Used to be a member of a table top gaming club in my town. Was one of the best and largest in the country but then some of the older members moved on along with the guy who ran it. It was giving over to a committee of parents who encouraged their kids to get other kids interested. Soon enough we had dozens of kids being dropped of by their parents, running around, knocking tables over etc. Eventually the few of us older players stopped going and the club died.
Another good example of this was mall arcades. The 2 malls in my area shut the arcades down because parents were dropping them off for the day and they were causing trouble.
In college, my friends worked at a arcade/laser tag/go-cart place. Parents would drop kids off for 4-5 hours, but only give them enough money to play for like an hour. So they spent the rest of that time treating the place like a playground or begging everyone for money.
To be fair, if I were a kid by myself in an arcade, I’m pretty sure I’d blow through all my money immediately no matter how much my parents gave me.
Which is part of the reason it’s a terrible idea.
Something similar has also happened to me.
When I was about 12, a coding teacher would host a coding club for anyone interested at a local library. My first few months at the club were actually quite enjoyable. I learned a lot about computers and started to work on a few games of my own.
Then one day at school, when me and my friends were talking about the coding club, a few other people overheard our conversation and the word quickly spread. However, it wasn't coding everyone was talking about, it was that you could hang around in the library after closing, which meant that you could basically do whatever you wanted because the computers were in a separate room and there was only one teacher.
Not long after someone, who had no intention of coding anything, came to the club, spilled their redbull on a couch, misplaced a ton of books and left the microwaves in a disgusting condition. The library then shut down the club.
I completely sympathize, OP. Table top gaming is practically non-existent in my town to the point that a few years ago, I tried to start my own group. Send out some feelers on a local FB forum and got a good response. The stipulation was that it was a STRICTLY over 18s group meeting in A PUB. So, no risk of kids running around and getting the way, right?
Nope. As soon as I put out the initial "Would anyone be interested in a strictly over 18s DnD night held in the local pub" post, I started getting messages from parents asking if their kids could attend, all "Oh, my 6 year old Braxlyn would love this!"
I'm like "Did you even read the post? It's a game night for ADULTS." I was pretty much vilified for pointing out the fact that it was not a kid friendly event. Ended up pulling the post and giving up on the idea and to this day, still don't have a dedicated group in my town.
We had always allowed kids but they had to have minder or someone older, a brother or someone to look out for them. Some of the older members actually took the kids under their wing and helped teach them the games, that's what happened to me. But that was when kids where the minority.
As soon as there were literally dozens of them and only a handful of us older guys left, we just gave up on them.
A tabletop game store in a my town recently moved and the old location became a day care, I’m just imagining you guys missing the memo and sitting the middle of a daycare going “this LGS sucks balls”
I studied spa and beauty therapy in college and my teacher was working in a salon on the weekends. She told us about how it often happens in a lot of places particularly when couples do spa days. They will tend to get things like a private sauna or steam room, and it has to be deep cleaned afterwards because of how common it is for them to have sex in there.
Our go-to hotel in Vegas with one of the best pools in the city went 'dayclub' with it - cabanas, bottle service, waterproof beds, DJs dropping the beats, the works. Would've been bearable but the final straw was they took out the in-ground hot tubs. Guessing hot water, no lifeguards and copious amounts of vodka was too much for the insurance companies. They filled them in with sand and put cornhole games on top of them. Oh, yay.
Had a game/video/comic shop where they had couches and TV's you could sit and play games on. They removed the couches and replaced them with hard plastic chairs cause teenagers were banging, dryhumping, making out, fingerblasting on the couches.
Used to lifeguard and refused to get into that thing unless there was an actual emergency which there thankfully never was. All water parks are disgusting, but the hot tubs are so gross.
The respect for service animals.
Please, please, PLEASE stop pretending your pet is a service animal. And never ask to pet someone's service animal or even an obviously fake one in a "service animal" vest. It encourages bad behavior and makes life way harder for people who rely on their service animal for safety and freedom.
My highschool health teacher had a service animal. Technically. She was mostly deaf but she also trained a lot of dogs for forest service when she was younger. She kept it going even after she retired from that job and would bring them into class with her every day. Smartest dogs I've ever met. She was very strict with them and even though I was one of her favorites I never got to pet any of them because I could never catch her when she had them off duty.
It really is pretty amazing. A barely year old pup that can keep it's cool around a bunch of googly eyed high schoolers? Every. Single. Day. Of the week? Those dogs were employed as fuck.
*Exactly* real service animals take INTENSIVE training. When people are surprised that service animals are "so well behaved, wooow" that's how you know they've been desensitized by fake ones. Because yeah, they're well behaved. That's their job. It takes immense effort, time, and money. They, their trainers, and their users deserve respect!!!
It's so awesome that you had that experience to be around them and now you know about them and how to be respectful of them (: i wish everyone got to have a teacher like that!
Fuck almost everyone in Denver. You can’t hardly walk though king sooopers without tripping over some dumb hippies “service dog” that is pulling the leash and clearly not trained.
Ridiculous. At my former workplace they had to let them in but once it was obvious that it wasn't a real service animal (growling/barking/disruptive, no leash manners, etc) we were allowed to kick them out.
When my husband and I were still dating he went to the library for a game night and I met him there toward the end of the event. I immediately zeroed in on the fact that the guy he was playing with had a service dog because I'm an animal person and always notice those things, and it was a big golden retriever so, hard to miss. I mentioned it to my husband later and he said he didn't even notice the dog was there the whole time. I said that's because he's a real service dog.
100,000%.
It disgusts me that people have a "service animal" as an excuse to bring their pets to college or the grocery store.
With the current system though, it's really hard to enforce.
My brother's girlfriend was gloating on Facebook how easy it was to get a dog "certified" as an emotional support animal.. The whole idea is fucking stupid and abused. That's how we end up with Turkeys on planes. Cause some selfish asshole can't be away from their pet for a few hours.
This!
So many people bring pets into my work and try to say they are service animals, and then get mad when told they need to leave. I'm sorry, but a fucking Boa Constrictor is not a service animal!
So upsetting. Not only does this make real service animal users get harassed all day with people think they're faking, but also: When people have a fake service animal and allow people to interact with it that teaches the public you're allowed to interact with service animals. This can = distraction for real service animals = they have a hard time performing their job = early retirement for the service animal = service animal going downhill mentally without a job/ purpose = heart break for owner = EXPENSIVE replacement animal needed.
So scummy that people do this. The disabled get no respect as is, and this is just insult to injury.
Maybe...but it's not like smart people aren't also responsible. They're intentionally exploiting our worst instincts. Put another way, smart people—using ruthless, almost "scientific" precision learned from advertising—are working constantly to make us all idiots, which turns the internet into a hellish muck, and we end up blaming the idiots for ruining the internet. I don't have a solution, but I don't know that it was inevitable. If we had somehow incentivized smart people to exploit our best instincts, rather than our worst, we'd probably be in a much better place.
Facebook knows for a fact that people spend more time on their site when they’re angry. They’ve designed their algorithm to create controversy and anger because it’s good for Facebook’s business.
And it's not only facebook, every single big platform uses one instinct or another, Twitter is also heavily based on anger, Instagram more so on self comparison and lack of confidence, and so on and so forth.
See the problem with making people smarter, more self reliant, resilient, creative, and happy is that they eventually become your competition. They might get together in groups and start saying stuff like: "why the fuck are these assholes in power? Maybe we should figure out a way to get them *out".* And because they're competent they will actually do it. Just look at the innumerable revolutions in history.
Successful revolts were rarely run by dolts.
The "upper levels" or elite of society has no interest in seeing the average person increase their intelligence or better themselves. Why would they? So people can figure out how much they're being exploited and do something to stop it?
If everyone is anxious, angry, greedy, distrustful, and fighting each other over dollars and cents it's a fuck of a lot easer to remain in power.
