Dear creepy imitation of Princess Celestia: please send help · 1:59pm Oct 19th, 2015
I feel kinda sick with something. The people at Snapdragon's job apparently have an "OH IT'LL BE FIIIIINE" attitude towards safety protocols and could expose her to something deadly. She's miserable, overworked, under-respected, and worried she'll have to quit her job to avoid getting a deadly disease she's already had once. Because hey, why not almost die a second time, just because you're told to casually disregard the danger!?
Sometimes she tells me life would be so much better as wizards or energy beings or something. You know, if we had bodies that weren't so damned broken and painful and tired all the time. Sure, we both make a bit of fun at loud transhumanists because Eliezer Yudkowsky comes off as way arrogant and Zoltan Istvan is a psychopath, but... she's scared of dying, and I'm scared of what life throws at the living a lot of the time. She's no quote-unquote "transhumanist", but then she wants to be an energy being, and a sorceress, and, of all things, a horse.
She's one of those girls who grew up liking horses without any need for plastic toys, you see. Sometimes we'll be lying around together and she'll say I'm the best pony, to which I insist that I'm obviously an ape.
We're the lucky ones, though. We know people who have it all so much worse than us.
And that's atrocious. It's offensive. It's wrong. It's getting to the point where the oft-heard suggestion to live by our own strength sounds offensive, because we run our own strength out so rapidly just to get by in life.
So to the Princess of Omnicidal Evil and Totalitarian Caring, to Lyrical Melody (despite your creepy religion), and most especially to Forward Charge... please send help. I miss you, and we desperately need more like you.
Oh, and blank_check is totally going to make fun, but let's see her finish school and support herself while all the ordinary troubles of life start to kick in. Enjoy your youth, girl!
Sorry to post a whiny blog entry instead of a chapter. I try to write when I can, but I have work, and research, and a person to take care of. Also, Battle Station Bass Cannon takes priority, since it's got a coherent plan laid-out and actually involves the canon version of MLP.
Think of death before and while I sleep. Have a hard time imagining not being. Past the fear, got to wonder what it not being is like. Must like looking in from the outside but you are so far away you can't see anyone else or even yourself. Easier than life. No worries of all your sins to expose you to harm. No struggles to keep on going. No reason to make reason.
I always feel like I'm outside no mater how much anyone reaches towards me. Must be fear. Fuck that noise.
I'll pretend to care about courage while apathy eats me!
Wear the mask. Be the mask. Let it fill the hollowness.
Apathy can choke on me.
It can choke on you.
Make it puke you up.
Then kick it the gut.
Laugh at it!
No horseman is coming to help unless you seek them out. In less insane terms, if you haven't already got help for you and her, you should do this.
Magic Sky-Daddy and Hypothetical Future-Brain don’t seem to be intervening in any obvious way. We are on our own.
I’m aware that there are likely to be many factors you haven’t reported, and you surely have already considered what I’m about to write… but very few jobs are worth possible death. Unless Snapdragon can save a number of lives via a heroic sacrifice and is willing to be a martyr and is compensated accordingly, there is no reason to undergo any significant risk of catching a disease, and those attempting to force this through disregard of safety rules should be reported to relevant authorities if applicable, and to the public at large if there are none. It’s not just Snapdragon’s health and welfare at stake; others may be hurt by the callous and foolish ones who wield such power and violate safe policies.
If something like an entirely good and ethical CelestAI is ever to become a reality, it can only happen from the efforts of people who behave in a good and ethical manner. Ethics concealed, for whatever justifiable reasons they are repressed, are ethics denied, kept from being actual. Since neither Yahweh nor CyberHorse are able or see fit to step in, we must act in their stead, as we would want them to act.
Of course, easy for me to speak; my livelihood is not in danger. Perhaps there’s some way that we can still help? Could public shame help to change this company’s ways? Could we be a part of that?
3481935 "Snapdragon" doesn't work in anything remotely close to do-or-die heroics. Neither do I. We work in the bog-standard biotech (Snapdragon) and silicon-tech (me) industries for our region.
I mean, I totally volunteer for something very much like an AI lab in my free time, and the company I worked at started as an AI-focused company before that failed completely and they did something else (and I didn't know that when I joined), and they've got connections to all kinds of people whose expertise I could use to help if I was going to build a super-AI....
