Ok my call center is basically fuck friends or family promoting and the fact I hate my job is an issue. I hate the patients with their stupid questions and the fax my lost scripts to who the fuck do I care wherever and the fucking managers and sleep with directors and what not I fucking hate my job and wish cancer would kill them all like their patients.

Hi there,
I am a candidate from Europe choosing between a few MBA programs, including Ross, Fuqua, McCombs (with heavy scholarship). I am aiming for a job in management consulting. MBB preferred, but I'd be okay with EY-P, Deloitte, Strategy&, LEK, and what not.
The purpose of this question is that from the perspective of many in my country, the US seems de facto divided into two, with blue and red states seeming to be like two completely different countries. From one state to another, you have very wildly different laws on major topics like abortion, LGBTQA+ rights, and gun control, with some places in the American South having high populations that don't believe in basic things like evolution or climate change.
I do not view myself as left wing at all. I vote conservative (Center-Right) in my own country. I think my country's taxes are too high and our welfare state is unsustainable long term, and even feel our country was too lax in admitting way too many refugees without properly integrating them. However, even our mainstream right wing party is pro gay marriage, pro abortion rights, and pro gun control, and the members are highly educated typically. In the US, it seems much of the modern day Republican supporters are rednecks, hillbillies, and hicks with very low levels of education, and they view Trump (and DeSantis) as their God-Emperor.
It seems the most developed areas of the US include NYC, SF Bay Area, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, DC, and Los Angeles, with places like Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, and Arkansas being quasi-third world shitholes. The Midwest seems mixed with Michigan seeming MOSTLY OK, Minnesota being fine, but Indiana is also shithole territory. The national parks in these Republican states look beautiful, but too bad the residents are idiots.
I have heard in Texas places like Austin are liberal, but it does not matter if the state as a whole is hard right. I am a woman, and despite being a European conservative, abortion access is very important to me. I am single so in the case I get pregnant from sex, I want to be able to plan my pregnancy and terminate if I want to. I also don't want to live in a third world country where banning drag shows and trans care is the norm.
Is my view correct? Should I reject Fuqua and McCombs for these political reasons, and go to Ross? Should I aim for jobs in NYC, SF, Chicago, DC, etc?

So, I came back home this morning after spending the night at a nearby hotel. I didn't feel safe staying alone in my house, since she had a copy of the keys. Even if I have a surveillance system I didn't want to take the risk. The first thing I did when I came back was calling an emergency locksmith, explained the situation, and they arrived and did the job swiftly. I felt so much safer knowing that she can't get in anymore. I checked the house but I was exactly as I left it yesterday, and after checking the surveillance tapes I was sure she didn't pay me a visit. I informed my close neighbors about what happened, and they were very understanding and helpful. I then met up with the mutual friend, and she updated me on the talk she had with her.
She told me that she visited her at home this morning, because she wanted to talk to her face to face since she thought I was a little bit overreacting. Well, she went, my best friend greeted her and they started chatting a little before she invited her in. So far so good, until they sat down and my best friend asked her if they could keep talking while she pumped because she needed to get her supply running. Our mutual friend played dumb, saying that it wasn't a problem but she asked why she needed to pump if she doesn't have childrens. She replied back saying that she indeed has a daughter and that she was surprised that I didn't tell the mutual friend about it. She then pointed out that it was my daughter and that even if she didn't gave birth to her she still consider her as her baby too, and that she needed mama's (referring to her) milk to grow healthy. She kept going saying that she had no choice but pumping because I was being sassy and inconsiderate and I wasn't letting her breastfeed our baby, but that she couldn't be inconsiderate like I was and she needed to get her supply to a sufficient level, but that she was sure that I would change my mind in no time since I'm not stupid and I know that her breasts are better for our daughter.
She told me that she couldn't believe what she was hearing, and that she couldn't believe that all of this was true. But what it shocked her the most was the fact that she was indeed lactating, she wasn't producing much but she was indeed pumping breastmilk. She tried to talk to her but it wasn't no use, she just wasn't listening, and after a while trying she just said that there was nothing wrong in what she was doing and that she was just being a good mother, and after that she asked her to leave because she needed to relax while pumping. Unfortunately she forgot about asking for the keys of my house, but fortunately I was able to change the locks this morning.
I honestly wasn't surprised hearing all of that. But still, it was very, very depressing. She was completely shocked and she couldn't understand what happened, since apart from this she seemed completely normal.
I then asked her to accompany me to the police, and unfortunately there aren't no extremes yet to file for a RO, not even a temporary one. According to what they told me where I live solid proofs of harassment, stalking, etc need to be presented, and the surveillance tapes/texts (which are the only things I have) don't show no harassment or clear evidence that she's stalking me. So the only thing I could was file a formal complaint of what happened, and did that. They told me that they will keep an eye on the situation, and they will check my neighborhood more frequently to be sure nothing happens.
And that's it for now. The mutual friend will stay at my house for a couple of days to help me recover from what happened, also to wait for my parents to arrive.
Unfortunately she doesn't know her parents, but she found a way to contact her ex husband, and I will contact him tomorrow to ask for help. It's been a while and I hope he's willing to.
I also booked an appointment with the pediatrician, and I will get my daughter checked next week.
I will stop making updates for a while. I need to get my s--t together, plan what to do next, and take care of my daughter. Fortunately enough my parents are coming to help me, and I'm really really relieved. I don't think I can keep facing this situation alone.
People of reddit, thank you very much, really. You gave me wonderful advices and support, and it really helped. I will update you after the situation settles down a bit, and I really hope it does. Thanks again, and bye for now.

For background I have worked in food service and hospitality for almost 20 years. I am employed as a manager in a hotel running a banquet department. I make good money. I like my job. I decided to go back to school during COVID since Financial Aid would cover my Associates degree. I went to a CC and earned two Associates degrees. I was planning on transferring to a four year college, I will call them school X. After my first semester at CC I began exploring transfer options. I was told by school X I could apply to their school under a specific articulation agreement between my CC and school X. Under this agreement I would be eligible to transfer up to 90 credits to school X and then would receive reduced tuition for the rest of my time at school X. The BSBA which I was going for at school X is 100% online. The fact I could transfer in so many credits and it was online made me choose school X. I have been in contact with the Academic Advisor at school X for over two years and I was even signed up to begin classes in the Fall at school X.
The trouble came after I graduated from CC. I went to take summer classes and financial aid denied me because I was not enrolled in a major. I explained to financial aid that I am transferring my credits to school X. My CC asked me to provide an acceptance letter from school X saying that I was accepted to the school and into the specific program I wanted to be in under the articulation agreement. And they did send me and the CC the acceptance letter stating my intended major and that I was a part of this program. Well it turns out I am not eligible for the program because I did not major in Business Admin Transfer. The advisor at school X has known what my CC major was (hospitality management) since I started attending CC. We even spoke about majoring in hospitality management at school X like I did at CC but it would require me to take in person classes and since I work full time I need to take online ones.
I really don't know what to do right now. I kind of feel like a kid who was told they were going to Disney only to have my parents say "just kidding!" School X is saying that it was an oversight on their end and that I don't qualify for the program I've been planning on joining in the Fall.
So now I am debating whether it's even worth it to go to a four year school and get my Bachelors in BA. I work in management but that is not what I am passionate about. Most jobs in my field require either a degree or equivalent experience. A degree is definitely not a requirement if you have the right experience. And I don't see myself climbing much higher up the corporate ladder, I like where I'm at right now.
I just don't know what to do. I don't even know if I want to continue with my summer classes at this point. I'd kind of like to just call it a day and walk away with my two Associates degrees and forget about my BA.
Any thoughts?

This was a personal essay for a writing course. It ended up being a very personal writing. I'm much better at fiction and my other personal essays did not stand up to this one at all. So this one is very special to me. I hope you enjoy the read.
Ever since I could remember I wanted to be a superhero. I read and traded comic books and superhero cards with my neighborhood friends regularly. In 1989 my parents got me a Nintendo Entertainment System (or and NES for short) in which I actually could be superhero characters and save the day. These early years ultimately forged who I would grow up to become, for better or for worse. I would go on to develop one driving force in my life. One mission above all: to be a hero, to help people at any cost.
You could say I was a typical young boy. I loved my parents and wanted to be just like my father. When he had to work on his old Chevy I was there. When he watched basketball games on Sunday afternoon I was there. When he played basketball in city leagues, I was there. In fact, in the city league games, I got to flip the score cards and sound the buzzer for the end of each quarter. So as I got into high school, still wanting to be like my father, I considered joining the military. I didn’t go to enlist for a long time, but after high school while working at my job at a kiosk in a mall, I ran into an old friend who was now in the US Army. He had asked if I would be interested in enlisting. I was in my mid twenties and working at a mall kiosk barely making any money with no real career prospects. I told him I would go down to the center.
This was my chance to be a hero. This was how I could do something to better myself and the world around me. When I committed to the decision to enlist, I proudly told my parents. My father, who served in the army when I was a child, was proud and excited for my decision. My mother on the other hand, was more apprehensive and worried about her only son enlisting. A couple of years passed by and I swapped my elected branch to the US Navy. The enlistment process was intense and I needed a lot of documents. I regrettably left my military career behind when I got a job offer at GE Aviation. This was a big deal. The facility manufactures helicopter and airplane engines and components for commercial companies and the US military. It was a major salary boost and a job I could be proud of.
Even after landing this career job, I stilled pined for military life. What kept me motivated was knowing that if I couldn’t serve next to the brave and dedicated men and women of the armed services I could have their backs in a way. The main engines produced at this facility are for the US Blackhawk helicopters. The engines are designed to withstand sand, dust and other materials that might otherwise damage and bring down other engines. When I tell people that I wish I enlisted to this day and that if I could still I would, they try to dissuade me.
“The pay isn’t that great.” “It’s dangerous.” “You’ll probably get sent overseas.”
None of these were valid points for me. You do not perform a job of nobility for the money or accolades. Yes the job may be dangerous at times, but to defend what you love, sometimes you must take risks. If called to travel for the job, I will go for my job. I would be signing up for this role knowing what it entailed. There would be little shock and awe when it comes to the basic job duties. I truly believed that having to abort my previous mission to start this new mission with this new job that I would still be satiated. I believed it would be what I needed. To fulfill my duties and honorably contribute. I was only partially correct.
While I am very proud of the work we do and my part in the system, the “hero” in me never left. Still having a strong affinity for military culture, I strive to take care of and protect people, usually at a personal cost. Leave no man behind. Sacrifice yourself to save the person next to you. Earn the highest honor. While lending someone money or waking up at two am to help with an emergency or dropping what you’re doing to help someone who ran out of gas is not a death on the battlefield, it can still be a death of self. Superheroes are super for a reason. Maybe they are impervious to heat or cold. Maybe they can fly. They can probably bench press cement trucks. Maybe they just have billions of dollars to buy all the heroic toys they want. I don’t fit into any of those molds. I am just a human, just a man of average means going through life like everybody else. I can’t possibly save the world myself.
In trying so, I have developed depression and anxiety, both extremely debilitating. I somehow put on my cape and cowl and gauntlets and never took them off. I made my mission to serve and protect at any cost. In doing so I forgot who I was. I will disregard my comfort in order to make somebody else more comfortable. I will sacrifice my sleep if it means somebody else can rest more easily. I believed wholeheartedly in my impregnable armor and that it would keep me safe from trauma and I could freely rescue people. I learned that my armor is not impregnable. I learned I could be attacked and damaged. However, I am also learning that it is possible to take off my armor and not be the hero. I will by no means abandon people, but I am on a path to learning how to wear just a utility belt rather than a full suit. Without my suit of armor I can be a normal person. Everything I did to save others I can use on myself. I can have bad days like everybody else and I am learning that it’s okay to tell somebody else having a rough go:
“Hey, I’m not doing so well today. I don’t think I can be much help right not.”
Even though I am in the process of removing my superhero attire, I will hold on to my utility belt. It still contains useful tools to assist others, but allows me to be me. I can learn who I am without my gauntlets and work to fortify my mental and emotional armor. I can be my personal superhero.

