl Power had was probably on my shoe choice in the 90s but they are regarded as pop culture icons.

Anyway - this morning I read this thread and thought "Hmmm, do I know any Taylor Swift songs?" and now I'm dying on this hill!

The private jet emissions are awful.

[worry]

Far be it from me to defend super rich people (or more pertinently, having to rely on their benevolence when taxation is preferable), and she's not exactly a bleeding heart lefty, but frankly more pop megastars could stand to follow her example. TS gave $55 million in bonuses distributed among every single crew member on the Eras tour in 2023 (famously, $100k for each truck driver alone), gave generous (but undisclosed) sums to food banks in the cities she stopped in all along the tour while publicizing the local food relief orgs and the food insecurity issue more broadly, and has a pretty commendable history of doing things like that (though obviously increasingly so as she's matured and generated more income).

[Cyphon]

Madonna perhaps not the best comparator but there never really is one.

Thanks for your thoughts and effort Mez, I hadn't quite thought of it like that before, and makes it less black and white.

I'm still inclined to think the comparable hype was more as Madonna pushed the envelope versus Swift's more, I suppose, 'Corporate feminism'. I guess that's erring into judging based on intent which is difficult to do with either party.

[amphibian]

Swift is the biggest music artist on the planet. She's navigated a kinda tough maze to get there, even if she had a bit of a leg up in the beginning due to family wealth and access early.

Swift paid for Kesha's legal costs in her battle against Dr Luke. That's a huge deal. There's several stories of her picking up the tabs for surgeries, legal funds etc.

She's not a hollow person or a corporate shill. She's a pretty normal person who is interested in making lots of money, supporting some people out of a sense of morality + ethics + just because, and appears to be having a much more fun and sustainable time doing it than previous mega stars.

Michael Jackson was the biggest pop star ever. And he was miserable for a big chunk of that time. Prince too. Madonna seems to have been in similar straits. Beyonce is a purposely unknowable mystery as to whether she's enjoying it or whether she kinda hates it.

I tend to view Swift as a smart lady who can really compose and play music, puts on a show that lots of people want to see, and does the occasional good thing mixed in with a very mundane lukewarm cruddy thing now and then. Plus she's happy - which is unusual.

I'd be really wary of both the people who hate her so much and the people who think she's world transforming. She has a tiny bit of political power push and it pales next to someone like Muhammad Ali or Michael Jordan (who famously didn't use it much).

She's more like the Beatles or Rolling Stones who have mostly focused on making tons of money than she is an Oprah or Obama.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

worry, on 31 January 2024 - 07:46 PM, said:

Far be it from me to defend super rich people (or more pertinently, having to rely on their benevolence when taxation is preferable), and she's not exactly a bleeding heart lefty, but frankly more pop megastars could stand to follow her example. TS gave $55 million in bonuses distributed among every single crew member on the Eras tour in 2023 (famously, $100k for each truck driver alone), gave generous (but undisclosed) sums to food banks in the cities she stopped in all along the tour while publicizing the local food relief orgs and the food insecurity issue more broadly, and has a pretty commendable history of doing things like that (though obviously increasingly so as she's matured and generated more income).

Anyone who's a billionaire hasn't given away nearly enough money. Though how bad it is does depend on how they invest the assets they retain.

Quote

[Swift] puts her money in a niche type of mutual fund, an elite investor has revealed.

[...] Swift – whose father[...] used to work for [investment management firm] Merrill Lynch – has shown over the years that she's well-versed in finance.

Taylor Swift's Financial Acumen: Avoiding FTX Deal, Investing in Funds (businessinsider.com)

She could put that billion dollars to work by being an activist investor herself, advocating for ESG initiatives, for example---and encouraging her fans to do the same. Does she? Not afaik. If she did, she'd crow about it.

[worry]

You must not be on the mailing list!