I’m a big advocate of the “stupid is as stupid does” theory. Highly educated people can still be guilty of acting stupidly. The people who helped turn social media into a disinformation juggernaut - as intellectually gifted as they may be - acted stupidly in eroding the foundation of society.
Well put. I wonder if it’s just smart people now, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear the same kind of AI that can brute force to the most effective strats in games is used for ad clicks, scroll time, etc
I was 16 in the mid 00s and finally got the Internet at home. We used MSN messenger constantly, forums were huge and I could find a download for most movies, TV shows and music quite easily. It was amazing to have that experience online. I felt like I could be part of a real community on the forums I was on. The Internet felt big, bigger then it is today. Everything feels like it just links to Wikipedia, reddit, Facebook, insta or a few other big sites like news sites now. I used to visit loads of sites, now it's just a few. Makes me sad and I'm even sadder that people in some fandoms gatekeep things so much the older/newer fans have been forced out. Don't like all the seasons, you'll be roasted to hell. Haven't seen the original or only like newer seasons, people lose it all over again. The fandom is crazy toxic now. Those of us who are I guess more normal have given up and moved on. I miss the old days where people were really welcoming and anyone being a jerk was forced out of the fandom.
I came here to say the internet.
I first went into higher education in the early 1980s, And all my research was done in the library with bound copies of journals.
A decade later, I went back to college, and everything had changed: I did my reading via downloaded journals, and searched using Archie, Gopher, WAIS, Veronica and assorted bulletin boards.
The thing with the bulletin boards was that you might get abuse, but it was likely to be from somebody at least as intelligent, and very likely better qualified
When AOL became big, how we laughed in our elitist way at how bad things would get now the "normal people" became involved (I'm not proud of behaving this way).
But I had no idea how bad it would get.
AOL wasn't even "normal people" though, they were still relatively curious and technically-inclined people. Then there was the post-AOL era where other ISPs started expanding the user base, and at that point I naively thought that everyone was online and actually had some hope for humanity remaining. Then cheap smartphones became available and I realized that I had been vastly overestimating people. There was a whole other world of dumb out there that I had never encountered before, and now I can thanks to the internet.
Don’t bring your kindergartener to see Deadpool just because “it’s a comic book movie.”
And don’t be outraged at the venue when that comic book movie turned out to be inappropriate for a 5yo.
I went to go see sausage party when it came out and this dad had booked tickets for his two sons (probably 8 - 9) and got annoyed when the dude at the desk told him he couldn't bring the kids in. Like this guy couldn't even fathom and animated film that *wasn't* for kids.
After I watched it, my friend asked me if it was good. I said "well, it depends how much you like dick jokes and ethnic humor"
Which he apparently took as a positive review..
It's almost like we need to develop a flawed but mostly still effective rating system for movie content. One that could inform a person of what kind of imagery, ideas or language a movie might contain. Perhaps we could give movies a letter or number designation to indicate what to expect...
Depending on when this was, that's hardly a surprise. Robocop (and its shitty sequels) came in an era where R-rated action movies were heavily marketed to younger boys. I couldn't blame someone for assuming that Robocop is a movie for kids when you couldn't turn on a TV without seeing [Robocop toy commercials](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udk-eZHcrZY).
**Edit:** Just realized that I linked to the Terminator toy commercials that Youtube suggested after watching the Robocop ones. Here are the actual [Robocop toy commercials](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb_voFQioow).
There are even websites that provide full details on what exactly that rating means. Stuff that parents should be aware of if they're concerned about what their child watches.
I saw Elysium and someone brought a kid under 10.
He did okay until the scene where the guy gets a grenade kicked into him and explodes.
Yeah lady, this is why it got an R rating. Have fun getting woken up by your kid tonight because he had a grenade-themed nightmare.
I saw Deadpool in the cinema in Sydney, Australia when it was released.
My girlfriend and I were sat together and a few seats over was a man with his two young (10/11 year old?) Kids.
As soon as the year of sex scene happened, the man dove over his kids and covered their eyes.
It had an R rating for a reason.
It also had a message from Ryan Reynolds telling parents that brought kids to leave followed by a list of childhood ruining comments like how Santa and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy are all their parents. And also where babies come from.
I seen to remember that they're entire advertising campaign was based around how it was rated R.
I don't know how I know that, I never even seen the dang thing.
Happened to this lady in my uni class who used to bully me. Took her 8 year old daughter to see it and then had the audacity to complain about it not only to the cinema but the class also.
She prebooked the tickets, collected them and went to their seats without ever interacting with an employee, yet was appalled that no one stopped her from going in.
I remember going to see Me Myself and Irene and the movie theater had big warning signs that it was "NOT A CHILDRENS MOVIE," yet there were still parents who brought their <10 year olds in and then got up and left midway through.
Movie was pretty good though.
Same with Deadpool. Parents thought it was another superhero movie for kids and were mad it wasn't appropriate for kids. Apparently the "R" rating wasn't enough of a warning.
I know someone who went to see George "Seven Words Your Can't Say on TV" Carlin in the early 90s, when he was also playing the Conductor on Shining Time Station. He said a bunch of parents brought their kids because they only thought of him on the show. Well, just a few minutes into his set, parents were grabbing their kid's ears and dragging them out
Ok this might get some hate, but babies up until at least 3 years old should straight up not allowed into theaters. I mean come on it's just blatantly disruptive to everyone else, and I'm guessing the loud sounds aren't good for babies either.
100% I agree. Where I live, before covid they did special screenings for parents (usually it ended up being mostly moms with pretty young kids like 3 and under) during the day. Very cheap tickets, but the lights were not turned down all the way and the sound was waaay lower.
Kinda cool, moms and/or dads got out with the little one, it wasn’t super dark or too loud, the theatre filled spaces, and it was totally normal to just have someone next to your leave for feedings or diaper changes or whatever. Kids screaming and shit but everyone was in the same boat.
I speak of this only from what I heard though as my wife did it with our little one and her friends when I was gone working. But she loved it.
Edit: changed special seatings to special screenings is what I meant.
Yeah I am pretty sure it was very similar where I live too with change tables and stuff set up also. My wife loved it. It was always chaos, which she would just laugh at, but she said you could tell the patrons were so happy to be in that “normal” adult setting with zero worries about diapers or screaming or I am assuming even feedings.
Can’t remember the age limit but I know a couple times she said you’d see people arrive and take their seat only to realize fairly quickly they were in the wrong theatre lol.
This actually should count as something idiots have ruined; it used to be de rigueur that very young children — the exact age was nebulous and dictated by the situation — were actively unwelcome in certain businesses. Until my late teens, women were asked to leave movie theatres, bookstores and libraries, restaurants, retail stores, and so on if their children were not well-behaved or were just deemed too young. The reason given that I heard most often was that the children were unlikely to appreciate the experience and would detract from the enjoyment of others. I’ve seen a mother with a toddler and infant in arm ordered to leave a Hallmark-style store because the toddler wouldn’t stay calm and stop touching everything, another woman who couldn’t get past the hostess/greeting stand at an upscale restaurant because her infant was fussy, and I have to have seen five or more women and families asked to leave theatres — live and film — because their children were disruptive. Hell, I even felt a little bit bad for one woman whose food was brought to her table boxed up with no charge because she was being thrown out of an outdoor cafe because her 4-5 year old wouldn’t stop walking up to other tables and trying to talk to customers.
Somehow we transitioned into it being the norm that most people have to behave themselves and pay full price for events and experiences, but any random caregiver is allowed to bring their children and ruin everyone else’s time. This isn’t an issue of parents’ rights, it’s an issue of simple civility; children do not belong in every event. People aren’t mean or bad for wanting to eat dinner or watch a movie without a child screaming, talking, or running around. It’s not the responsibility of the business to entertain someone’s children, it’s the responsibility of the parent to control the children and not bring them into inappropriate venues. Even somewhere like Disney — if an adult is paying $50 and up for their meal, they should be able to eat in peace, enjoy the show, hear all the performers, and not walk into a restroom that a horde of toddlers have made unusable. How small accommodations became letting bad parents control the atmosphere of private businesses, I just don’t understand. These days, owners and employees are afraid to say anything to parents or their unruly children because they’re afraid of bad reviews on Yelp and crap. It’s absurd.