I am looking for guidance on remote jobs that are not call centers and not sales because I suck at both. I have experience as an admin assistant, banking (call center), warehouse and customer service. I am currently off work due to an injury so I have some time if I need to study for a certification to get my foot in the door. No college degree. Any advice in careers that I maybe haven’t thought of? I’m hoping to make $50k - $60k. No children at home. Please be kind as I’ve been through enough the last year dealing with my injuries. Thanks!

I applied for the PMP 13 months ago when I was feeling super motivated to earn the PMP. After changing jobs to a more mentally draining and time consuming place, as well as having other major life changes like moving twice and getting married, I studied practically zero.
As I was approaching the last month of the 1 year I was eligible to take the test, I said fuck it, might as well take it, fail it, but at least know what the test is like.
I listened to some of Andrew Ramdayal’s Mindset videos on the long drive to the testing center.
I went in 100% expecting to fail, but I got AT across the board. It was not hard. Exhausting? Absolutely- it took so long and I couldn’t have my water. But hard? No.
I’ve seen others say they’ve had the same experience in the last month. Did it drastically change the last couple of months, or was I just listening too much to the old school guys that had to memorize that massive chart, ?
If it stays this easy, everyone and their mom will get a PMP, and make the cert kinda worthless.
I almost feel like a phony considering my limited job experience but am now taken more seriously simply for bullshitting my way through getting this cert.

