Because they’re fucking everywhere, something like 90% of the US population lives within 10 miles of one.

It’s basically shorthand for “this is a common and readily available thing that you can acquire anywhere in the country for cheap even if megacorps have driven all of the local specialty retailers out of business in your areas”

As opposed to something like a HF ham radio which is a specialty item that no big retailers like walmart, to the best of my knowledge, carry, and so you’re probably not going to be able to find it locally.

I keep a CB radio in my car, and have a few friends with them

It is actually really handy when you’re road tripping together in different cars to be able to just grab the mic and say something to the other vehicle when you need to stop for a bathroom break or you’re having an issue with your car or want to give them a heads-up about whatever.

If you’re fairly close together a set of cheap FRS walkie-talkies from Walmart does the job just as well. Probably worth stepping up to CB if you expect to lose sight of the other vehicle though, range is usually a bit better.

It’s especially handy if, like me, you go camping and such in rural areas with unreliable cell coverage.

You do occasionally also get helpful heads-ups from truckers if you’re listening to channel 19 about road conditions, police activity, traffic, etc. but mostly it’s just idiots babbling about conspiracy theories and immature bullshit.

I feel like that’s kind of the point they’re making

When you tie so many of those things to marriage, you’ve created an inherent inequality between married people and unmarried people.

Let the idea of “marriage” be up to you, your spouse(s) and whatever god(s) you think may exist.

And let people sort all the rest of it out for themselves.

For example

You can have your spouse and kids covered under your health insurance that you have through work. You don’t necessarily need to live together or even be on good speaking terms as long as you have that piece of paper that says you’re married.

So why shouldn’t you be able to share those benefits with someone else of your choosing? Maybe you’re single and would like to make sure that your best friend and their kids who you see all the time and think of each other as family can go see the doctor when they need to. You probably have a closer relationship with them than someone with an estranged wife and kids they never talk to, why shouldn’t you be able to add them onto your health insurance?

No, I think I got you figured exactly right. You’re a whiney loudmouthed asshole who wants to complain.

You weren’t offering any solutions, you weren’t encouraging people to do more, you were just bitching that what they are doing isn’t enough without any advice on what they can be doing better.

Now I’ve managed to tease some of that out of you over the course of this conversation, but it sure as hell wasn’t what you were doing when I started, and I doubt that you would have ever bothered to elaborate on your own. You’d just be another nuisance around Lemmy making everyone’s day a little bit worse. Hopefully you’ll keep that up in the future instead of just spouting sarcastic whining like

Forgot all about how that happened and then nothing happened… again

And

Not in the United States of Obedience.

Complaining about a problem is only useful if you’re following it up with at least an attempt to find solutions if not offering them up yourself. Otherwise you’re just a whiney, loudmouthed asshole.

No, because your tactics are actively harming my attempts to bring more people into our fold.

It’s already an uphill battle getting people to do anything without assholes like making them feel like since they’re not yet willing to go all-in on a revolution that they might as well not do anything at all.

Be less of an asshole, so that we can get all hands on-deck instead of just a few loudmouthed assholes who won’t be able to get anything done by themselves.

There is a huge difference between asking people to help, and being an asshole like you have been. Give examples of what more people can do to help don’t just poo-poo what steps they’re already taking.

And no, I’m not a fed, and I live in Pennsylvania. And before you start on why I’m up at 2am, I work night shift.

I really like that he seemed to think it wasn’t an effective tactic, but it sure seemed to keep him busy all day instead of bothering other people.

Not a fan of people shitting on you for how you’re trying to contribute to a movement? Gee, I wonder how that feels.

And dude, if you think this is harassment, you’re probably way too thin-skinned for the kind of action you’re trumpeting for, I think you need a little warming-up yourself before you’re ready because the kind of actions you want to see come with consequences you can’t just block or log off of Lemmy to avoid like you can with me.

Tell you what, if you agree to knock off being an asshole to other people on our side, then this is the end of it from me, that’s all I’ve wanted from this conversation from the very beginning. But if I log on tomorrow and see your name pop up pulling the same shit in the comment section of the 2nd or 3rd post I open tomorrow like I did today, I’m gonna pick it right back up again. Deal?