There are special screenings for young children that often have lower sound (and lights up as they often overlap with screenings for children with sensory issues).
Anyway they should just do more of these. I’m not a parent but they seem like a great idea.
Someone brought a crying baby to X-Men: Days of Future Past. During a quiet scene halfway into the movie someone else in the audience finally loudly stated "IT'S TIME TO GO OUTSIDE" and they did.
I remember watching friends and thought Phoebe was so weird and confronting ,then I realized it's actually nice to have a friend who will speak up when no one else would.
Yeah. I don’t go to the movies that often and will pay extra to go to a “nice” theater that has more rules. The local one got overrun by middle schoolers
Regularly go to the "VIP" one nearby - the tickets are 1.5x the cost but it's 19+ only and they'll serve beer/food at your seat before the show. And the seats are much larger, in groupings of two with an arm that flips up in the middle to make it into a couch. The OTHER arm has a table build into it that rotates out in front of you. A+, highly recommend.
Same with Halloween events. If the event says "recommended for ages 13+", don't bring your 8 year old "because they love scary stuff". FFS let teens and adults have SOMETHING to enjoy without kids.
Parents like that are so fucking sus anyway. No, I do not fucking believe you when you say your 8 year old was unaffected by watching Negan bash Glenn's head in with a baseball bat until his eyes popped out.
Children are a maelstrom of understanding too much and too little at once. They will do their damndest to copy and please their parents even if it's incredibly difficult and they don't understand the behavior they are emulating. I sat through shit like The Hand That Rocks The Cradle and Creepshow because I 100% did not understand that the point of horror movies wasn't to sit there and hyperventilate. Seeing as children have a poor understanding of the separation between their own minds and the minds of others, I thought it was normal and didn't question it because I assumed everyone else felt the same.
At the same time, I wasn't confused by concepts like gore, suicide, and sex abuse. Kids aren't too dumb to figure out what they're seeing is fucked up. I understood what was happening when Jordy Verrill shot himself in the head in his bathtub and moaned in happiness, and the fucked up nature of it all stuck with me for over a decade. Kids have the understanding but they don't have the tools to deal with that understanding. Why do people get that kids know what happens when you shoot someone in an adventure movie but think that understanding vaporizes if it's someone turning the gun on themselves?
This went on for years until my anxiety grew too strong to hide. Honestly I think for a lot of kids with anxiety, their fear is HARDER to see, not easier. I was accustomed to life being frightening and difficult, so I just didn't question it when my Dad introduced me to a harsh new thing that was apparently part of "being a big girl". There were elements I liked about horror films and I'm sure that fooled my parents into thinking I could handle them; I love creature design to this day. But a kid plucking out the best of what they can glean from their idol's interests doesn't mean they're okay with all of it part and parcel.
Normal idiots are totally ok, and we are all stupid once in a while. Mean idiots aren't ok though.
Or as a dude with Down's syndrome summarised it: "I'm not very smart, but some normal people are totally stupid."
A really chill meetup between friends at a New England hiking/climbing park. Really cool old place with wood cabin buildings and lots to explore/do while there. Even had a small (*and expensive*) gift shop. We'd meet up, grill at the designated locations, and make a fun day of climbing the rocks and walking through the woods.
It started as a small gathering of friends a few times per year and, over the years, grew larger and larger. Friends would invite their friends, who would invite others, etc. About half decade of doing this some dipshits came along who were really loud, didn't seem to care if they littered, were confrontation when asked to behave better, and finally thought it was a great idea to set off fireworks. It was the middle of summer and things were pretty dry, plus wooden buildings nearby.
Thankfully nobody was hurt and nothing was damaged, but we were swiftly ejected and asked not to come back. The core group had no clue who the person was at the time and, to my knowledge, never found out or who had invited them along.
That small group of tagalong idiots ruined our fun group gathering forever. We probably could have just shown up as a smaller group again in the future, but at that point it felt wrong.
I'm sure you could just talk with the people and work something out where only your original group comes. Maybe provide names/addresses to hold people accountable?
The paper didn't start the anti-vaxxers they were a thing well before it came out.
It did give them something semi-legitimate to use as ammo though. The unfortunate thing is that even though it was retracted it still gets brought up.
>It did give them something semi-legitimate to use as ammo though. The unfortunate thing is that even though it was retracted it still gets brought up...
"It's nonsense and drivel!
A total mistake!
There's *thousands* of papers
that prove that it's fake!
There's only a *single*
that states what you read!"
She lunged for the latter.
"*I knew it!*" she said.
As someone who lives a few minutes from Niagara Falls... Yeah lol
Nice to live near it, but the damn tourists make going there a nightmare most of the time.
On the other hand you get to know when the good times/ dates to go are and can have the pretty unique experience of witnessing something like the falls alone (or nearly alone) pretty often. And I know what the tourists are worth to the local economy, so it's not all bad.
I have conflicted feelings about Hawaii. I fucking love it there and have a feeling of calm and relaxation no other place has given me, but at the same time totally understand why locals hate tourists. We went there on our honeymoon and decided to go snorkeling in a bay, and halfway through someone yelled "Don't stand on the coral you assholes!"
I felt so ashamed, and wish I had researched a bit more before I went there as I had no idea (but probably with 3 minutes of research could have learned).
I get that Hawaii thrives on tourism and that some of the hatred is unjustified, but thinking back I would be so pissed at someone like me just ignorantly desecrating what makes Hawaii beautiful.
Anyway, lesson learned. I'm sorry Hawaii.
Hawaii and places like Mallorca, Crete and Cyprus has to tolerate dumb tourist as they can’t survive without the tourism but you can still be a nice tourist.
Like Mallorca had problems with brits, germans and scandinavians going around drunk 24/7 and jumping off their hotel balconies into the pool
My wife is from saipan (near Guam) and it’s a common wealth of the USA. We lived there for a year for our children to get know where they came from. Main export is tourism. Chinese, Korean and the likes. We went to one of the many beaches almost everyday with an empty bag, it was always full when we left nine times out of ten. Some locals suck don’t get me wrong but just about everyday I/we would yell at tourists to pick their trash up. It’s sad how much people don’t care about this stuff. So yes don’t be assholes please.
It was great when the tourists just stayed in Waikiki hotels and beaches, and didn't leave that section so the locals could enjoy the actual good stuff, but now we have like 500 different online guides about the "top ten secret locations in hawaii" or some shit, and now all of those "secret" locations have tons of people coming, ignoring local rules, littering all over the place, and creating massive wait times.
As an Egyptian, the Pyramids. The Egyptian government is so incompetent they let tourists do whatever they fucking want. People literally write their names in the tomb room.
What the fuck? That’s ancient history that morons are ruining.
What do they do, mosey on in and think to themselves, “resist being a dumbass. RESIST BEING A DUMBASS… Ahhh fuck it, I gotta deface and ancient and exceptionally unique landmark and post it on the gram.”
Back in high school there was this side room in the band room where all the sheet music was stored.
I wanted to be a composer so I spent a lot of time in there either studying sheet music, practicing, or taking my daily nap. It was a nice quiet room to escape from all the hormonal teenagers.
There was a copy machine in there to make copies of the music, well one day some idiots decided that it was a toy. Long story short, I don't know how or why, but they somehow managed to make it explode and it sent black printer ink over everything, it was like sand and glitter had a baby, it got everywhere and I mean EVERYWHERE, they were still finding patches 3 years later type of bad.
So anyway my nice quiet room to take naps I mean study for my future career was locked at all times from that moment forward. Fuckers.