Jesi had never been in a hotel before certainly not one as fine as the one Mr Ericson took her and Damion too. They had a suite all to themselves it had two bedrooms connected to a living room, and kitchen. The hotel room was larger then the apparent she used to share with her mama all those years ago. Damion shared a room with Mr. Ericson but for the first time in her life Jesi had a room all to herself. She thought it would feel secure, but she still slept with a knife under her pillow. Still the bed was so soft she felt like it was going to swallow her alive every night. Her nights were one thing but the days were another thing entirely, they were a whirlwind activity. First there was the image coach, a person that Mr. Ericson hired to find a way to make sure Damion and Jesi, both looked nicer then street kids but were still comfortable. Then there was the mountain of paper work and explanations of how her life would change once she signed the papers. Mr. Ecrison said that the press had heard there was an heir to the O’Connal empire but they didn’t have her name or face yet. He was hoping that meant they would have a quite arrival when their plane landed in upstate New York.
He realized he was wrong the moment they entered the airport. Mr. Ericson was shocked to see the number of reporters swarming the gate. He cursed under his breath he’d been so careful he’d even gone out of his way to ask O’Connal’s business partner Constance Karington if they could borrow her family’s private jet to fly the girl in under the radar. With a sigh he squared his shoulders and looked at the two young adults behind him. “You both need to stay quite they will snap photos, shout questions, and shove whatever kind of recording devices they have practically down your throats for a sound bite. Do not give them one.” Mr. Ericson commanded as he lead them toward the crowd. Airport security was already attempting to hold the crowd back. The instant the crowd caught sight of Jesi flashes began to blind them all while the questions started flying
“Miss Jahari is it true you never knew your father?”
“Miss Jahari are you going to sell the company?”
“Miss, Jahari how does it feel to be Cinderella?”
Jesi was proud of herself for not pulling her knife on any of the reporters at the airport. She didn’t like people in general and she certainly wasn’t used to crowds surrounding and recording her. Mr Ericson parted the crowd as best he could and then shoved both Jesi and Damion into a waiting black sedan, with a driver. A short ride later and the small black sedan pulled up to a set of iron gates in the center of a brick wall that surrounded a mansion as big as a castle. The street in front of the wall however was filled bumper to bumper with cars parked on the curb. As the black sedan they were in pulled up to the gates people mobbed the car banging on the windows shouting questions making it hard for the car to move. Mr. Ericson pushed a button on his phone and the gates swung inward admitting the car the driver moved forward slowly through the throng as the gates swung shut behind them. The car pulled up to the front of the house and an older matronly type woman, came rushing out, as Mr. Ericson opened Jesi’s door.
“Ah, let me look at you!” the woman cried out in a thick Irish accent as she looked at Jesi.
“Jesminda Jahari this is your father’s maid and cook Mrs. Mable Mcguil, she has served your father’s family since before I can remember.”
“Aye, your mother must have been a beauty. Why just look at ya! You did get yer Father’s hair though I see, and his eyes.” Mable said as she reached out to brush a strand of red hair from Jesi’s face
“You knew my father?’ Jesi asked
“Knew him? Why I helped his mother raise ‘im I did. Kindest boy you’d ever want to meet. Ack, but he did he ever have a stubborn streak.” Mable added with a laugh
“Mable, my dear, I know you want to get to know Miss Jahari but that’s better left inside I think as the wolves are snapping pictures at the gate.”
“Ack, of course where are my manners, get in here all of ye.” Mable said as she turned to lead the way into the house. Mr. Ericson handed Damion and Jesi the 2 small carry on bags worth of clothes they’d purchased a few days ago, and motioned the two of them to follow Mable inside while he took his own bag from the trunk.
Jesi stepped wide eyed into the large foyer, the floors were a black and gold marble. The walls were a pristine white, with a stair case on either side curving up to the open second floor but what drew Jesi’s eye was a large painting hanging on the wall between the stair cases. A small family of three with a rather severe looking man with blonde hair standing tall a woman beside him with red hair gave anyone who entered a warm welcoming smile. The boy in the front drew jesi in he was around 7 at the time of the painting. Red hair green eyes but the happy smile he gave didn’t quite make it to his eyes. Jesi walked toward the painting staring at the child.
“That’s your father.” Mabel said walking up beside Jesi. “I remember that day clear as a bell yer grandfather insisted on a family portrait sitting. Ah, but yer father little scamp that he was was having none of it. All he wanted was to go out and play in the yard. The artist finally got yer grandfather to agree to take a photo to make the painting off of. As soon as he was free Conner went out and rolled through the grass in that fancy suit you see ‘im wearing. Aye but yer Grandfather was in a snit for days over the grass stains.”
“This house is massive.” Jesi said looking around the foyer.”
“Ah, but we do agree on that. To the left You’ll find the kitchen, dinning room, ballroom, bathroom, den, and living room. Through the right door you’ll find the home theater, another bathroom, library, office, gym and indoor pool. Upstairs there are nine bedrooms each with their own on suite bathroom, And the master bedroom has exclusive access to it’s own balcony. The third floor contains the greenhouse conservatory and excellent views.”
“So many rooms for only three people.” Jesi marveled turning a slow circle around the foyer.
“Yes, that was yer Grandfather for ye. The man insisted on showing the world how successful he was by getting the best of everything privet jet, fancy yacht, all the cars, the house. Yer father was a much simpler type He would have been happy with a one room apparent in the city. That’s why he never replaced the privet jet after the crash. He didn’t see a need, said if he was gonna fly it could be commercially, with real people.”
Jesi stood staring at the painting tears burned the back of her throat, as waves of emotion beat at her. Her father sounded like such a good man she wished she could have known him, but right on the heels of that she was so angry, her father lived in such excess while she and her mother had scraped by on nothing. Yet according to Ericson her father had never known that she existed her grandfather had lied to her father to her mother. Jesi choked back the tears and clung to the only emotion that had kept her alive for so long. Anger. “I hate them.” she ground between clenched teeth.
Mabel’s face fell she seemed to be hoping for a more joyful reaction from Jesi, but to her credit she didn’t try to talk the girl out of her pain either. Damion walked over and placed an arm around Jesi’s shoulders. “Mrs. Mcguil, is there a room we can go to for rest and a little privacy?” Damion asked
As soon as the door to the large guest bedroom drifted shut behind them Jesminda let her real feelings be known. She broke into deep sobs and fell into Damion’s arms.
“I don’t- I can’t- How could he- How could they-” Jesi started so many sentences but the jumble of emotion stampeding through her.
“Easy Jes, take a breath.” Damion tried as he held her.
“Why am I morning a man I never met? A man who abandoned me?” Jesi started
“Because he didn’t abandon you not on purpose Jes.”
“I want to hate him. I need to hate him, Why can’t I hate him?” Jesi sobbed
“Your right Jes it’s not fair. None of this is fair. It’s a lot to take in, and neither of us have taken the time to really process this.”
“In the hotel he didn’t seem real, but now… He was my father, and I never knew his name.”
“I know, Jes, it’s not fair.”
“He was stolen from me!”
“Yes he was.”
“This whole life was stolen from me!” Jesi hiccuped
Damion just held her and let her cry. There was so much for them both to process. Jesi was now one of the richest women in the nation, and she had insisted that Damion share her home as the brother he’d been to her since the day they’d met.
Jesi spent the rest of the day in the guest room that was now her bedroom with Damion bouncing between sorrow and anger like a rubber ball. Eventually she cried herself to sleep. Damion had just eased her into the plush bed, when a soft knock sounded on the door.
“Hey, uumm.” Damion stammered he wished he could remember the maid’s name.
“Mabel deary. How is she?” Mabel asked as she tried to look past Daion towards Jesi.
“She’s sleeping.” Damion said protectivily blocking to door.
“I mean her no harm.” Mabel said gently
Damion winced and tried to force himself to relax “Sorry, I know you don’t it’s just…” He trailed off at a loss “I’ve protectd her since she was five. Its just really hard to let that go.”
“Ye love her then?” Mable asked
“Of course.” Damion stopped and then a thought occurred to him “Oh! Oh you mean! No, no we’re not like that. She’s basically the sister I -” he stopped.
“Yer sister?”
“The crash that took my parents. It also killed my five year old sister Amy. Three days later I met Jesi, she looks nothing like Amy, but she was the same age and well I guess I wanted to protect her the way I couldn’t protect my family.”
“Ack, ye poor dear.” Mabel said with tears pooling in her eyes. “She’s safe here though, not a sole can get past the walls without setting off the alarms.”
Damion stiffened “Jesi, doesn’t like loud noises. Not since her mother was shot.”
“She was there?” Mable asked
“I thought Mr. Ericson would have told you?” Damion asked in confusion
“No, he told me who she was and that her mother had been killed but nothing else.”
“Yeah, she was there, her mom had to take her to work that night and, she says all she remembers is her mom stuffing her in a cabinet then she heard someone yell for the manager then the shots.”
“My God! Did she see anything?”
“No the officer on the scene worked really hard to make sure she didn’t see anything, But she’s been really jumpy ever since.”
“Ack, the poor dear. Well it seems there’s nothing more You and I can do for her til she wakes come I’ll show ye to yer room you must be tired as well.”
“I-I can’t leave her I’ll just stay here with her.”
“She’s safe here. Your safe here. You need rest too.”
“And I’ll get it right here beside her.”
“Ye’ve taken care of her for thirteen years, Ye’ve earned a rest and so has she.”
“We rest better together.”
“I’m sure ye do, and you’ll be ale to hear her through the wall if there’s trouble.” Mable encouraged
“I-”
“Yer both safe. She’ll be fine.”
Damion reluctantly followed Mable from the room. Mable made a show of taking a key from her pocket and locking the door to the room she explained that she was the only one with a key to unlock the bedroom doors but that all door could be locked or unlocked from the inside.
The next morning Mable opened Jesminda’s door with a cart of food behind her. “Good moring Miss Jes-” Mable froze as Jesi lept from the bed a knife brandished in her hand it’s tip nearly rested on Mabel’s neck
“Sorry,” Jesi said as she lowered the knife. “Force of habit.”
“Well, I will say that’s a new way to get the blood runnin in the mornin.” Mabel said with a giggle “Is there a reason ye have a knife on ye?”
“I’ve slept with a knife since I was sixteen.”
“And ye haven’t cut yerself?” Mable tried to joke
“No, Sargent Mullens trained me and Damion how to defend ourselves.”
“Sargent Mullens?” Mable asked
“He was staying at the first homeless shelter we crashed at after leaving the home. I was young inexperienced in street life and so excited to have my first shower in weeks I wasn’t careful enough. After I walked into the ladies room a man grabbed me from behind. He clamped his hand over my mouth and put a knife to my throat. I tried to scream to struggle while he cut my clothes off. Sargent Mullens heard the struggle and rushed in. He pulled the man off before anything happened and called for help. The man tried to cut Mullens but he dodged the blade, disarmed him, and held him until the folks that ran the shelter arrived. He told them to bring the guy to the police for sexual assault. After he helped me and Damion disappear when the police showed up and then taught us how to survive on the streets we stayed with him for about 4 months, until he disappeared.”
“That must have been hard on ye both.” Mable said
“It’s life on the street.”
“Jesi!” Damion called out as he rushed into the room.
“Ah and that saves me the trouble of bringing breakfast to ye as well.” Mable said as she motioned to the cart behind her. “I didn’t know yer preferences, so I, well, I made yer Father’s favorites. Bacon, sausage, pancakes, as well as some fruit a selection of juices and, aspirin.”
“How did you know I have a headache?” Jesi asked
“I’ve spent more then a night or two crying meself te sleep. I know the headache ye wake with in the morin all to well. OOP!” Mable said as she pulled her phone from her pocket. “And it seems that Ericson has arrived for the day with company not far behind. Best ye eat up and prepare seems as though yer in for yoru first dose of Constance.”
“Heellloo, Constance Karington,” The tall blonde woman in her early twenties stepped up to Jesi and offered her hand “Your sister.”
“I have a sister?” Jesi asked
“No, you do not.” Ericson answered.
“Oh not a biological sister but Conner was like a second father to me.” Constance said
“That makes one of us.” Jesi griped under her breath
“Oh look at you aren’t you a vision well besides that scare on your neck but don’t you worry my step-mom knows a great plastic surgeon we’ll have that gone in days.”
Jesi rested a self conscious hand over the knife scare on her collar bone.
“I wish you had consulted with me Ms. Karington, Miss Jahri’s schedule is full today.”
“Oh, so I cleared my entire morning of running my very successful company to hang out with my new sister for nothing” Constance protested actually pouting at Ericson.
“I believe you’ll find the company belongs to both of you Ms. Karington, and as I Said if you’d checked with me I could have told you that Miss Jahari’s scheduled is full this morning.”
“Oh come on I’m sure you don’t need a stuffy old man telling you what to do Jesi. You don’t mind if I call you Jesi do you?” Constance’s words dripped with sugar.
“Actually I do mind.” Jesi wasn’t buying Constance’s act for a second. “And Ercison has a full day planned.”
“Well, what am I supposed to do with an open morning Ericson?” Constance tried again
“Since your so keen to have family time I suggest you go connect with your brother.” Ericson suggested
“I suppose I could find Skyler but I look forward to dinner tonight Jesminda.” Constance commanded
“I will contact your office and arrange for a dinner in a few weeks then.” Ericson offered.
“I look forward to it.” Constance said with a smile as she turned to go.
“Oh Ms. Karington I would like to know how our confidential flight itinerary was leaked to the press.” Ericson asked
“Oh right, I have talked to my pilot about that rest assured he’ll be disciplined for his loose lips. Ta.” Constance tossed over her shoulder as she left.
“Who was that?” Damion asked when the door closed behind Constance
“Constance Karington, she is the co CEO of O’Connal and Karington Enterprises.”
“Isn’t she kinda young to be a CEO?” Jesi asked
“She was a child prodigy she graduated high school early and earned her MBA by the time she was 20. Two years ago she convinced her father to entire and hand over his half of the company to her.”
Constance slammed the front door to her family’s home. And let out a frustrated scream.
“I take it your plan to get Cinderella to sign the papers was a bust?” her brother Skyler appeared at the top of the stairs.
“I thought you’d still be sleeping.” Constance griped
“I was until you slammed the door quite rude if I’m honest sister dear.” Skyler, said with a lazy drawl
“Well, tell whoever your current girlfriend is I’m sorry to have disturbed her.” Constance replied with a forced smile
“You can drop the loving sister routine Constance I’m alone today.”
“For once.” Constance laughed sarcastically. “What do Nora find you flirting with a waitress?”
“Her name was Ashley and no, she asked for commitment, and you know I don’t do commitment.”
“Hm. Yet another doe eyed debutante that thought she could marry New York’s most eligible bachelor?”
“Yes you’d think they’d know better by now don’t they all talk?”
“Brother this may surprise you but the world does not actually revolve around you.”
“And it doesn’t serve you sister dear. A fact it seems ‘Cinderella’ reminded you of today.” Skyer gloated
“That company is mine! Conner promised it to me! Then that worthless brainless rat shows up and takes everything from me!” Constance shouted.
“I’m not sure Cinderella showed up isn’t more like Connor hunted her down?”
“Cinderella?” Constance said as a calculating smile slid on to her face
“That look never bodes well.” Skyler observed
“Well, every Cinderella needs her Prince Charming doesn’t she.”
“As I understand it she came with hers did she not?”
“The street rat no he’s more a brother to her as I understand it, but you Brother dear are currently between lovers at the moment.”
“Ha! Don’t even try it. Your little Cinderella is no where near my type.”
“Oh please, she’s beautiful, rich, and a woman that’s exactly your type.”
“Hardly, once a street rat always a street rat!” Skyler objected
“I don’t care, you will romance her get her so infatuated with you that when you tell her it’s in her best interst to sign over the company she’ll comply.”
“And if it can’t.”
“Then you’ll keep it in your pants until you marry her! I will not let some brat swoop in and steal everything I worked my entire life to get!”
“You can’t make me do any of this.”
“Can’t I? Last I checked Brother dear I control your trust fund.”