[Lady Bliss]

I’ll be honest. I have nothing against her exactly. Yeah, I don’t like her music, but I feel that way about a lot of musicians. I’m annoyed with the world’s fixation on another overly wealthy person and am sick of her face all over everything. I’d be annoyed with anyone like that especially when I feel like we have more important things I would read about than her

[Raymond Luxury Yacht]

Oh no Carl Weathers died!!!

[amphibian]

We hired a person at work to handle a specific population in our state. I'm worried they don't get how complex and precarious the work positioning is - the email volume, the pace of work, the lack of general buy-in within our organization on their mission etc.

They also keep saying they don't have ambition, yet they have said they'd take my boss's job and go no further because they don't want anything more.

They can't do my boss's job. I can't do my boss's job and I've significantly more experience and skill at this than them.

I'm worried that my weeks of patient, steady support are sinking into an ocean of overconfidence and obliviousness. Their co-worker, who came on at the same time, is picking stuff up much more rapidly.

Hopefully this isn't going to be an expensive boondoggle...

[Maark Abbott]

Think a tooth I had filled a couple years ago has cracked. It's been aching for a couple days now, might have to have it out.

Not ideal all else considered.

[Tsundoku]

Aircon in the car died. This is not good in an Australian summer.

This post has been edited by Tsundoku: 08 February 2024 - 10:04 PM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Huh, Taylor Swift won best album for her extra-mediocre Midnights? (The title is nice, but that's about it.) Ah well, it's basically a popularity contest I guess....

I did the calculations yesterday and realized that, despite eating a lot of edamame, salmon, and almonds, I'm probably not getting enough calcium in my diet. And I chipped a tooth perilously close to the gum line on some horribly defective dried vegetables (long and terrible story), but I don't want to go to the dentist and be forced to have my mouth open breathing in covid (unfortunately I doubt I'll be able to find a dentist willing to do it outside---unless perhaps I offer to pay them a lot... doubt I'll even be able to find an affordable local dentist who uses air purifiers for a sufficient amount of time between patients and requires everyone to wear effective masks---especially since my health insurance, as is common in the US, doesn't cover dental at all). While it's not painful or sensitive, I am concerned about it potentially exposed dentin, or it cracking more and exposing the gum line, which can lead to infection and require root canal. So I've been applying stannous fluoride gel to promote remineralization, but the remineralization process also requires calcium from the saliva, so I need to be getting enough.

I could just use calcium carbonate, but that's probably what gave me several terrible kidney stones, so I don't want to do that every day....

Might switch from boneless salmon in vacuum sealed pouches to sardines (with bones, for extra calcium) in cans---going to read more about the carcinogens in canned foods... considering Ocean Prince because (as the name implies) it's cheap, but California forced them to remove the 'BPA free' label---which OP claims is only because of trace amounts. Hmm. Amazon or the seller seem to have removed the Questions and Answers section from the product page and the ability to search reviews.

Quote

Plastic labelled 'BPA free' might not be safe, studies suggest


BPA substitutes may cause similar health effects to BPA, sometimes at lower levels


Plastic labelled 'BPA free' might not be safe, studies suggest | CBC News

Guess the solution is to just go catch them from the local School-Kill river oh wait that's even more polluted... maybe (yet again) the Chinese have the right idea and I should have my own little aquarium to devour? Yeah, give half my apartment over to that, then pluck a tiny oily fish from the purified water and plop it in my mouth... so fresh and so clean. And the bones and eyes so crunchy!

[Cause]

My new work colelague who I will have to work with closely talks, a lot! I mean to the level of a mental illness. She never stops. She is friendly and warm which would be an asset, but it doesn't stop there. If you are engrossed in work she will talk to you, if there is silence, she will fill it. Still perhaps an annoying affectation rather than a real problem except in the case when there is nothing to talk about, she will simply narrate out loud what she is doing. She will tell you who she is sending an email to, or that she is scheduling a meeting with someone else, regarding a matter that doesn't concern you. Everyone comments on it within moments of meeting her. I haven't brought it up, but I am sure someone must have at some point. Colleagues don't dislike her, but people eventually reach their limit and try and avoid her. The job involves travel and working with customers and so after multiple days on the road its natural to say you need alone time and will have dinner in your room alone tonight and watch TV but in her case people do it to avoid her. This is the person I will work with the most. For a colleague who works with customers directly it's also a problem in that the customers also reach their limit but have a harder time making an excuse to avoid her and out of politeness can't be direct. Will have to see how it gets along. She has been doing the job for years and is good at it. However, I think it would be fair to say she is good despite this quirk rather than because of it. I walked into an empty conference room once to realize she had been carrying on a conversation nor realizing that no one was in the room. Working with her long term will be a chore I think, and I think I may have to subtly intervene on the customers behalf at times.
______________________________________