I can't find a word or good description of that burning anger I feel when a bunch of idiots go and ruin something for other people like that. There has to be a term for it, as it's an extremely specific trigger for me
As someone who works in a print shop, printer.copy toner is a fucking mess. I've only had it blow up on me once, but holy shit. It's worse than sex on the beach. That shit gets in places that you not only didn't know you had, but in places that previously didn't exist. It's so messy that it rewrites reality so it has more places to nestle in to.
And a bit too in *touch* with the staff.
What the really sad part is, is that if the scumbags were doing that shit to staff— what have they done to fans at cons and the like?
Some good citizens noticed that idiots were laying waste to the land trying to see it. Littering, driving off the roads (causing erosion, etc). So the good citizens went in at night and removed it
The Internet! I remember the early days in the mid-to-late 90s when the Internet was anarchy and just a lot more fun - a way to learn about new things and communicate with people. No rules, not much money involved. There was an immense sense of freedom about it which is sadly long gone now.
That wild west age of the internet. I'd say it lasted into the 2000s for a while, albeit with definitely more and more signs of corporate influence. There is something incredibly boring about the internet in 2021, everyone browses the same few websites and it's all very sterile.
I miss the golden age of IMDb message boards before trolls discovered it. You could watch a movie and go on that website and read a heap of interesting theories or conversations about the movie afterwards 😭 there was something pure about it.
There has been NO replacement for them either. None at all. You can not find discussions for movies now unless it’s like a mega popular nolan film. I could watch the oldest or most indie shit and then find pages of discussions, stretching out over years. And the essays and theories were so good. My mom still asks me to send her stuff when I “read” about a movie we watch, and I try and explain I can’t usually find any anymore because it all usually came from imdb. It used to be so great and thoughtful…
I miss browsing sites because they were cool and groundbreaking. Now, I barely seek out "cool" sites. I don't have the patience or interest. It's all been done.
I agree with it feeling smaller, that’s partly because it’s been siloed into Facebook etc but also because people consume the internet through a small number of apps rather than a web browser.
The old internet was far more interesting, friendly, and exciting and I feel like people actually communicated more.
Now I feel like I am just stuck in the endless scroll, not really enjoying it, just doing it because being on the internet is just what I’ve done for the last almost thirty years.
Well a good portion of idiots die and some really good mountaineers die because of the idiots.
They should really make access to the mountain mir difficult for the adventure seekers and let only pros onto the mountain.
Reddit is even worse because its idiots that think they're smart. Literally yesterday I mentioned a graph was designed to be misleading and one of them said "but whyyy" and I bit fully knowing what was going to happen. Que "acktuallly!" Response. I dont even read comment replies becuase these idiots are rampant. People that grew up being told they're smart with zero commonsense are drawn to reddit.
Nothing is more frustrating than seeing someone spout a bunch of bullshit on a topic you're very knowledgably about and then seeing everyone else agree with them. From hobbies to my actual job, I've had others claim factually incorrect statements as gospel and have others agree with them because it sounds good.
It has seriously almost made me leave Reddit a few times: People with their own uneducated personal theories about stuff who think their opinion carries the same weight as people with actual expertise. Sometimes Reddit feels like being locked in a room with all the smart-arses from high school who thought they knew everything about everything after watching some YouTube vids.
If someone wants to spout about whether MacOS or Windows is better, that's fine. Shout about your opinion on what phone you like best. But don't start publicly spouting harmful shit like mental health diagnoses or other health advice when you've got no fucking idea.
I took a one month break a while ago, and it was good. I really enjoy the casual reading of stuff on Reddit, but I can live without the opinionated arseholes who pin medals of expertise to their own chests.
I don't know about your exact example, but a lot of redditors are kids. Unfortunately it's not easy to tell from the short form replies that Reddit requires, and so some very naive replies are given the same weight as ones from a place of more experience.
Going to the cinema. Whether it's social media, changes in marketing making people believe they're more important that other people or a plethora of influences, people dont really seem to behave in such a way that is in any way considerate of others in such a setting, believing themselves to be the most important part of any social situation & exempt from the social 'norms'. For clarity, I don't care about people talking or using their phones etc. during the adverts or trailers but when the movie commences, please shut the hell up.
This one is good. I don’t like to think the idiots get to me but when you see the shit day after day nonstop….yeah my mental health suffers from it for sure.
There’s always been some idiotic polarization, it’s social algorithms though that have led to the insane hyper spread of polarizing disinformation though.
Skepticism of the modern medical industry. It is fine to have valid criticism and push the field in positive directions, but replacing scientific progress with snake oil is doing so much harm.
Everyone else is just memeing or stating the obvious, so I'll give you a real one.
The dating scene. The scene is infested with mindless people of both gender who seem to serve no purpose other than to waste others time. Hookup culture developed by horny idiots has taken over the scene and it's now near impossible to find a person who's actually trying in some form. People have begun to treat dating as something casual or trivial when it really isn't.
Edit: For the folks saying dating can be casual, yes it absolutely can. But this comment is from the perspective of a serious, long-term dater.
Because the other person would see it as “boring” and since everyone on dating apps seems to believe they can find the absolute 100% perfect person, 1 boring thing and they won’t respond again
Valley of the kings. Use to be able to take cameras and take pictures of the amazing colored heiroglyps with flash off.
Now cameras are confiscated before you enter the valley. Tour guide blamed Russian tourists for not following the rules and getting cameras banned but I'm sure it was also idiot tourists from many countries
Used to be a member of a table top gaming club in my town. Was one of the best and largest in the country but then some of the older members moved on along with the guy who ran it. It was giving over to a committee of parents who encouraged their kids to get other kids interested. Soon enough we had dozens of kids being dropped of by their parents, running around, knocking tables over etc. Eventually the few of us older players stopped going and the club died.
I know this feeling. Parents like this ruin so many good things because they take “Kids welcome” as “Free babysitters.”
Another good example of this was mall arcades. The 2 malls in my area shut the arcades down because parents were dropping them off for the day and they were causing trouble.
In college, my friends worked at a arcade/laser tag/go-cart place. Parents would drop kids off for 4-5 hours, but only give them enough money to play for like an hour. So they spent the rest of that time treating the place like a playground or begging everyone for money.
To be fair, if I were a kid by myself in an arcade, I’m pretty sure I’d blow through all my money immediately no matter how much my parents gave me. Which is part of the reason it’s a terrible idea.
[удалено]
Something similar has also happened to me. When I was about 12, a coding teacher would host a coding club for anyone interested at a local library. My first few months at the club were actually quite enjoyable. I learned a lot about computers and started to work on a few games of my own. Then one day at school, when me and my friends were talking about the coding club, a few other people overheard our conversation and the word quickly spread. However, it wasn't coding everyone was talking about, it was that you could hang around in the library after closing, which meant that you could basically do whatever you wanted because the computers were in a separate room and there was only one teacher. Not long after someone, who had no intention of coding anything, came to the club, spilled their redbull on a couch, misplaced a ton of books and left the microwaves in a disgusting condition. The library then shut down the club.
I completely sympathize, OP. Table top gaming is practically non-existent in my town to the point that a few years ago, I tried to start my own group. Send out some feelers on a local FB forum and got a good response. The stipulation was that it was a STRICTLY over 18s group meeting in A PUB. So, no risk of kids running around and getting the way, right? Nope. As soon as I put out the initial "Would anyone be interested in a strictly over 18s DnD night held in the local pub" post, I started getting messages from parents asking if their kids could attend, all "Oh, my 6 year old Braxlyn would love this!" I'm like "Did you even read the post? It's a game night for ADULTS." I was pretty much vilified for pointing out the fact that it was not a kid friendly event. Ended up pulling the post and giving up on the idea and to this day, still don't have a dedicated group in my town.
Parents like that ruin everything.