My (22F) roommate (22F) have been friends since first year of college. We both have different backgrounds, she grew up rich, privileged and never had to work a day in her life and I grew up living paycheque to paycheque. Everything was fine until her boyfriend came along, who also had a family even richer than hers who also never had to work a day in his life who was living im our apartment full time. They always had loud sex and he even invited his buddies over to our place 2-3x/week. My boyfriend on the other hand is the sweetest, kindest, most respectful person who makes me very happy but my roomated hates him. He was never over because we're long distance but she never even wanted me to talk about him or ft him without her making a face. When he would visit, she would be rude to him and I couldn't understand why.
Now this is where I might be the AH. Last week, my bf flew in for a week to visit me. All week, she was being rude (throwing his shoes outside in the rain, "accidentally" spilling cranberry juice all over him, making him specifically build the new dresser she bought while his bf was drinking w his buddies etc.) My boyfriend asked me if it was because he was asian, which made me remember how she behaved during covid. Her entire family avoided asians like the plague because they thought they had covid. (I never agreed with it and was very vocal about how wrong that was, even before my bf) We left the house and slept in a hotel that night. I felt so guilty and hated myself for not connecting the two dots any sooner and putting him in that position. The next day my stepdad and I moved my stuff out while she was gone and ended the lease for our nice, cheaper priced apartment, knowing damn well that she wanted to keep because any other apartment is out of her budget from her parents allowance, meaning she'd have to find a miracle or a get a job. All our mutual friends are telling me that I'm an asshole for screwing her over and ghosting her over a boyfriend because she's not really that racist. AITA?

Some background for my situation. I'm a 27-year old guy from a Nordic country. I've been studying on and off, in two different universities for 7 (!) years. But I don't really study. I'm incredibly lazy and just don't do anything towards completing a degree. Sometimes if I'm able to shake off the laziness, anxiety takes hold. Dozens of times I've gone to school and just left because I chicken out. Basically I'm living on welfare, and pissing away my life, as I'm painfully aware that however long this goes on for, the harder it is to get out of it.
I then recently started to apply for jobs. I had applied for jobs randomly sometimes before, but this time I went into turbo mode (for me) and browsed the country-wide job openings every day and applied to any that I thought I'd be able to do. I have some miscellaneous work experience here and there. Part-time jobs, some summer jobs, temporary jobs. Nothing to call a career. I can't even get a phone call from ANYWHERE. This surprised me, as I thought I'd always get a chance to do something if I really tried. The job market is very competitive here and well, I'm clearly not the ideal candidate.
This brings me to my current situation. I have a job offer from a different country in Europe. It's helpdesk type of work. The pay is average or slightly below average for the city. Their relocation package is really poor, just a small refund with my first salary that will cover the flight and maybe two nights at a hotel. I barely have enough savings to afford it (flight, hotel, apartment deposit). I have to get rid of basically all my belongings. I don't want to stress my family, who are vehemently against it, but they also don't know my full situation and how "stuck" I feel. There are so many reasons to not do it. But I also feel like if I don't do it, 10 years from now I will be in the same exact situation I am now. For some reason, as anxious and lazy as I am, the idea of moving to a completely different place where no one knows me excites me. False hope? :D
Give me some thoughts on what you'd do. Even harsh advice is welcome and possibly needed.

I (31m) just broke up with my (26f) girlfriend today.
You guys I don't really know where to start and I don't really want to ramble but I guess I'm going to anyways.
We've been together about 1.25 years, live 5 hours apart and have seen eachother almost every weekend except maybe 6-8.
I'll never forget the first time we met, she had never done a LDR before, was recovering from being sick so I offered to drive down to see her. We got a hotel (not classy I know) in a location that she works and loves, I remembered hugging her, putting a face to a name so to speak. We had met on Boo (app, highly recommend it) and we had these engaging long conversations about everything... The first message I sent her was about history, something I am very interested in and my god, the conversation flowed and continued to flow. The level of connection we had almost instantly was like no other I have ever felt.
I remember us getting out of the car and being weak in the knees with taking it all in. It was real now. She was even more beautiful than in her pictures. I hugged her and felt so alive and happy. We checked into the hotel, we both had to pee really bad and joked about peeing on the rug in the lobby as we were standing in line.
I came directly from a 10 hour day at work (carpenter) was so filthy and went directly into the shower. I get out of the shower and we held eachother and talked for hours laughing and having a good time. We both didn't even realize how hungry we were. We went out and got waffle house which was a first time for me. Our relationship was full of many firsts for us.
Right away I knew I had to have her, I asked her if she would want to continue and be my gf and she said she'd be a fool not to. A month or so in we told eachother we loved eachother at a very special location in my life, we had both been fighting the urge to say it sooner.
This woman changed me. She made me better. I cried more in front of her than I have in my entire life, something I have always been uncomfortable with. I am so grateful for her for being supportive to me in that way.
I remember us meeting eachother's families and it felt so good. I felt like I had a place in hers and I know she did in mine. My grandma's health is going downhill and has been for a while now, this Christmas my gma handmade my gf this really cool and cute old school apron with my gf's and gma's name on it. Added to that, my gf's profession is baking, something she is very passionate about. That's never happened in my entire dating life and my gf and I were so honored.
A couple months back her GPA developed cancer and has been going downhill, I have a motorcycle, turns out same exact one he had. He gave me his bells. I was so honored, I was speechless and stammering looking at them.
The plan has been for 6 months or more that I move to her to close the distance. Initially I was scared, I had never wanted to move away from my family before and had never taken that big of a risk before. We discussed at length who moves where and both agreed it would be best if I moved there due to a variety of factors.
Life got in the way, I had a couple old junky vehicles that needed attention and money and spent a couple months like crazy after work working on them with my brother. The amount of frustration and guilt I had for not moving in with her tomorrow was insane. We talked about it several times and agreed that it was for the best that I get all my ducks in a row before I move, as coming back home every weekend for however long it takes to square up my life would make both of our lives harder when it would already be challenging initially living together and have me acclimate to her area.
I had several job offers in her area soon after dating. Most of them not a good idea. As an example I could work for a family friend who gets drunk on every job and can't pay his bills... so we agreed that I needed to figure out what I wanted to do for work for myself in a way that benefitted me.
About a month ago my mom and her friend came down to visit, all four of us stayed at airBnB close to gf's work and in the area in which we would move. It was a lot of fun. I felt something was off in gf. The morning before mom, friend, and I were to leave I looked at gf's phone and had found she posted on reddit about us but the post was deleted so I didn't see much. I felt betrayed. She had become distant and wasn't talking to me much and she'd rather talk to strangers instead of me? I confronted her about it and a fight ensued.
So I decided to stay another couple days with her to work on ourselves, I helped her at work for a half a day (something I've done several times that everyone enjoys), we went back to her place and she got super drunk. Told me she felt like her life is falling apart and she's not happy. I held her while she cried, listened, and told her I'd be there for her rain or shine always. At one point she stood up... barely and she got a look in her eyes combined with her body language where I was near certain she was going to hit me (been here before in the past with others). It scared the shit out of me.
I left in the afternoon the next day after she told me I was her person, and she was laying in bed crying uncontrollably. It was so hard to leave but I had thought it would be better for her if I did.
For a couple weeks all communication on her end dropped. We used to talk all the time, and I was lucky to get an "I love you" once a day. I begged her to talk to me and not give up on us. The only times we talked she had clearly been drinking and said some truly horrible things about me. Character assassination repeatedly, I told her in confidence previously about some deep dark secrets I have and insecurities and she used then against me to tear my soul apart. I was devastated, I thought of leaving her then, but I didn't because I still loved her and she had been a great partner up until this point. She had stopped going to work, did not work for two weeks. From what I gather she spent most of that time at her mom's probably drinking and not doing much else.
One weekend we were supposed to go to a family wedding on my side, lots of people coming from out of town who are huge in my life I don't get to see often at all. A day or two before she told me she wasn't coming, and the thought of being with me and talking to me riddled her with anxiety. I spent that weekend surrounded by beautiful strangers and happy times and it was hard for me to quell the thoughts about "the grass is always greener". At one point an attractive woman was talking to me briefly at a bar after the wedding, playing with her hair etc. It was clear she was into me. It felt good to have someone give me the time of day but I felt terrible for putting on an impression that I was available and happy.
Then this weekend (memorial day weekend)... oh God. Gf and I had plans to go to a concert, stay at a hotel. I told her I said I don't want to go to a concert with you and your sister and spend money and pretend everything is fine when it most definitely isn't. She told me that was selfish because her sister was looking forward to it. So I begrudgingly agreed to continue with the concert.
We saw eachother for the first time in three weeks and right away I sensed the guilt from her for being cruel to me. I tried to point it out and she denied it, she was a lot more physically attentive with me and giving me compliments. The first night we were alone and it was hard but I think we undid some of the damage and reconnected a lot. I think we were both happy about the progress but sad at what we had become.
Concert was the next day, it was great, again she's attentive and amazing like the woman I fell in love with. My hopes had reactivated for us a little and my smile was genuine instead of forced.
Her mom had texted us Sunday (the next day, clarification gf lives with mom so I stay there when I visit) and had said to try to not be at the house all day since the house had many people in it already. Okay, makes sense. We occupied our time doing other things, and drove back to her mom's around 8 or 9p.
On the way there, one of my brother's (E) calls me and asked if I had heard what had happened to my other brother (B). I had said no, I hadn't heard I had assumed he had got the job he was looking at. E tells me B's apartment building collapsed. B was safe, but lucky to be alive realistically. B had lost everything he's ever had, he escaped with the clothes he had on and his phone, he didn't even have his wallet.
I'm dissasociating as I'm hearing all of this, driving gf and me back to gf's mom's house. Our relationship is dying, and I get the feeling that her mom isn't happy with me. We get to her mom's house and her mom and aunt (who is currently living there, I've seen her only twice) are drinking on the porch and want gf and me to come out and talk to them. Was a demand not a request. I don't know how long this went on, best guess is 1-1.5 hours but they berated me, were drawing wild ass conclusions about me, you name it, really weird, scary and hurtful things. I didn't bother to try to defend myself because there was no point. Gf sat there quietly and agreed with them partially. I felt so betrayed, hurt and alone, she didn't stand up for me. I asked her if she would speak to her mother or my behalf and she said she wouldn't. I found out I'm no longer welcome at the house, complicating our relationship further.
Memorial day the next day, I hadn't even really slept, no shower, I left gf's mom's house at 5a when I knew no one would be there and waited at a truck stop for hours for my gf to wake up and come talk to me. Eventually she did, and I told her my respect and trust for her mom was in the sewer and I was afraid her crazy ass alcoholic mother was twisting my gf's opinion of me over the last month. I told her I don't know how you can do it but please get out of that house soon. Between B losing everything he owns and the verbal assault I had last night I was in a very dark place. Later that day, completely dead inside with no sleep we made it to her dad's side of the family where everyone appreciates me and loves me. We had fun in the backyard, I did my best to try to forget about B and last night but I couldn't. I went inside at some point to pee and I snapped. I found my gf in the backyard and announced in front of her family that I had to go home immediately.
As she was driving me back to her car I reminded her about how I had been to the hospital for her brother several times and how I would like the same respect for myself. This frustrated her. I said I think now is the time we agree to go to therapy and she did agree, however I felt she didn't want to.
I've been working like a dog this week sweating my ass off, hadn't heard much from gf at all, last night I asked when can we talk again? She said today after work. I woke up this morning and I knew I couldn't take it anymore. I knew in my heart I have always supported her and loved her deeply. I knew all the sacrifices I already made and all the sacrifices I would continue to make in the future with my moving to her, and how she still would refuse to give me the proper recognition and reciprocation I deserve.
I broke up with her this morning. I'm hoping to meet halfway this weekend to exchange our stuff. I'm also hoping she'll do some self work and come back to me before I move on for good, I told her my door will be open to her for a while but I don't know how long.
Moral of the story- changing for people is good if it's good, sacrificing for people is good if it's good, loving people is good if it's good. If the person you are with refuses to communicate and reciprocate, it's not your fault. We make our own choices. Please be smarter than me and take care of yourselves.