The problems with my friend continue. I have maintained my attitude of not confronting her about her behavior but also pulling back myself. I can't expend the energy trying to connect and keep getting nothing back. The fact I am still talking about it in this thread bothers me. The amount of thought I have expended on this issue angers me. When possible, I have tried discussing her mental health, but she prefers not to. It shuts down conversations so I can't understand what is going on, how to help her, of if she is getting the help she needs. Recently after not responding to my message for 2 weeks she responded with a wall of text and pictures, apologizing and saying that she had been overwhelmed by all the travelling she had been doing and that she was also sick. This is the kind of thing that annoys me, since no one is that busy while on vacation in Scotland in wales. Mental health may manifest in many ways, but I struggle to understand this one. If it wasn't the fact that she is on six weeks leave for mental health from work I would again question if anything is even wrong rather than her just pulling back. I try to make allowances for what she is going through even as I don't understand it and try not to take it personally but it's a struggle.

Recently a postcard I sent in Decemeber from my trip to Vegas finally reached her on the 16th of January, or at least that's when she told me she got it. I got a postcard this week from her trip to Denmark. The postcard is dated for November, but she decided to include a gift with it and the customs deceleration is from the 18th of January. So, she sent it after she received my card. The card that's dated for November references the gift she included, and I know the gift she sent is actually something that has been sitting in her room for at least the last 6 months. The gift suits me and is not the issue rather the obvious and poor attempt at subterfuge to try and pass off the card as coming from November upsets me. She had to write out the customs declaration at the post office so she knows I would realize she sent it only after she received my card. Without the gift I might at least at thought she had just forgotten to mail it, but the gift is obviously not from Copenhagen (its priced in dollars on the back) and I recognize it from her room. Charitably I can at least perhaps imagine she did buy the postcard with the intention of sending it to me back in November. Sending it like this though, and adding the gift as well makes me feel like she felt guilty when she got my card. Receiving this card made me feel worse than if I had received nothing.

In the card she mentioned that I would have loved the castles and the suits of armor, I can't understand why someone would know enough to say this in a card 3 months late but not shoot me a text and a picture the day of.
___________________________________

These two issues all sort of make me realize my main issue, I guess. While I am not chatty to the extent of mental illness, I think I do talk to my colleagues more than I normally would because I don't have many people to talk to otherwise. While I am not against work friends, they are great if you can get them I have also often in the past made the distinction between people you are friendly with and people who are your friends in describing some colleagues. We get along at work, we enjoy talking about non-work-related things but at the end of the day we are not going to the movies on the weekend together. I reach out to my colleagues more than I might have in the past to share jokes I know they might like or ask them for book recommendations out of necessity. As an adult immigrant I think work may be one of the best places for me to make connections but between covid and remote work this doesn't quite work in my case.

On reflection I realized that while my friend above is the most extreme case, a lot of my oldest and closest friends have drifted from me over the years I have been in America. I have a friend who lost his job before mine, I realise that I called him to check in on him several times, asked how the job hunt was going, offered to practice interviewing and when he did get a job which then overlapped with my then unemployment I wished him luck on his first day, asked how he liked it after his first week and first month. I recently realized that this friend, though we speak quite often did none of that in return. We talk about games, exchange memes, discuss the news but never asked me once about my new job.

I guess this is the nature of distance but I guess with everything going on I have begun to really notice it.