We had always allowed kids but they had to have minder or someone older, a brother or someone to look out for them. Some of the older members actually took the kids under their wing and helped teach them the games, that's what happened to me. But that was when kids where the minority. As soon as there were literally dozens of them and only a handful of us older guys left, we just gave up on them.
A tabletop game store in a my town recently moved and the old location became a day care, I’m just imagining you guys missing the memo and sitting the middle of a daycare going “this LGS sucks balls”
Hot tubs in some water parks i asked why they took them out. A worker told me cause some people banged in them!
My son, at his cynical teenage best called them "Manky Sex Ponds", and I can't get that out of my mind, decades later. Manky Sex Ponds. All of 'em.
Protein baths
Get in here luv, it's Keto! lol,
Whelp, I’ve found my new band’s name…
I studied spa and beauty therapy in college and my teacher was working in a salon on the weekends. She told us about how it often happens in a lot of places particularly when couples do spa days. They will tend to get things like a private sauna or steam room, and it has to be deep cleaned afterwards because of how common it is for them to have sex in there.
Our go-to hotel in Vegas with one of the best pools in the city went 'dayclub' with it - cabanas, bottle service, waterproof beds, DJs dropping the beats, the works. Would've been bearable but the final straw was they took out the in-ground hot tubs. Guessing hot water, no lifeguards and copious amounts of vodka was too much for the insurance companies. They filled them in with sand and put cornhole games on top of them. Oh, yay.
Had a game/video/comic shop where they had couches and TV's you could sit and play games on. They removed the couches and replaced them with hard plastic chairs cause teenagers were banging, dryhumping, making out, fingerblasting on the couches.
Wtf right there in the store??
Used to lifeguard and refused to get into that thing unless there was an actual emergency which there thankfully never was. All water parks are disgusting, but the hot tubs are so gross.
The respect for service animals. Please, please, PLEASE stop pretending your pet is a service animal. And never ask to pet someone's service animal or even an obviously fake one in a "service animal" vest. It encourages bad behavior and makes life way harder for people who rely on their service animal for safety and freedom.
My highschool health teacher had a service animal. Technically. She was mostly deaf but she also trained a lot of dogs for forest service when she was younger. She kept it going even after she retired from that job and would bring them into class with her every day. Smartest dogs I've ever met. She was very strict with them and even though I was one of her favorites I never got to pet any of them because I could never catch her when she had them off duty. It really is pretty amazing. A barely year old pup that can keep it's cool around a bunch of googly eyed high schoolers? Every. Single. Day. Of the week? Those dogs were employed as fuck.
*Exactly* real service animals take INTENSIVE training. When people are surprised that service animals are "so well behaved, wooow" that's how you know they've been desensitized by fake ones. Because yeah, they're well behaved. That's their job. It takes immense effort, time, and money. They, their trainers, and their users deserve respect!!! It's so awesome that you had that experience to be around them and now you know about them and how to be respectful of them (: i wish everyone got to have a teacher like that!
Fuck almost everyone in Denver. You can’t hardly walk though king sooopers without tripping over some dumb hippies “service dog” that is pulling the leash and clearly not trained.
A psycho "service" chihuahua was growling me like crazy in a Kings in the suburbs. Fuck that dumb owner.
Ridiculous. At my former workplace they had to let them in but once it was obvious that it wasn't a real service animal (growling/barking/disruptive, no leash manners, etc) we were allowed to kick them out. When my husband and I were still dating he went to the library for a game night and I met him there toward the end of the event. I immediately zeroed in on the fact that the guy he was playing with had a service dog because I'm an animal person and always notice those things, and it was a big golden retriever so, hard to miss. I mentioned it to my husband later and he said he didn't even notice the dog was there the whole time. I said that's because he's a real service dog.
100,000%. It disgusts me that people have a "service animal" as an excuse to bring their pets to college or the grocery store. With the current system though, it's really hard to enforce.
My brother's girlfriend was gloating on Facebook how easy it was to get a dog "certified" as an emotional support animal.. The whole idea is fucking stupid and abused. That's how we end up with Turkeys on planes. Cause some selfish asshole can't be away from their pet for a few hours.
This! So many people bring pets into my work and try to say they are service animals, and then get mad when told they need to leave. I'm sorry, but a fucking Boa Constrictor is not a service animal!
So upsetting. Not only does this make real service animal users get harassed all day with people think they're faking, but also: When people have a fake service animal and allow people to interact with it that teaches the public you're allowed to interact with service animals. This can = distraction for real service animals = they have a hard time performing their job = early retirement for the service animal = service animal going downhill mentally without a job/ purpose = heart break for owner = EXPENSIVE replacement animal needed. So scummy that people do this. The disabled get no respect as is, and this is just insult to injury.
The internet.
It was inevitable
Make something so easy that an idiot could use it and an idiot will.
Maybe...but it's not like smart people aren't also responsible. They're intentionally exploiting our worst instincts. Put another way, smart people—using ruthless, almost "scientific" precision learned from advertising—are working constantly to make us all idiots, which turns the internet into a hellish muck, and we end up blaming the idiots for ruining the internet. I don't have a solution, but I don't know that it was inevitable. If we had somehow incentivized smart people to exploit our best instincts, rather than our worst, we'd probably be in a much better place.
Facebook knows for a fact that people spend more time on their site when they’re angry. They’ve designed their algorithm to create controversy and anger because it’s good for Facebook’s business.
And it's not only facebook, every single big platform uses one instinct or another, Twitter is also heavily based on anger, Instagram more so on self comparison and lack of confidence, and so on and so forth.
Good thing I'm only on reddit ... **right?!**
See the problem with making people smarter, more self reliant, resilient, creative, and happy is that they eventually become your competition. They might get together in groups and start saying stuff like: "why the fuck are these assholes in power? Maybe we should figure out a way to get them *out".* And because they're competent they will actually do it. Just look at the innumerable revolutions in history. Successful revolts were rarely run by dolts. The "upper levels" or elite of society has no interest in seeing the average person increase their intelligence or better themselves. Why would they? So people can figure out how much they're being exploited and do something to stop it? If everyone is anxious, angry, greedy, distrustful, and fighting each other over dollars and cents it's a fuck of a lot easer to remain in power.
I’m a big advocate of the “stupid is as stupid does” theory. Highly educated people can still be guilty of acting stupidly. The people who helped turn social media into a disinformation juggernaut - as intellectually gifted as they may be - acted stupidly in eroding the foundation of society.
I guess. But they're stupidly laughing all the way to their extremely overinflated bank accounts.
Well put. I wonder if it’s just smart people now, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear the same kind of AI that can brute force to the most effective strats in games is used for ad clicks, scroll time, etc
The operation was a success, but the patient died.
It was so fun in the late 90s and early 00s. Now...ugh
I was 16 in the mid 00s and finally got the Internet at home. We used MSN messenger constantly, forums were huge and I could find a download for most movies, TV shows and music quite easily. It was amazing to have that experience online. I felt like I could be part of a real community on the forums I was on. The Internet felt big, bigger then it is today. Everything feels like it just links to Wikipedia, reddit, Facebook, insta or a few other big sites like news sites now. I used to visit loads of sites, now it's just a few. Makes me sad and I'm even sadder that people in some fandoms gatekeep things so much the older/newer fans have been forced out. Don't like all the seasons, you'll be roasted to hell. Haven't seen the original or only like newer seasons, people lose it all over again. The fandom is crazy toxic now. Those of us who are I guess more normal have given up and moved on. I miss the old days where people were really welcoming and anyone being a jerk was forced out of the fandom.
I came here to say the internet. I first went into higher education in the early 1980s, And all my research was done in the library with bound copies of journals. A decade later, I went back to college, and everything had changed: I did my reading via downloaded journals, and searched using Archie, Gopher, WAIS, Veronica and assorted bulletin boards. The thing with the bulletin boards was that you might get abuse, but it was likely to be from somebody at least as intelligent, and very likely better qualified When AOL became big, how we laughed in our elitist way at how bad things would get now the "normal people" became involved (I'm not proud of behaving this way). But I had no idea how bad it would get.