New games:
A blind legend
Hook
The surge 2
Bioshock: the collection
Colt canyon
Blasphemous
Song of horror: complete edition
Haiku, the robot
Is Simon there?
Inside Depth 6
Suite 776
Post void
Out of the box
Serial cleaner
Slain: back from hell
Kingdom rush
Chrono ark
Borderlands 3 directors cut
Metro exodus
Wasteland 3
Spec ops the line
Life is Strange 2: Complete Season
Metro redux bundle
Metal gear solid V
Double kick Heros
Desolate
Crashday Redline edition
Between the stars
Rebel Galaxy Outlaw
Vambrace: Cold soul
The ambassador: fractured timelines
Evans remains
Nihilumbra
The town of light
Death Stranding Directors Cut
The life and suffering of sir Brante
Monster prom 2: monster camp
Revita
Batman Arkham Origins
The long dark: survival edition
Kerbal space program

• 12 is Better Than 6
• 5 Dates
• Act of Aggression - Reboot Edition -A girls fabric face
• Anomaly: Warzone Earth
• Autonauts (3) -Autonauts vs pirate bots
• Backbone
• Barrier X
• Beholder
• Book of Demons
• Convoy -Crazy machines 3 -Darkwood
• Dead Age -Dead end job -Dead island definitive edition
• Dead Light
• Doom 64 -Fallout 3
• Fobia St Dinfna Hotel -Founders fortune
• Game Dev Studio
• Garfield Kart - Furious Racing -Geometric Sniper- Blood in Paris
• Goat of Duty -Golden light
• Gone Home + Original Soundtrack (2)
• Hero's Hour -Home front the revolution -Hot shot racing
• Hokko Life
• Impulsion
• Iron Fisticle (3)
• Main Assembly
• Manual Samuel
• Monument Builders - Alcatraz
• Mordhau
• Nomad Survival
• Outbuddies DX (2) -Out of space
• Pawnbarian
• Payday 2
• Peaky Blinders: Mastermind
• Pixel Heroes: Byte & Manic
• Pumped BMX Pro
• Rogue Lords
• ScourgeBringer
• Shady Part of Me -Snafu
• Smoke and Sacrifice (2)
• Space Com (2)
• Space Crew Legendary Edition (2)
• Spirit Hunter: Death Mark
• Stikbold! A Dodgeball Adventure -Stick it to the Man!
• Super Meat Boy Forever -System shock: enhanced edition
• Terrain of Magical Expertise
• The Indie Mixtape
• The Wild Eight -This war of mine
• Toki -Turok
• Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York
• Wargame: Airland Battle -Within Skerry

One other thing that's driving me crazy that is probably something pretty simple: How can one default certain Organizations or Companies to a Location?
Let's say I want someone to start a req for a job in the US and when choosing the Company I'd only want one or two companies to appear I/o a list of 20+.
Also, what if I want a Cost Center or a custom organization to default out of the suporg tied to said job req? I know this is doable but I can't find the guides nor any information on Community that helps me with that. Appreciate any help I can get.

Dear Professor Peterson,
I realize that your schedule probably won’t allow you to read this letter, least to reply. I am not expecting either of these and will not be offended. Why do I write it, then? Well, most probably because in the past several years you have been for me the voice of reason from abroad. Too many things are going in a crazy and disastrous direction, and listening to your lectures and videos have been very inspiring. It always amazes me how deeply you investigate the problem and how thoroughly you analyze it. In many cases listening to what you say have been like hearing what I always felt was true, but could not formulate and justify it myself. Thank you for that experience.
During the past year, which not only attracted the whole world’s attention to a conflict in Ukraine (at last, I’d say, war started there in 2014), but also demonstrated the unwillingness of countries and people to hear each other, I felt the growing urge to share Russian understanding of current situation and of the events that lead to it with someone who could probably be able to hear. Your name was the first to come to my mind. I hesitated until some time ago I came across the interview that you have recorded – “Israel, Russia, China, Iran: The World in Conflict” and it actually triggered me into writing. It occurred to me that, objective as you are, you may be unaware of some facts and interpretations, partly because modern media have mastered the art of being silent about some facts while shouting about the others, partly because you were born and raised in Anglo-Saxon civilization, with all embedded ideas and principles.
A bit about my background. Master’s degree in English language and literature, spent one year as a student in Connecticut, worked in American-owned companies for 17 years. That allows me to a certain degree to understand both sets of values.
I wanted to offer for your attention the view from the other side on what’s happening now between Russia and Western European civilization. I don't say that it is correct, I just say how Russians see it.
Very briefly, just point by point:

• Currently many people in the West are speaking about Russia as about a threat. But what makes you think that we see you differently? We see you as a growing threat. We don’t trust you. And we have plenty of reason for feeling this way.
• We see the West is regularly breaking its own rules and demonstrating double standards, so we can’t rely on its words.
• It has been clearly shown to us, that we will never be accepted by the West as an equal partner, so to us the West is neither a friend, nor a partner, but a competitor at best, an enemy at worst.
• We have seen what the West does to regimes that don’t obey and how the West does it, so West is a serious threat. Don’t come any closer.

3 basic principles of western foreign policy
Looking at the international events of past 30-40 years, we may see 3 basic principles of international policy that the West is utilizing.

1. Democracy is the best possible society model.

Hard to argue – there is the strongest correlation between availability of human rights in society and its prosperity. Let’s accept it as it is, although it is much more complicated and there are other factors that should be taken into account, like, for example:

• Pure democracy is limited to small communities, and is impossible in big countries. Once a certain threshold is passed, democracy is either a burden to every decision made, or is executed via representatives. And representatives, being people with all their imperfections, gradually start spoiling and corrupting the idea.
• Democracy tends to evolve, or, I’d rather say, degrade into oligarchy. Examples are numerous. Ancient Greece and Rome, Novgorod Republic (XII-XV cc), medieval Poland, etc. Even now – with all our experience, we keep hitting the same wall. Legal practice of lobbying in USA is the desire of big money (oligarchs) to have more influence on country policy. In Russia lobbying is illegal, so the same goal is achieved by other means, but without digging deep into details, it is the same – democratic form of power, spoiled by natural human desire to grab more for oneself on the expense of others.
• The most prosperous regions now (North America, Western Europe, Scandinavia, New Zealand, Australia) are the ones where capitalism appeared and developed earlier than in other parts of the world. That boosted production, country strength and wealth and eventually allowed them to have colonies in other parts of the world. Owning some overseas land gave enormous economic advantages. Remember “British East India Company”, which at its peak of wealth had an army of 160 thousand soldiers (more than some counties had!). The importance of having colonies can be best illustrated by the simple fact – one of the core reasons of the WW I was the desire of Germany, who was late to the table, to have its share of a pie. And even though political power of metropolises over colonies seized in mid-XXth century, economic bounds stayed much longer. If, let’s say, a uranium mine in Uganda belongs to French company, then which country benefits more from it? And to what extent the modern wealth of Europe and North America is due to other parts of the world?
• I doubt that democracy and human rights priority are possible in every country of the world. This idea just occurred to me, so I did not dig deep into finding the proof, but mentality (to put it narrower – religion) could prevent the society from accepting ideas that are just natural for another society. There are some facts I immediately recall that support this idea.

a) Majority of Noble prize winners are from protestant countries. Disproportional majority if you look at country population or wealth or other factors. Why? Maybe because Protestantism urges its followers to read the Bible on their own, whereas in Catholicism you study Bible under the priest’s guidance. Encouragement for independent research must have some effect.
b) After the ancient Rome fell, and Europe lived through the Dark Ages, Arabian countries preserved much of knowledge and science. At that time Arabian East was much more cultural and civilized than Europe. What happened to them later, why they stopped developing science, how could Europe overtake them? One of the explanations is that at some point of time Muslim theologians declared that “Koran has everything”, so scientific research stopped. The legend says that under this slogan the Library of Alexandria has been burnt by Arabian conquerors.
c) There is an interesting correlation between the agricultural conditions in a certain territory and some national traits of character. That’s more than a coincidence. For example, wheat was the main crop in Europe. It doesn’t require any special irrigation, so you can well grow and harvest it alone. That means you are less dependent on other people. Hence smaller states (Germany before mid-XIX century consisted of dozens independent states), hence more independent opinions. Compare it to China. Rice requires serious irrigation works, you’ll never do it alone. In order to harvest rice, you need to organize a fairly large group of people to do a job together. And as the population grows, you need to perform those works at a larger scale, also because the easiest-to-work fields are already busy. As a result, we see that Chinese value the society more than they value an individual. A single person sacrificing his wishes for the good of the others is more acceptable for them than for Europeans.
This idea needs further thinking but it is quite possible that the liberalism and human rights developed in Western Europe to the extent we see due to a unique combination of religion, natural conditions and other factors. And it can’t be copied in other parts of the world. It can be brought to other parts of the world by immigration of people with European mentality, of course. But otherwise it can be done only by complete mentality change of local inhabitants. Not an easy task, could take generations and mean death of local culture.