[amphibian]

3 things:

1) it may really help to get a public facing hobby like bike riding in groups, bar trivia, soccer watching, book clubs, kickball, or whatever draws you outside to an event where there will be adults you can possibly make friends with.

2) you're expecting things from your friend that she can't deliver and her being on leave from her job for mental health is a huge indication that some serious shit is going on, especially when combined with the erratic communication and little lies to you. I really suggest backing off on communication to a point where you're expecting nothing from her, so that anything that does come in is pure bonus. You don't have to understand her mental illness or put parameters on her behavior, you gotta control what you do and getting grumpy about it is -as you note - not fun/good.

3) I've had a mega chatty co-worker before. What worked for me was to set time limits on how long to talk (inside my head), track time, and then decisively head off after saying I had to do something. I sprinkled in a bit of "I have only 5 min of break left" or short pointed questions that were friendly, yet had a natural end point soon. Good luck and I hope it gets better.

[TheRetiredBridgeburner]

My work are going through a redundancy process.

The initial panic has subsided from the announcement a couple of weeks ago, but the pall over morale is almost palpable. We've been told without being able to promise that our office is pretty much safe, we're all junior and that's the end of the staff they want to keep. There's going to be a lot of change over the next year (mostly positive, but it'll be a lot of upheaval and weirdness for us all) so the voluntary phase was to give staff nearing retirement an incentive to perhaps make the leap now. The deadline to register interest in voluntary has passed and now we're all just waiting to find out if enough people's applications were accepted that a compulsory stage can be avoided.

Knowing I'm reasonably safe doesn't make me feel better for colleagues or hate seeing everyone so down and worried any less.

[Tsundoku]

Cause, on 06 February 2024 - 02:22 AM, said:

My new work colleague who I will have to work with closely talks, a lot! I mean to the level of a mental illness. She never stops. She is friendly and warm which would be an asset, but it doesn't stop there. If you are engrossed in work she will talk to you, if there is silence, she will fill it. Still perhaps an annoying affectation rather than a real problem except in the case when there is nothing to talk about, she will simply narrate out loud what she is doing. She will tell you who she is sending an email to, or that she is scheduling a meeting with someone else, regarding a matter that doesn't concern you. Everyone comments on it within moments of meeting her. I haven't brought it up, but I am sure someone must have at some point. Colleagues don't dislike her, but people eventually reach their limit and try and avoid her. The job involves travel and working with customers and so after multiple days on the road its natural to say you need alone time and will have dinner in your room alone tonight and watch TV but in her case people do it to avoid her. This is the person I will work with the most. For a colleague who works with customers directly it's also a problem in that the customers also reach their limit but have a harder time making an excuse to avoid her and out of politeness can't be direct. Will have to see how it gets along. She has been doing the job for years and is good at it. However, I think it would be fair to say she is good despite this quirk rather than because of it. I walked into an empty conference room once to realize she had been carrying on a conversation nor realizing that no one was in the room. Working with her long term will be a chore I think, and I think I may have to subtly intervene on the customers behalf at times.

I'm probably (huh, definitely) a lot less subtle than you. Even if I work closely with someone like that (and I have), I will eventually keep things short and to the point and basically given them the "we work together and I respect you, but we are definitely not friends so please don't share" vibe. Which probably comes across as rude but, whatevs. As long as they're not talking my ear off I put that in the "win" column.

Pithy, but relevant:

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This post has been edited by Tsundoku: 06 February 2024 - 09:32 PM

[Cause]

Tsundoku, on 06 February 2024 - 12:56 PM, said:

Cause, on 06 February 2024 - 02:22 AM, said:

My new work colleague who I will have to work with closely talks, a lot! I mean to the level of a mental illness. She never stops. She is friendly and warm which would be an asset, but it doesn't stop there. If you are engrossed in work she will talk to you, if there is silence, she will fill it. Still perhaps an annoying affectation rather than a real problem except in the case when there is nothing to talk about, she will simply narrate out loud what she is doing. She will tell you who she is sending an email to, or that she is scheduling a meeting with someone else, regarding a matter that doesn't concern you. Everyone comments on it within moments of meeting her. I haven't brought it up, but I am sure someone must have at some point. Colleagues don't dislike her, but people eventually reach their limit and try and avoid her. The job involves travel and working with customers and so after multiple days on the road its natural to say you need alone time and will have dinner in your room alone tonight and watch TV but in her case people do it to avoid her. This is the person I will work with the most. For a colleague who works with customers directly it's also a problem in that the customers also reach their limit but have a harder time making an excuse to avoid her and out of politeness can't be direct. Will have to see how it gets along. She has been doing the job for years and is good at it. However, I think it would be fair to say she is good despite this quirk rather than because of it. I walked into an empty conference room once to realize she had been carrying on a conversation nor realizing that no one was in the room. Working with her long term will be a chore I think, and I think I may have to subtly intervene on the customers behalf at times.

EI'm probably (huh, definitely) a lot less subtle than you. Even if I work closely with someone like that (and I have), I will eventually keep things short and to the point and basically given them the "we work together and I respect you, but we are definitely not friends so please don't share" vibe. Which probably comes across as rude but, whatevs. As long as they're not talking my ear off I put that in the "win" column.

Pithy, but relevant:

I am not exaggerating when i say this is on the level of a neurological disorder. She isnt oversharing or having a conversation. She is just filling silence. She will get into an uber and just start narrating outloud what she is doing on her phone. I dont know if its a manifestation of anxiety or something else.

[Tsundoku]

Cause, on 06 February 2024 - 05:01 PM, said:

I am not exaggerating when i say this is on the level of a neurological disorder. She isnt oversharing or having a conversation. She is just filling silence. She will get into an uber and just start narrating outloud what she is doing on her phone. I dont know if its a manifestation of anxiety or something else.

Sounds like something is going on for sure. I don't suppose there's any way someone can get her to take herself to a doctor? Any excuse really.
Huh, doesn't everyone in America have a therapist these days?

[Cause]

My grandmother just celebrated her 103rd birthday. Despite her age her body is remarkably health (or was) but in the last few years her mind has begun its decline rapidly. She cant distinguish one grandchild from another, cant rememeber I live and have lived in the USA for the last 4 years, forgets that people who died 30 years ago are dead. My mom sent me a message last Friday saying my Gran was dehydrated and it sounded like she was on deaths door. Its now Wednesday and she seems fine, or fine for 103 anyway. Hopefully you wont judge me for thinking this but I feel like its time and I actually hope for her sake and more for my mothers sake that she wont linger for long. Assuming this is the end which I am not not even sure it is. I just don't know what if any quality of life my gran has left. She has no friends left alive, has lost her hearing so no longer enjoys TV, can walk on her own but has nowhere to go and no desire to leave her apartment except for her hair appointment which seems to be her last remaining joy.

This is also makes me ask the question will I go home for her funeral? I want to say yes and was surprised when my mother mentioned she wasn't expecting me too. I wouldn't be going for the funeral so much as to support my mother in truth. That said I just started my new job and don't know how they will react to my requesting emergency leave to fly to South Africa for my grandmother, nor how much leave I could reasonable get. Would I take a day each way to fly home to spend just 2 days in south Africa? Ill cross that bridge when it comes to it.

________________________________

My gran and my dad actually had the same birthday. It actually completely escaped my notice until my sister posted a tribute to my dad. As the atheist that I am I don't believe my dad is still around watching over me, I don't really memorialize the anniversary of his death, don't visit his grave. I miss my dad at random moments throughout a year and through my life. Accomplishments I wish he could see because he allowed them to happen. I often wish hew was around for me to ask him for financial advice or car buying advice, career or property buying advice. He was someone I knew I could trust to have my interest at heart, was someone whose advice on such matters I respect and who would actually give enough time to really explore the matters. Not connecting my grans birthday with his bothers me in a way I cant explain. I wouldn't have done anything different had I made the connection but missing it seems wrong.