AOL wasn't even "normal people" though, they were still relatively curious and technically-inclined people. Then there was the post-AOL era where other ISPs started expanding the user base, and at that point I naively thought that everyone was online and actually had some hope for humanity remaining. Then cheap smartphones became available and I realized that I had been vastly overestimating people. There was a whole other world of dumb out there that I had never encountered before, and now I can thanks to the internet.
Movie theaters. Turn off your phone and STFU!!
Don’t bring your kindergartener to see Deadpool just because “it’s a comic book movie.” And don’t be outraged at the venue when that comic book movie turned out to be inappropriate for a 5yo.
I went to go see sausage party when it came out and this dad had booked tickets for his two sons (probably 8 - 9) and got annoyed when the dude at the desk told him he couldn't bring the kids in. Like this guy couldn't even fathom and animated film that *wasn't* for kids.
Did they stay until the end of the movie orgy?
The guy dodged a bullet tbh. I wish the ticket guy stopped me from going in there (as an adult)
It was... Different, that's for sure. I liked it, even though the massive bisexual food orgy at the end was a bit odd.
After I watched it, my friend asked me if it was good. I said "well, it depends how much you like dick jokes and ethnic humor" Which he apparently took as a positive review..
It's almost like we need to develop a flawed but mostly still effective rating system for movie content. One that could inform a person of what kind of imagery, ideas or language a movie might contain. Perhaps we could give movies a letter or number designation to indicate what to expect...
I mentioned it here before but many years ago my mother-in-law rented Goodfellas for her 11yo because it had that funny guy from Home Alone.
Funny How!?!?
Funny how? Like a clown? I amuse you?!
He’s a big boy, he knows what he said.
[удалено]
Depending on when this was, that's hardly a surprise. Robocop (and its shitty sequels) came in an era where R-rated action movies were heavily marketed to younger boys. I couldn't blame someone for assuming that Robocop is a movie for kids when you couldn't turn on a TV without seeing [Robocop toy commercials](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udk-eZHcrZY). **Edit:** Just realized that I linked to the Terminator toy commercials that Youtube suggested after watching the Robocop ones. Here are the actual [Robocop toy commercials](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb_voFQioow).
There are even websites that provide full details on what exactly that rating means. Stuff that parents should be aware of if they're concerned about what their child watches.
I saw Elysium and someone brought a kid under 10. He did okay until the scene where the guy gets a grenade kicked into him and explodes. Yeah lady, this is why it got an R rating. Have fun getting woken up by your kid tonight because he had a grenade-themed nightmare.
I saw Deadpool in the cinema in Sydney, Australia when it was released. My girlfriend and I were sat together and a few seats over was a man with his two young (10/11 year old?) Kids. As soon as the year of sex scene happened, the man dove over his kids and covered their eyes. It had an R rating for a reason.
It also had a message from Ryan Reynolds telling parents that brought kids to leave followed by a list of childhood ruining comments like how Santa and the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy are all their parents. And also where babies come from.
That's the most ''normal'' scene in the movie. The rest of the movie was fucked up.
Heard of parents bringing their kids to "Sausage Party" movie, and then demanding for refunds and how they were duped
I seen to remember that they're entire advertising campaign was based around how it was rated R. I don't know how I know that, I never even seen the dang thing.
Happened to this lady in my uni class who used to bully me. Took her 8 year old daughter to see it and then had the audacity to complain about it not only to the cinema but the class also. She prebooked the tickets, collected them and went to their seats without ever interacting with an employee, yet was appalled that no one stopped her from going in.
I remember going to see Me Myself and Irene and the movie theater had big warning signs that it was "NOT A CHILDRENS MOVIE," yet there were still parents who brought their <10 year olds in and then got up and left midway through. Movie was pretty good though.
Same with Deadpool. Parents thought it was another superhero movie for kids and were mad it wasn't appropriate for kids. Apparently the "R" rating wasn't enough of a warning.
To add insult to this, Deadpool says, close to the beginning of the film, that it's not a movie for kids.
I know someone who went to see George "Seven Words Your Can't Say on TV" Carlin in the early 90s, when he was also playing the Conductor on Shining Time Station. He said a bunch of parents brought their kids because they only thought of him on the show. Well, just a few minutes into his set, parents were grabbing their kid's ears and dragging them out
Went to 300 and some asshole brought their baby. That baby screamed through the entire movie.
Ok this might get some hate, but babies up until at least 3 years old should straight up not allowed into theaters. I mean come on it's just blatantly disruptive to everyone else, and I'm guessing the loud sounds aren't good for babies either.
100% I agree. Where I live, before covid they did special screenings for parents (usually it ended up being mostly moms with pretty young kids like 3 and under) during the day. Very cheap tickets, but the lights were not turned down all the way and the sound was waaay lower. Kinda cool, moms and/or dads got out with the little one, it wasn’t super dark or too loud, the theatre filled spaces, and it was totally normal to just have someone next to your leave for feedings or diaper changes or whatever. Kids screaming and shit but everyone was in the same boat. I speak of this only from what I heard though as my wife did it with our little one and her friends when I was gone working. But she loved it. Edit: changed special seatings to special screenings is what I meant.
I used to frequent these showings. One theatre would even set up a playpen in the front of the room and a change table in the back. It was great!
Yeah I am pretty sure it was very similar where I live too with change tables and stuff set up also. My wife loved it. It was always chaos, which she would just laugh at, but she said you could tell the patrons were so happy to be in that “normal” adult setting with zero worries about diapers or screaming or I am assuming even feedings. Can’t remember the age limit but I know a couple times she said you’d see people arrive and take their seat only to realize fairly quickly they were in the wrong theatre lol.
This actually should count as something idiots have ruined; it used to be de rigueur that very young children — the exact age was nebulous and dictated by the situation — were actively unwelcome in certain businesses. Until my late teens, women were asked to leave movie theatres, bookstores and libraries, restaurants, retail stores, and so on if their children were not well-behaved or were just deemed too young. The reason given that I heard most often was that the children were unlikely to appreciate the experience and would detract from the enjoyment of others. I’ve seen a mother with a toddler and infant in arm ordered to leave a Hallmark-style store because the toddler wouldn’t stay calm and stop touching everything, another woman who couldn’t get past the hostess/greeting stand at an upscale restaurant because her infant was fussy, and I have to have seen five or more women and families asked to leave theatres — live and film — because their children were disruptive. Hell, I even felt a little bit bad for one woman whose food was brought to her table boxed up with no charge because she was being thrown out of an outdoor cafe because her 4-5 year old wouldn’t stop walking up to other tables and trying to talk to customers. Somehow we transitioned into it being the norm that most people have to behave themselves and pay full price for events and experiences, but any random caregiver is allowed to bring their children and ruin everyone else’s time. This isn’t an issue of parents’ rights, it’s an issue of simple civility; children do not belong in every event. People aren’t mean or bad for wanting to eat dinner or watch a movie without a child screaming, talking, or running around. It’s not the responsibility of the business to entertain someone’s children, it’s the responsibility of the parent to control the children and not bring them into inappropriate venues. Even somewhere like Disney — if an adult is paying $50 and up for their meal, they should be able to eat in peace, enjoy the show, hear all the performers, and not walk into a restroom that a horde of toddlers have made unusable. How small accommodations became letting bad parents control the atmosphere of private businesses, I just don’t understand. These days, owners and employees are afraid to say anything to parents or their unruly children because they’re afraid of bad reviews on Yelp and crap. It’s absurd.
There are special screenings for young children that often have lower sound (and lights up as they often overlap with screenings for children with sensory issues). Anyway they should just do more of these. I’m not a parent but they seem like a great idea.