1. All people are seeking freedom and democracy, so it is our duty to help them achieve this goal. If some part of the society resists this help, it is the tyrannical part and it should be eliminated.

Yeah, really. Take up the White Man's burden… This idea is not dead yet, with all its prejudices.
In some part such understanding is based on the theory that appeared in history (history as a science!) in the UK in 18th century. This theory states that the process of human society development over time is a) linear and b) goes through the same stages in every society of the planet. One of the consequences of this theory was the statement that every society started from matriarchate – researchers came across some primitive society, ruled by women, and made their conclusion. This theory has long been proved wrong, but its influence is still alive.
Even if we accept that all countries, all societies are aiming at maximizing human rights, how justified will interference be? Good intentions are the pathway to hell. How long it took Anglo-Saxon civilization to reach modern state of human rights? Setting the Magna Carts as the starting point, it is a bit over 800 years, roughly 30 generations. Looking at the world history, we see how slowly societies change their organizational forms, evolving one into another. And you can’t forcefully speed it up. Imagine that our modern “crusaders of democracy” take time machine and show up at Hastings early in the morning on October 14th, 1066. “William, Harold, there is no need to fight. You need to run democratic elections, and everything will be ok…” Will they even understand the idea??? And what will happen the next day after they are left alone?
You have shown significant interest in Russian culture. If you care spending some more time on Russian books, I’d recommend you brothers Strugatsky (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkady_and_Boris_Strugatsky). The form of what they have written is science fiction, but the contents is all about ethics, morale, responsibility, conscience. Try «Escape Attempt», «Hard to be a God», «Overburdened with Evil».
Why I am mentioning them now is because among others they are exploring the topic of “progressors” – people from Earth of XXII century who try to speed up the history of other planets, to solve their problems, stop wars, etc. And it doesn’t end well. As one of their heroes says, “You can’t break up the natural course of history without breaking the spine of humanity.”
It’s hard to find examples of good revolutions when they are initiated from abroad. Change of regime should be supported by majority within the country – it is the guarantee that society is ready for it. What Anglo-Saxons and NATO frequently do is supporting the angry minority in its aspirations for power. And instead of peace, freedom and prosperity it brings chaos. The classic example is Libya. Over 10 years ago the country was “spared of Gaddafi’s tyrannical rule”… How do they live now? The GDP is still around 50% of what it used to be, the country is still not at peace, there are two major forces each claiming to be the legal power. How many lives it did cost already and how much time it will take free Libya to recover? Can such liberation be called anything but a disservice? In Russia we call it “bear’s help”. I don’t say that everything was good in the country when Gaddafi was alive, but aren’t they in the worse situation now?
The whole series of Arabian spring looks like a great mess, not a great success. I rely on the opinion of an expert – below is the brief translation of an article published in 2015-2016 by Mordechai Kedar, an Israeli scholar of Arab culture and a lecturer at Bar-Ilan University. I can’t find the original, unfortunately.
December 2015 was the fifth anniversary of the events known as an ‘Arabian spring’. The world applauded the heroes of the streets in Tunis, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain. Now, five years ago, those countries are still battlefields, with no light ahead. What problems have prevented them from positive development? Most of them have developed over centuries and they still prevail in mentality, remaining the dangerous rudiment.

1. Tribalism*, that was always a survival factor in harsh natural conditions of the region. Now the conditions are different but mentality is still the same, when each person thinks of himself as a member of the clan first (family, tribe, tape, whatever…), not the citizen of the country.*
2. Violence*. Resources are scarce, so anyone who is not the member of my clan, is a deadly threat. And the first reaction to a threat is violence.*
3. Honour*, understood very specifically. Dishonoured person will seek revenge. It is not uncommon for a person to kill members of his own family if they dishonoured him. Honour is of primary importance in relations between countries and nations, sometimes more important than economics and healthcare.*
4. Nepotism*, which has its roots in tribalism. Promoting your relatives to administrative positions is illegal in the West, but is part of normal practice in the East.*
5. Corruption*. An office holder will invest in projects and regions where his tribe and supporters live, not otherwise. He feels financially responsible to his family, not to the country.*
6. Multiple ethnic groups*, which protect their own languages and traditions. Marriages outside of a group are rare, coexistence with other groups is tense and hostile.*
7. Islam*. Islamic extremists are sure that people who believe otherwise, are deserved to be killed.*
8. Sunnites vs*.* shiites*. This conflict started back in 7th century as a conflict for control over Islam. Non-Islamic people see them analogous to Catholicism vs. Orthodox church, but in reality now, after centuries of religious wars, these are two separate religions, and the dialogue between them is very difficult.*
9. Predominant culture*. Three main groups are Bedouins who live in deserts, fellahs who are the peasants, and inhabitants of the cities. Each group thinks stereotypically of other two, cross-marriages are rare.*
10. Country borders*. British, French and Italian administration have been drawn the borders straight, just by a ruler and a pencil, paying no attention to the real borders between various groups which differ by religion and ethnicity. People who never thought about themselves as about having anything in common, are now the citizens of one country. And they don’t feel it this way.*
11. Power change*. This is something which never happens peacefully in Arabic countries. The ethnic or religious group at power holds to it by all means.*
12. Israel*. Arabs and Muslims don’t acknowledge Judaism as a live religion, Jewish people as a people. So for them the very existence of Israel is illegal. Plus Israel is very convenient as an external enemy, a good target for the aggression of the masses.*
13. Oil has turned the countries of the Gulf into societies which don’t produce, but do consume without limits. The difference between wealth of the Gulf and poverty of other Arabian countries is shocking.
14. West that interferes into the region to solve its own problems. Oil, gas, weapons – all is targeted to use natural resources of Middle East.
15. Al Jazeera as a catalyst of social and religious unrest.

Throughout the XX-th century Europe tries to solve myriads of cultural problems of the Middle East, trying to create modern Arabic states that will fit Europe’s needs. The brightest example of Western misunderstanding of the East is the belief that Middle east can easily adopt democracy. Western democracy is based on western culture with equality of religious and social groups, minority rights, freedom of speech and opinions. Add to it religious freedom and free elections and you will get the list that is absolutely alien to Middle East.
Here’s an article by the same author on the same topic – https://fathomjournal.org/why-we-keep-getting-the-middle-east-wrong/
Here’s an interview with him – https://chicagopolicyreview.org/2015/07/28/americans-still-dont-understand-the-middle-east-this-man-wants-to-help/
In one of your interviews you discussed the competition between China and the US for influence in Africa. And your opinion was that China wins due to corruption of local elites. Let me offer another reason for your consideration. It is the same reason that allows Russia to gain influence in Middle East, Africa, South America. When China or Russia come to some country to cooperate, they come to cooperate, not to teach, not to judge, not to interfere into the internal affairs of the state. And people appreciate this.

1. We have the right to decide who is democratic and who is not.

This one is undoubtedly wrong. As a psychologist, you can diagnose it, I guess. What will you call such mental blindness, when a person considers himself flawless and assumes the right to judge and punish others, like in “The House of Pride” by Jack London. And here we see a group of countries that consider themselves the best in the world, that judge other countries and feel it righteous to interfere into their life, to change it without being asked. I understand why leaders of these countries have that blindness, but I wonder how many people in these countries actually understand that it is not a radiant crusade for democracy, but a destructive raid of Normans.
De furore Normannorum libera nos, Domine.
One of the principles of democracy is separation of three powers – legislative, judicial and executive. So why then countries that consider themselves “leaders of democratic world” forget about this principle in international relations. They make the rules, they judge and they punish.
One of American diplomats said recently that USA supports international rules-based order. Sounds good, sounds undoubtedly right. But why USA and NATO forget about the rules when it is convenient? Or is it “We support international rules-based order, but our own actions should not be limited by these rules”? What immediately comes to my mind without web search:

• Kosovo, 1999. Civil war or genocide or whatever it may be called. How it should have been handled according to the rules? UN Security Council makes the decision, ‘blue helmets’ move in and stop the hot phase of the conflict. How it was done? NATO forces moved in without UNSC mandate. Forget the rules.
• Iraq, 2003. USA and its allies invaded Iraq based on false claims that Saddam had mass destruction weapons. The Center for Public Integrity stated that the Bush administration made a total of 935 false statements between 2001 and 2003 about Iraq's alleged threat to the United States. International lies-based order?