First your asking for a date now you want me to slide into your DMs to tell you how naughty you are, you really are enjoying this, aren’t you?

I certainly don’t claim to be perfect, when I’m wrong, which I often am, I’m happy to be corrected.

But when I see someone being a prick for no damn good reason and hurting causes I care about, I’m gonna say something about it.

Say something constructive or hold all criticism until 7/12/2178.

You’re posting on a public forum, every comment you make is directed at everyone who can see it. If you don’t want people inserting themselves into a conversation, take it to their DMs.

Good for you that you’re doing those things elsewhere, now stop shooting yourself in the foot by being counterproductive and scaring people away on Lemmy.

For starters, if you want to find your new message, just stop being an asshole to people who are trying to be more engaged and celebrating the steps that people are taking

What you want to be doing is basically the old improv technique of “Yes, and…”

"It’s great that you showed up to protest. If you want to do more to help these causes you can…

Help put up these posters

Hand out these pamphlets near home Depot

Use these resources to report ICE sightings

Make sure you show up to vote

Boycott these companies

Show up to the next protest and bring some friends so that they can start helping too

Etc.

As far as people not considering criminal activity to be peaceful protest, consider, for example, sit-ins or Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat, etc. I don’t think anyone would consider those to be anything but peaceful, but yet those were criminal acts, trespassing for example. When you provide that sort of context, it helps people open their minds to other ways

But seriously, start by just not being a disagreeable prick. You’re not helping anyone.

If you’re exhausted, you can stop anytime you want.

Those are examples of peaceful protest. They’re a necessary escalation from where we are now, but we still need to warm people up to taking that kind of action.

There certainly is a possibility, but if either or both of us are paid shills this conversation won’t go anywhere so let’s go ahead and discount that possibility.

What do you mean “continue” to ignore these direct questions? So far you’ve just been accusing me of being maga for some reason, you haven’t been asking any questions.

And yes, so far I’m quite happy with what no kings (and other protests) have achieved. There’s still a long way to go but we are slowly waking people up to the fact that things are not ok and that they need to do something.

Yes more people need to be doing more, but great masses of people are slow to mobilize. If we can’t even get most people to show up to a protest that is more of a party than anything, how the hell do you think you’re going to get people to go from 0-100, from doing nothing to taking more direct action? You’re certainly not going to get them to do it by browbeating them over not doing enough, they have to want to do more.

Every new person who shows up to a protest is someone who’s taking that first step towards more action than they were the day before. Some of them may never be convinced to take more direct action, that’s just the way the world is, but some of them will and they have to learn to crawl before they can walk and eventually run.

And people like you are doing nothing to encourage them, in fact you scare them away.

And even if they don’t take direct action themselves, since they’re more aware of what’s going on and what’s at stake, it means they might be more likely to lend support to those who are when they’re able, or at least turn a blind eye to them.

Do not split.

And I think your premise is flawed. There really isn’t much if any space between peaceful and killing. There’s a lot that you can do under the category of peaceful protest, including a lot that we haven’t started doing in any great scale and need to start, but once violence is introduced, killing is not far off. It doesn’t take much to kill a person, people die all the time from stupid accidents tripping over their own feet, one shove or thrown punch and some bad luck could be all it takes, so the moment you’ve decided to escalate from peaceful protest to violent action, you have opened the door for killing, and once you’ve set that precedent, you had better have the numbers behind you to continue down that road and win if the other side decides to respond the same way.

Kind of seems like you are, can’t really think of any other good reason you’d be on here bothering people like this. You’re not helping win anyone to your cause by doing it, you’re not adding anything useful to any discussions, you’re note even particularly funny or interesting, so I can only assume you just enjoy being a prick, and this gives you an excuse to do it.

Unless you’re getting paid to do it, which is certainly a possibility.

7/12/2178

You could also be out buying ammo or whatever instead of doing this.

I figure any time you’re replying to me is a time you’re not being a pest to someone else

Oh hey, you again,

Per our agreement, please hold all complaints until 7/12/2178

7/12/2178

Now you’re violating the deal, I gave you a date, save your complaints until then. I look forward to hearing from you again in 153 years,

7/12/2178

So that no one alive will have to deal with your bullshit.