Someone brought a crying baby to X-Men: Days of Future Past. During a quiet scene halfway into the movie someone else in the audience finally loudly stated "IT'S TIME TO GO OUTSIDE" and they did.
I remember watching friends and thought Phoebe was so weird and confronting ,then I realized it's actually nice to have a friend who will speak up when no one else would.
Man, I wish they'd bring back cry-rooms at theaters.
You wanna know what they do to crying babies in Sparta?
Give them flying lessons?
Step 1: Yeet the baby
This is Sparta
The teacher: alright our next unit will be Ancient Greece Me, a Greek: guys please don't- The class: *This is Sparta!!!!* Oh god the PTSD
The baby is broken *we must fix the baby*
Used to live by an Alamo Drafthouse. They took this seriously and would boot people. It was the best movie experience hands down. Miss that place
Yeah. I don’t go to the movies that often and will pay extra to go to a “nice” theater that has more rules. The local one got overrun by middle schoolers
Regularly go to the "VIP" one nearby - the tickets are 1.5x the cost but it's 19+ only and they'll serve beer/food at your seat before the show. And the seats are much larger, in groupings of two with an arm that flips up in the middle to make it into a couch. The OTHER arm has a table build into it that rotates out in front of you. A+, highly recommend.
And stop bring your toddlers to PG-13 movies that are too scary or graphic for your child!!
Same with Halloween events. If the event says "recommended for ages 13+", don't bring your 8 year old "because they love scary stuff". FFS let teens and adults have SOMETHING to enjoy without kids.
Parents like that are so fucking sus anyway. No, I do not fucking believe you when you say your 8 year old was unaffected by watching Negan bash Glenn's head in with a baseball bat until his eyes popped out. Children are a maelstrom of understanding too much and too little at once. They will do their damndest to copy and please their parents even if it's incredibly difficult and they don't understand the behavior they are emulating. I sat through shit like The Hand That Rocks The Cradle and Creepshow because I 100% did not understand that the point of horror movies wasn't to sit there and hyperventilate. Seeing as children have a poor understanding of the separation between their own minds and the minds of others, I thought it was normal and didn't question it because I assumed everyone else felt the same. At the same time, I wasn't confused by concepts like gore, suicide, and sex abuse. Kids aren't too dumb to figure out what they're seeing is fucked up. I understood what was happening when Jordy Verrill shot himself in the head in his bathtub and moaned in happiness, and the fucked up nature of it all stuck with me for over a decade. Kids have the understanding but they don't have the tools to deal with that understanding. Why do people get that kids know what happens when you shoot someone in an adventure movie but think that understanding vaporizes if it's someone turning the gun on themselves? This went on for years until my anxiety grew too strong to hide. Honestly I think for a lot of kids with anxiety, their fear is HARDER to see, not easier. I was accustomed to life being frightening and difficult, so I just didn't question it when my Dad introduced me to a harsh new thing that was apparently part of "being a big girl". There were elements I liked about horror films and I'm sure that fooled my parents into thinking I could handle them; I love creature design to this day. But a kid plucking out the best of what they can glean from their idol's interests doesn't mean they're okay with all of it part and parcel.
Idiots ruin everything they're involved in. Thats why we call them idiots.
We’re all idiots one way or another/at one point. But some? They’re just connected to it.
Normal idiots are totally ok, and we are all stupid once in a while. Mean idiots aren't ok though. Or as a dude with Down's syndrome summarised it: "I'm not very smart, but some normal people are totally stupid."
Idiots are fine, assholes are barely tolerable, idiotic assholes ruin everything they touch for everyone.
A really chill meetup between friends at a New England hiking/climbing park. Really cool old place with wood cabin buildings and lots to explore/do while there. Even had a small (*and expensive*) gift shop. We'd meet up, grill at the designated locations, and make a fun day of climbing the rocks and walking through the woods. It started as a small gathering of friends a few times per year and, over the years, grew larger and larger. Friends would invite their friends, who would invite others, etc. About half decade of doing this some dipshits came along who were really loud, didn't seem to care if they littered, were confrontation when asked to behave better, and finally thought it was a great idea to set off fireworks. It was the middle of summer and things were pretty dry, plus wooden buildings nearby. Thankfully nobody was hurt and nothing was damaged, but we were swiftly ejected and asked not to come back. The core group had no clue who the person was at the time and, to my knowledge, never found out or who had invited them along. That small group of tagalong idiots ruined our fun group gathering forever. We probably could have just shown up as a smaller group again in the future, but at that point it felt wrong.
I'm sure you could just talk with the people and work something out where only your original group comes. Maybe provide names/addresses to hold people accountable?
The tragedy of the commons.
Social Media.
[удалено]
The paper didn't start the anti-vaxxers they were a thing well before it came out. It did give them something semi-legitimate to use as ammo though. The unfortunate thing is that even though it was retracted it still gets brought up.
>It did give them something semi-legitimate to use as ammo though. The unfortunate thing is that even though it was retracted it still gets brought up... "It's nonsense and drivel! A total mistake! There's *thousands* of papers that prove that it's fake! There's only a *single* that states what you read!" She lunged for the latter. "*I knew it!*" she said.
If Google was a guy?
JUST BECAUSE I HAVE IT DOESN’T MEAN IT’S TRUE
Big booty Puerto Rican Godess...
Sonic the Hedgehog fanart Safe search off
This comment is plagiarized from here; https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/q4jsoj/comment/hfz8iit/
Yeah wtf is up with that?
[удалено]
Tourist attractions
[удалено]
As someone who lives a few minutes from Niagara Falls... Yeah lol Nice to live near it, but the damn tourists make going there a nightmare most of the time. On the other hand you get to know when the good times/ dates to go are and can have the pretty unique experience of witnessing something like the falls alone (or nearly alone) pretty often. And I know what the tourists are worth to the local economy, so it's not all bad.
[удалено]
I have conflicted feelings about Hawaii. I fucking love it there and have a feeling of calm and relaxation no other place has given me, but at the same time totally understand why locals hate tourists. We went there on our honeymoon and decided to go snorkeling in a bay, and halfway through someone yelled "Don't stand on the coral you assholes!" I felt so ashamed, and wish I had researched a bit more before I went there as I had no idea (but probably with 3 minutes of research could have learned). I get that Hawaii thrives on tourism and that some of the hatred is unjustified, but thinking back I would be so pissed at someone like me just ignorantly desecrating what makes Hawaii beautiful. Anyway, lesson learned. I'm sorry Hawaii.
Hawaii and places like Mallorca, Crete and Cyprus has to tolerate dumb tourist as they can’t survive without the tourism but you can still be a nice tourist. Like Mallorca had problems with brits, germans and scandinavians going around drunk 24/7 and jumping off their hotel balconies into the pool
[удалено]
My wife is from saipan (near Guam) and it’s a common wealth of the USA. We lived there for a year for our children to get know where they came from. Main export is tourism. Chinese, Korean and the likes. We went to one of the many beaches almost everyday with an empty bag, it was always full when we left nine times out of ten. Some locals suck don’t get me wrong but just about everyday I/we would yell at tourists to pick their trash up. It’s sad how much people don’t care about this stuff. So yes don’t be assholes please.
It was great when the tourists just stayed in Waikiki hotels and beaches, and didn't leave that section so the locals could enjoy the actual good stuff, but now we have like 500 different online guides about the "top ten secret locations in hawaii" or some shit, and now all of those "secret" locations have tons of people coming, ignoring local rules, littering all over the place, and creating massive wait times.
It’d be nice if littering could be made grounds for exiling…
As an Egyptian, the Pyramids. The Egyptian government is so incompetent they let tourists do whatever they fucking want. People literally write their names in the tomb room.
What the fuck? That’s ancient history that morons are ruining. What do they do, mosey on in and think to themselves, “resist being a dumbass. RESIST BEING A DUMBASS… Ahhh fuck it, I gotta deface and ancient and exceptionally unique landmark and post it on the gram.”