Double standards
Speaking more about the rules… We are tired of seeing double standards. As an illustration, I will use just one aspect – the principle of integrity of the state vs the principle of the right of nations to self-determination. It looks like the West supports integrity of the state, when this state is allied or friendly to the West, and supports nation’s self-determination when the state is not. Let’s go through some examples.
- Chechnya (an autonomous republic within Soviet Union) wanted to become independent after 1991. It quickly started to use terrorism to achieve this goal. It took a lot of effort to stop the war and bring the region back to safety. Reaction of the West – support of chechens, their leader fled to London and was not deported to Russia despite all requests.
- Abkhazia (an autonomous republic within Georgian republic which was part of Soviet Union) wanted to become independent from Georgia when Georgia became independent from Russia. Resulted in a war. The conflict is still not solved. Abkhazia now is an independent state which is acknowledged by very few countries in the world. Reaction of the West – they still consider Abkhazia as a rebellious part of Georgia. Same situation about South Osetia – another region, that was an administrative part of Georgia until 1991 and that also seeks independence.
- Donetsk and Lugansk wanted to become independent from Ukraine after 2014 coup. Ukraine tried to subdue them by force and failed. Then the workplan has been signed in Minsk – what the parties of the conflict agree to do to settle. The result should have been – Donetsk and Lugansk return to Ukraine but have extended political rights, etc. Ukraine did nothing of its promises. Reaction of the West – support of Ukraine.
- Catalonia is seeking independence. And I remember that leaders of independence movement have been under political and criminal pressure.
- Scotland had a referendum about independence. And even though results were in favour of the UK, I remember how nervously London reacted.
Russia – NATO relations after 1991
This is best said by Vladimir Pozner, a journalist who spent years of his work in the USA, Russia, Europe and is one of the most known journalists of the old school (comparing to modern propagandists). Here’s the link to his speech in Yale University on September 27, 2018 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8X7Ng75e5gQ&t=2556s.
His speech takes around forty minutes, the rest is the Q&A. To save you time, I’d summarize it here in just a couple of phrases. After Soviet Union collapsed, there was an illusion that we aren’t enemies anymore, that the world is open now, and that we will be partners or even friends. Russia dismissed the Warsaw Treaty union and agreed for Germany to unite, that looked just right – why keep a military union when we aren’t enemies anymore? Sometime later Russia made an offer to join NATO to provide world security together and was denied. Russia offered to join the EU, and was denied. Russia was promised that NATO would not expand eastward and less than 10 years later this promise was broken. Since then, we’ve been witnessing NATO getting closer and closer to our borders, inviting countries that are our neighbours and aggressively supporting those candidates to country leadership in East Europe who declared anti-Russia views. So now the illusion is over. We are enemies. And what’s worse – we don’t trust US anymore, so negotiating some new principles of coexistence will be problematic.
Ukraine.
Briefly about history, in more details about recent times and present situation.
In 16-17th century the territory of modern Ukraine was controlled by two forces with no clear border between them. Northwest (where the city of Lvov is now) was under Polish rule, center and the region along river Dnepr – under control of “kazak military democracies” – gatherings of all people, who fled from Russia, Poland, Lithuania, Crimea and who with time formed Ukrainians as a nation. They were ruled by elected chieftains and made their living largely by either joining some military campaign for money and loot, or by robbery raids to Poland, Crimea, Turkey. They were allied to Russia due to same religion – Orthodox Christianity.
As Poland grew stronger, its pressure on the territory grew, which led to periodic rebellions. Poland is a Catholic state, and people of Orthodox Ukraine were severely oppressed. Seeking protection, Ukrainian chieftains asked Russia to include those territories into Russian state. First request came in 1591. Russia rejected this request and several others. Only in 1654 part of Ukraine, controlled by kazaks, was included into Russia. Consequences – war with Poland and tens of thousands orthodox people fleeing from Polish-controlled lands into Russian-controlled lands.
From then on Russians and Ukrainians were really ‘brother nations’. Well, it was not heaven, but it was the best available option. Same religion, very close language and mentality. And forget about oppression. Ukrainians were oppressed as much as Russians themselves.
When the WW I started, Germany and Austria-Hungary were looking for collaborators in occupied territories of Russian Empire. They promised independence to nationalists in Western Ukraine, and found people who bought the idea. Not surprisingly, the most dedicated nationalists came from the least developed region of the country. Ukraine did not become independent at that moment, but the ideas stayed and gave their fruit during WW II, when Ukrainian collaborators actively participated in Nazis’ crimes. In one of your videos you described what Unit 731 of Japanese army was doing and you warned your listeners that they will never forget it. If you will find and read witnesses’ accounts of Volhynia massacre, you will never forget it either. I read it once long ago and I never want to read it again. It was a shock to me that people are capable of such things.
In the period between 1945 and 1991 Ukraine had the same rights as any other republic. There were no impediments to preserving and developing local culture. If you lived in any republic, you learned two languages – Russian and local. National literature was actively translated into other national languages of the Soviet Union, there were no impediments to education. Soviet Union with all its flaws, really tried to unite all of its nations into one big family. (What surprises me though is why antisemitism remained. You could come from Georgia, Uzbekistan or Yakutia and pass exams to Moscow university, no problem if you are smart enough. But it could be problematic for a Jew…)
After 1991 Russia and Ukraine remained friendly states, tightly bound by economic, cultural and even family ties. Ukraine tried to get the most out of relations both with Russia and with the West and it worked fairly well for 30 years. But with time attempts to elevate significance of their own nation led Ukrainians down a dangerous path. They started to slowly eliminate all other cultures that were present in the country. This process sped up dramatically in 2014, when after a coup the nationalist forces gained influence on the government.
Official Kiev denies being nationalistic, but don’t trust what the person is saying, see what he is doing.

• Open Kiev map and you will find two prospects – one named after Bandera, another after Shukhevich. Those two stand behind Volhynia massacre and numerous other crimes. Now they are heroes.
• During WW II Ukrainian nationalists were gathered by Nazis into the division “Galicia”. Collaborators and traitors, they did not show much on the battlefield, but were always victorious in the punitive raids against civilians. Now they are heroes.
• Ukraine is banning and denying Russian language and Russian culture. And it did not start last year. It started much earlier, when bit by bit Russian-speaking people had more and more difficulties teaching their children in Russian, buying books in Russian. It even shows itself historically – famous writers, artists, musicians, etc. of the past are proclaimed Ukrainians if they were born or lived on the territory of modern Ukraine. Aivazovskiy was Armenian by nation, lived in Crimea which was Russian at the time. Repin was Russian, Kuingi was Greek. Gogol and Bulgakov called themselves Russian and wrote in Russian. Shevchenko wrote in Russian, and now his books in Ukraine are translated from Russian.

I live in Moscow region, so all these processes for me were just an echo of a far-away thunder. My friends who lived in Crimea, Kiev, Donetsks, Kharkov many times said how difficult it was to live in a country that is so obsessed with its own magnificence that it becomes absurd. Massive renaming of streets, destruction of monuments that signified joint Russian-Ukrainian history, rewriting of history, when traitors and criminals become heroes, heroes become butchers. Anne, daughter to Yaroslav the Wise, wife to Henry I of France is known as Anne de Russie or Anne of Kiev. But now there are attempts to call her Anne of Ukraine, even though the very term Ukraine appeared at least a hundred years after she died.
We see those nationalistic ideas demonstrating themselves in a number of ways, and we have seen them before and we know what threat they can bring if left unattended. Pay attention to a dragon when it is small, you may be unable to win when it grows up.
I don’t say that our perception is correct, I just say how we see it. And to us modern Ukraine is like a younger brother who joined a bad company and who is becoming dangerous.
Now combine these two. Ukrainian nationalism plus NATO. Two threats, one well known historically, another the most dangerous rival of the past 70 years. We see them uniting and it is really an existential threat to us. In such circumstances could we afford being blind to it, just sitting and waiting what comes next? We tried to settle it peacefully. Many times Russia said that we are worried by NATO expansion, that we are worried by Western support of nationalistic movements in our neigbour countries. No effect. The last attempt was made in autumn of 2021, when Putin offered a negotiation that should have resulted in guaranteed safety. No reply.
If there is a conflict and your rival refuses to talk, he is asking for a fight. I don’t say that war in Ukraine is the right way to solve the conflict, but who can say that we did not try to set it by negotiations?

Hey ya'll. So I'm struggling to fall asleep because I'm a bit nervous to start my first job at a call center. It's probably the worst job because I have social anxiety but I'm actually more nervous for the whole induction Part of the process with the ice breakers and all that. Just feeling a bit jumpy I guess.
Anyways, I'm a psychology graduate, I love music and I'm trying to read more. I also have been going to the gym for 2 weeks straight (so I guess I'm a fitness girlieee [not])... I can't think of anything else, other than I'm super bored.
Also my cat is a little sick so that has me worried because he never gets sick. His my baby, ye know.
But yeah. Message me if you want. I know this post was probably not my best work but whatever

During my 6th hour of school today, I had gotten relatively annoyed. While all of them are good, there are a select few who push my buttons. Don't get me wrong, they're all good people, it's just that they get on my nerves some times. So this week was very hot and humid, and that class usually sees me being annoyed due to behavioral issues from random people here and there. Today, I had just snapped. One of the few keeps saying Charlie, telling me to turn around then telling me Charlie, has done constant TikTok dances in-front of me that he sees annoys me due to my response each time, and keeps calling me (in class, we sit across from each other) to only say nonsense right after.The second shouts too much and does things that tick me off; for instance, he was flipping a bottle. In order to calm him down after he landed one, I said "good job." He then flipped across the center aisle of the room from where he was at to my side of the room next to the wall in which it made a semi-loud noise and moved my papers a bit. Due to the heat and my patience already dropping from the current annoyances, I had threw the bottle at him in frustration. The bottle slid off his table and hit a girl sitting beside him, fortunately it did not hurt her and I apologized multiple times and had gotten embarrassed. Then when I was trying to work and calm down, he kept calling to me for help and when I told him "no" in order to calm down, he got up and came to me. Although I helped him, I was still frustrated. So, after class, I decided to rant. I mentioned them both by name and although I was telling the person to not call them idiot and showed visual distaste in it, I still heard him say it. I then, in order to just finish the situation and not cause an argument, told him to just say annoying. I had refrained from calling them annoying (from what I remember), but I still allowed him (Note: The person I talked to has seen the two annoy me and has also been annoyed by them) to say it. I had also still heard him call them idiot prior to me telling him not to. Although the rant helped me calm down, I had realized soon after, that I had probably committed Ghibah (backbiting). I read on Islam.org that according to scholars, if someone is known for something by other people, then Ghibah is not haram. However, even when these two are known for their annoyance, I still feel bad. I also read that if one sins openly then it is not haram. Both had done something bad that I was clear of through hearing. So is what I had described backbiting or not?