But actually, doing anything like that takes many man-decades of experience, organizational skill, and original research, plus ethical good intentions, and so there's no rush whatsoever.
Besides which, I've got one life to live, and I want to enjoy a little of it for a while rather than rush around thinking I'm a Big Damn Hero when actually I'm just ruining my health and happiness.
That is exactly what we've been discussing over the past week. She still has another old friend working at the firm who she doesn't want exposed either, so she's going through internal channels first, but I've been urging her to "turn whistle-blower" and report things to the appropriate government office.
They're no corporate behemoth who even have that much of a public-facing operation! But hey, if you know how to get a shame campaign going against most of the USAian East Coast biotechnology industry for the rampantly atrocious labor practices, I'm all ears.
I know I'm not the only one who doesn't know what to say in response to this. (In fact, it's quite easy to put your foot in your mouth by trying.)
If it's just a question of having faith in something, I can make a bit of an attempt to help. I can ramble for a bit, or I can quote something poetic and meaningful. But I can't directly help you with just words. No one can. No matter what I type out here, it's not going to fix Snapdragon's job being shit, or find a new one that's halfway decent. And yet I don't think the danger is that our words will not be meaningful or powerful enough to help us against the void. Rather, as long as people keep speaking words to each other, we are still not lost. Keep talking to the imaginary friends, and the real people, and the dumb-as-a-brick physical world too. Even if you end up with your foot stuck in your mouth half the time, it's still worth it.
I'm not Celestia, but I want to help you.
3482976
If do go "whistle-blower", convince someone else to do it. This person should have nothing to lose. Selfish? Yes, but it's smart. These organizations didn't get powerful by following the rules and being ethical. It's who you know and how you scratch their back. They, the people with power, will turn a "whistle-blower" into a "non-person".
You need to get leverage and allies. Leverage I can't help you with.
They are still made up of people - flawed and fearful. Pliable. Part of the game is being know as a monster to other monsters makes you look weak and stupid. A target. Image is still the king baby. Just take a good hard look at news media and how time they spend time spinning stories to people from revolting. To keep the monsters hidden.
People are not sheep and there are more heroes and villains asleep than you think. Known monsters tend to wake people up and get themselves killed. This is where I would go into other things but at least let me focus on you:
You don't need to be a hero, villain or monster. But you sure as hell don't need to be a victim. Be smart.
3483053
Thanks.
Also, just by way of saying that my sickness got a bunch better: HOW DID YOU ALL MISS THE OPPORTUNITY TO TELL ME TO BELIEVE IN THE YOU WHO BELIEVES IN ME!?
3483666
Thank you, so much.
3483710
Look, it's not about minimizing chances of nasty repercussions. You basically have to work somewhere to blow the whistle on it. Snapdragon's mum knows lawyers, so we can ask around for advice on how to keep ourselves from getting into trouble.
3483862 It's also about maximizing your chances for success. They can't attack back effectively if the company can not target her and you. Moot idea because you can lawyer up and a good lawyer knows how to win right.
I believe you can succeed because it seems like you have a plan, appear to be witty enough to improvise and certainly have enough sense to ignore anything irrelevant. As in my ramblings and... this makes me happy.
3483862
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUovke8f72k
Glad you're feeling better now. Stay happy, and don't be afraid to ask your friends for help. A world which invented Gurren Lagann can't be entirely terrible.
3483939 It's a lot better for having you guys in it -- that's for sure!
3524216 Uhhh...
Ummm....
"Muffinbutts"? Really? Couldn't we just say, "sons of bitches"? Or how about the one Snapdragon settled on, "bags of dicks"?
"Muffinbutts" has a Somebody Else's Problem field around it.
Oh, and she's on the official Safety Committee now. Can make recommendations and everything.
Ha. Hahaha.
3525511 You weren't hurtful. It's just... it's a thing. Like, sometimes, if you can't change the circumstances, you feel better about cursing out the problems with your friends instead of trying to forget it all and "be positive"?
I know that's, like, weird nega-Pinkie reasoning right there, but it's also the way my emotions seem to work.
Thanks so much for your sympathy
!
3526421
Fluttershy is more Spiral than you.
Everyone in this thread is just adorable.
You and your fiancee are adorable. And thanks for the encouragement.
Don't believe in you, believe in the me that believes in you!
3557654
!
I WAS SICK