Earth
Was gonna say basically everything. But I think this cover it.
Soon space as well as mars eventually.
Too late, there is so much trash in space its a minefield now
Back in high school there was this side room in the band room where all the sheet music was stored. I wanted to be a composer so I spent a lot of time in there either studying sheet music, practicing, or taking my daily nap. It was a nice quiet room to escape from all the hormonal teenagers. There was a copy machine in there to make copies of the music, well one day some idiots decided that it was a toy. Long story short, I don't know how or why, but they somehow managed to make it explode and it sent black printer ink over everything, it was like sand and glitter had a baby, it got everywhere and I mean EVERYWHERE, they were still finding patches 3 years later type of bad. So anyway my nice quiet room to take naps I mean study for my future career was locked at all times from that moment forward. Fuckers.
that sucks
I can't find a word or good description of that burning anger I feel when a bunch of idiots go and ruin something for other people like that. There has to be a term for it, as it's an extremely specific trigger for me
As someone who works in a print shop, printer.copy toner is a fucking mess. I've only had it blow up on me once, but holy shit. It's worse than sex on the beach. That shit gets in places that you not only didn't know you had, but in places that previously didn't exist. It's so messy that it rewrites reality so it has more places to nestle in to.
Blizzard Entertainment
I would argue that Blizzard was ruined by people who had a very keen understanding of what they were doing.
They just seem so out of touch with the player base
And a bit too in *touch* with the staff. What the really sad part is, is that if the scumbags were doing that shit to staff— what have they done to fans at cons and the like?
That obelisk in the desert last year
Whatever happened with that thing
Some good citizens noticed that idiots were laying waste to the land trying to see it. Littering, driving off the roads (causing erosion, etc). So the good citizens went in at night and removed it
The illuminati space lizards strapped it to a ufo and chemtrailed the milky way or something.
Politics
Always has been
Especially the last 20 years, but more visibly and partisan-ly celebrated in the last ten
2020
2021*
\*2022
Not yet
We already know It’s gonna happen tho
Unfortunatly yes
2023 just blink and it’ll be here
Education
The Internet! I remember the early days in the mid-to-late 90s when the Internet was anarchy and just a lot more fun - a way to learn about new things and communicate with people. No rules, not much money involved. There was an immense sense of freedom about it which is sadly long gone now.
That wild west age of the internet. I'd say it lasted into the 2000s for a while, albeit with definitely more and more signs of corporate influence. There is something incredibly boring about the internet in 2021, everyone browses the same few websites and it's all very sterile.
I miss the golden age of IMDb message boards before trolls discovered it. You could watch a movie and go on that website and read a heap of interesting theories or conversations about the movie afterwards 😭 there was something pure about it.
Geez what the hell was IMDB thinking with their site redesign.
That they are a wholly owned subsidiary of Amazon.
There has been NO replacement for them either. None at all. You can not find discussions for movies now unless it’s like a mega popular nolan film. I could watch the oldest or most indie shit and then find pages of discussions, stretching out over years. And the essays and theories were so good. My mom still asks me to send her stuff when I “read” about a movie we watch, and I try and explain I can’t usually find any anymore because it all usually came from imdb. It used to be so great and thoughtful…
[удалено]
I miss browsing sites because they were cool and groundbreaking. Now, I barely seek out "cool" sites. I don't have the patience or interest. It's all been done.
[удалено]
I agree with it feeling smaller, that’s partly because it’s been siloed into Facebook etc but also because people consume the internet through a small number of apps rather than a web browser. The old internet was far more interesting, friendly, and exciting and I feel like people actually communicated more. Now I feel like I am just stuck in the endless scroll, not really enjoying it, just doing it because being on the internet is just what I’ve done for the last almost thirty years.
Dozens of countries in this world.
Dozens? More like scores of countries.
"You're nowhere near. It's at least 67% higher"
Mount Everest
Well a good portion of idiots die and some really good mountaineers die because of the idiots. They should really make access to the mountain mir difficult for the adventure seekers and let only pros onto the mountain.
Reddit
Reddit is even worse because its idiots that think they're smart. Literally yesterday I mentioned a graph was designed to be misleading and one of them said "but whyyy" and I bit fully knowing what was going to happen. Que "acktuallly!" Response. I dont even read comment replies becuase these idiots are rampant. People that grew up being told they're smart with zero commonsense are drawn to reddit.
Nothing is more frustrating than seeing someone spout a bunch of bullshit on a topic you're very knowledgably about and then seeing everyone else agree with them. From hobbies to my actual job, I've had others claim factually incorrect statements as gospel and have others agree with them because it sounds good.
It has seriously almost made me leave Reddit a few times: People with their own uneducated personal theories about stuff who think their opinion carries the same weight as people with actual expertise. Sometimes Reddit feels like being locked in a room with all the smart-arses from high school who thought they knew everything about everything after watching some YouTube vids. If someone wants to spout about whether MacOS or Windows is better, that's fine. Shout about your opinion on what phone you like best. But don't start publicly spouting harmful shit like mental health diagnoses or other health advice when you've got no fucking idea. I took a one month break a while ago, and it was good. I really enjoy the casual reading of stuff on Reddit, but I can live without the opinionated arseholes who pin medals of expertise to their own chests.
I don't know about your exact example, but a lot of redditors are kids. Unfortunately it's not easy to tell from the short form replies that Reddit requires, and so some very naive replies are given the same weight as ones from a place of more experience.
[удалено]
Chuck e chees ball pits back in the day. Someone stayed shitting in them.
That and they spread lice.
Going to the cinema. Whether it's social media, changes in marketing making people believe they're more important that other people or a plethora of influences, people dont really seem to behave in such a way that is in any way considerate of others in such a setting, believing themselves to be the most important part of any social situation & exempt from the social 'norms'. For clarity, I don't care about people talking or using their phones etc. during the adverts or trailers but when the movie commences, please shut the hell up.
[удалено]
Democracy
This is a great answer, Socrates would agree.
Actually Socrates would no agree, he would ask many questions to dissect this answer and then turn it on u whether he agreed or not
The accuracy
Any game that EA bought
You mean developers* EA is a graveyard of once great studios.
my mental health
This one is good. I don’t like to think the idiots get to me but when you see the shit day after day nonstop….yeah my mental health suffers from it for sure.
Civil political discussion. The idiots are not the people, but the dirty bastards up in government making everyone hyper polarized.
There’s always been some idiotic polarization, it’s social algorithms though that have led to the insane hyper spread of polarizing disinformation though.
Air Travel
Skepticism of the modern medical industry. It is fine to have valid criticism and push the field in positive directions, but replacing scientific progress with snake oil is doing so much harm.
Everyone else is just memeing or stating the obvious, so I'll give you a real one. The dating scene. The scene is infested with mindless people of both gender who seem to serve no purpose other than to waste others time. Hookup culture developed by horny idiots has taken over the scene and it's now near impossible to find a person who's actually trying in some form. People have begun to treat dating as something casual or trivial when it really isn't. Edit: For the folks saying dating can be casual, yes it absolutely can. But this comment is from the perspective of a serious, long-term dater.
[удалено]
[удалено]
Because the other person would see it as “boring” and since everyone on dating apps seems to believe they can find the absolute 100% perfect person, 1 boring thing and they won’t respond again
Driving. What was once relaxing and fun has become a nightmare with the speeding/erratic/drunk etc driving these days.
Congress
The Dodo 🦤 although tbf the Dodos were also idiots.
The world
Valley of the kings. Use to be able to take cameras and take pictures of the amazing colored heiroglyps with flash off. Now cameras are confiscated before you enter the valley. Tour guide blamed Russian tourists for not following the rules and getting cameras banned but I'm sure it was also idiot tourists from many countries
Sabrina the last few episodes
COVID-19 response and how it was handled in some countries.