This review, including photos from my games, originally appeared on my blog at: https://www.stuartellisgorman.com/blog/review-here-i-stand-by-ed-beach
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I first played Here I Stand five years ago at a time when I was far less familiar with wargames. In fact I had recently purged my small game collection of every wargame I owned but Here I Stand because I had given up on finding time and people to play them with. Despite this, in 2018 I made the effort of gathering six of my friends and spending the entire day playing Here I Stand. It was amazing. It took us over eight hours. In the end I emerged victorious as the French, securing an instant victory moments before the Ottomans won on VPs earned mostly through piracy. I spent the next 24 hours buzzing with excitement and exhaustion after that phenomenal day of gaming. I had to get it back to the table, I needed that experience again. Finally, a child, a pandemic, and five years later I managed to play it again and let me tell you, it was just as good the second time!
I finally managed to play Here I Stand again thanks to Chimera Con - a single day board game convention in Dublin dedicated to long multiplayer games. Unsurprisingly, Here I Stand is a perennial favourite and this year there were two tables of it running at the con. Instead of playing the full scenario which starts in 1517 and lasts for hours and hours, we were playing the tournament scenario which begins in 1532 and lasts for three game turns; turns four through six of the main scenario. I also wanted to change up my experience by playing one of the religious factions, since France had been pretty much pure military, and so I was assigned the Protestants. We played for the much more manageable time of just under five hours - still a long game, but short enough that many of us managed to play other games in the afternoon. Once again, after finishing the game I was buzzing with excitement and exhaustion for at least 24 hours. I may have only played two games of Here I Stand, but I’ve spent thirteen hours of my life playing those games and many more obsessing over it. I cannot imagine that my opinions will change substantially no matter how many more times I play it, and I have some thoughts I need to put down on (digital) paper.
SOME NECESSARY BACKGROUND
Here I Stand is a six-player card driven wargame about European conflict between the years 1517 and 1555. Each player controls one of six major powers: England, France, the Hapsburgs, the Ottoman Empire, the Papacy, or the Protestant Reformation. As befits a game with this many players covering such a wide topic, Here I stand is a game of substantial complexity. However, that complexity can be a little misleading. While the game as a whole is full of many different systems for modelling a range of potential actions, no player will interact with every one of these in a single game. The only person who really needs to know how every aspect of Here I Stand works is whoever has the onerous job of teaching the game to the rest of the table.
As an example, I was the Protestants in my most recent game. As the Protestants I had no access to ships, and thus I never needed to know how the several pages of naval rules worked. In contrast, my neighbour (both geographically in the game and at the table we were playing on), the Ottomans, needed to know the naval rules intimately but had no need to learn the rules for religious conflict, which made up most of my actions. Now, it is strategically beneficial to understand how each faction works so you can keep track of how they might be scoring points over the course of the game, but it is not necessary and that is a key distinction. You can play Here I Stand by only know about two-thirds of the rules, and that’s not nothing!
This asymmetry helps to keep the game manageable and is core to how it crafts an interesting experience. On their turn each player plays one card from their hand, either for the event or, more usually, for action points they can use during their turn. Each faction has a menu of actions they can spend points on but what options are available to an individual faction and, occasionally, the cost of those actions varies. This isn’t really where the game’s asymmetry comes in, though. These actions are the tools you use to play the game, but in most cases the game has just limited your actions to only those most relevant to your goals. To reuse a previous example, as the Protestant player I couldn’t build ships, but I also had no real motivation to want to do so, so removing this option was no great hindrance to me. How you win the game is where things get interesting.
The boring answer is that you generally win by getting victory points. However, how you get victory points can vary substantially between factions. All factions have some way to get VPs through controlling points on the board, but while most factions share a goal of fighting over key cities this is not universal. Beyond that, each faction generally has a way to earn their own VPs either through religious influence, building chateaus and cathedrals, having children, or piracy. Probably the most interesting element to Here I Stand’s victory conditions is how VP accumulation feels at the same time very slow and, occasionally, terrifyingly fast. This is a game where each VP can feel like a hard fought achievement but then at the same time in turn of my most recent game (a turn being approximately 5-7 card plays for each faction) the English player picked up like eight victory points, going from last to tied for first.
I could espouse at length about how this happens via the chaotic nature of conquest in Here I Stand and the occasional opportunities to seize a fistful of VPs that may come along only once per game, simultaneously lurching you ahead and putting a target on you, but I think describing the nitty gritty would be a disservice. What matters more is the excitement of it! Laying careful plans to slowly pull yourself ahead a few VPs at a time is great, particularly as you know that with the slow shifts in VP that the game allows it can be very hard to claw a leading player back down once you start pushing ahead. At the same time, if you are sitting near the back of the pack watching someone creep ahead you could potentially feel dispirited because you’re stuck behind, but all is not lost! Everyone’s focus being on the leading player could give you an opportunity to jump ahead by attacking a vulnerable point that someone forgot about! Here I Stand is not like the ever-popular multiplayer wargame COIN series in this regard. In my experience, a COIN game generally features players jockeying for the lead and then, as soon as someone gets too far ahead, everyone turning on them and pummeling them into submission. The goal in COIN is usually to be within striking distance of winning, but not actually winning, so that you can jump across that finish line at just the right moment.
Here I Stand absolutely has an element of players trying to keep an eye on who is in the lead and finding ways to pull them back, but it gives players nowhere near as many tools to do that with. For one thing, you can’t just attack players whenever you want – you have to have declared war on them at the start of that turn or have one of the very few cards in the game that let you declare war during a turn. If one player is creeping ahead it often falls to one or two of the other players to keep them in check, leaving the other three to plot how best to use this opportunity to secure their own fortunes. This means that more often than one player being dragged down a huge number of VPs, efforts will be put in place to curtail their advancement only for a new threat to emerge suddenly and distract the table anew. This dynamic is made possible thanks to the number of players and the limitations imposed, both mechanically and geographically, on each of those players. In both of my games one player managed to reach their victory threshold, and thus drew the ire of the table, only for a new threat to emerge in the final turn – in one case the new threat came out victorious while in the other it came up just short but both times it created a thrilling final act for the game!
Take for example my recent game. I was pulling ahead as the Protestant player and that meant that the Papacy and the Hapsburg player had to try and curtail my advancement. The papacy could try to reduce the reach of my religious conversions while the Hapsburgs could take electorates from me, netting them VPs and denying me ones. However, in doing this all attention turned away from England who chose then to launch a major invasion of France (who had left several cities largely undefended to pursue conquests in Italy), which saw them acquire VPs in spades while no one could stop them because they were only at war with France who was stuck in Italy!
A NOTE ON GAME SIZE
Here I Stand has a deserved reputation of being a game of enormous scale. This is both deserved and undeserved and I hope to explain why. Firstly, yes, Here I Stand requires six players. Do not be deceived by the box claiming it can be played at between two and six. This is a game destined to be a six-player experience and that is how I would recommend playing it.
As to its length, however, I have some thoughts. The full scenario is a day long experience, have no doubt about that. It lasts nine turns, and each turn will take you at least an hour to resolve, possibly quite a bit more. Even though there is a decent chance that your game won’t last all the way until turn nine, usually someone wins before then, it will still take many hours. It also won’t stop you from needing to put aside a full day to play the game, because even if you finish on turn seven you need to allow for the possibility of the full nine.
However, let me point you in the direction of the tournament scenario as an interesting alternative. In the tournament scenario you start the game in 1532, on turn four, and you play for three turns of the game. For my most recent game using this scenario we played for about five hours to resolve these three crucial turns during what would be the main scenario’s mid-game. I had worried that it would feel like a truncated experience, but honestly, I felt like it gave me most of what I love about Here I Stand in a much more manageable amount of time. I was really impressed, and I would recommend that people give it a shot – whether you are someone who wants to try this game but is struggling to find the time or if you’re a veteran who is always looking to play it more. It makes very few changes to the core game – players start with a few more cards on the first turn and on the final turn a key event is placed in the English player’s starting hand rather than shuffled into the deck – and gives you so much of that Here I Stand goodness in a half day experience.
That said, I won’t stop wanting to play the full scenario just because the tournament one is so good. There are a few elements that are missing from the tournament scenario and that will mean that I want to play both. In the early game, I missed the more antagonistic relationship between France and the Papacy of the 1517 start that isn’t present in 1532 – namely that the two are at war and France has invaded Italy. The tournament scenario also gives very few opportunities for dynastic change among the players which is an element of the game I really like. You will definitely see a new pope – in our game it happened immediately – and could potentially see a new English monarch or Protestant leader but neither is very likely. These rules don’t necessarily create a radical shift in the game, but if you’re into Here I Stand for the historical narrative (and why else would you be playing it?) then you will be missing out on some of that grand scope the game provides by including dynastic change among its mechanics.
WHAT DOESN’T QUITE WORK
Okay, so I adore this game to the point of obsession, but I am not going to sit here and tell you that it is flawless. This has not stopped me from loving the game, but I must confess that the religious conflict mechanics are a little bit…eh. For context, there are two main ways that the Catholic and Protestant players can convert regions of the board to either of their religious beliefs. They can take actions that let them try and convert specific points on the board or they can engage in religious debates.
Let’s talk first about converting spaces. Converting a space is a contested roll between the Catholic and Protestant player. Whoever is attempting the conversion selects a space and then both players calculate their dice pool based on a variety of factors such as adjacent spaces, presence of troops who support that religion, adjacency of key religious figures, any card effects that are in play this round, etc. Once each player has a total number of dice, they roll looking for the highest single die. Highest result, with whoever wins ties changing over the game, succeeds and the space is either converted or remains the same. I really like this mechanic and it’s a lot of fun…if you’re one of the players involved. Only two players take this action, and the Protestant player will take it far more, sometimes resolving six or more attempts in one turn while everyone else sits around and waits. It’s very time consuming and can cause the game to drag, particularly if you’re not invested in the result. As the Protestant player in my most recent game I had a blast doing this, but I could see the rest of the table groan whenever I had a big turn coming where I was going to try and convert a lot of spaces. It’s a cool mechanic but eliciting this response in a six-player game is not ideal.
The debate rules I like quite a bit less. The Protestant and Catholic player can call debates between their two sides, and these can be used to convert large swaths of territory all in one go and potentially secure victory points by burning or denouncing the opposing debater. The debates themselves work a bit like combat, players get pools of dice and try to score “hits” by rolling fives and sixes on them, but with more steps used to determine who the two debaters will be rather than just knowing who the two armies are because they’re on the board. This mechanism is clearly central to the vision of the game’s design – the Protestant player’s home card (a card that is always available to them every turn) includes specific abilities for using Martin Luther in debates. That said, they have not played a very significant role in either of my games. The rules are complicated and there’s a non-zero chance that after all the steps involved in determining debaters and dice pools and such you will end up with a draw or a very minimal result. The promise of burning heretics at the stake lying sadly out of reach. The two religious factions also have a huge pool of potential debaters, many of whom have useful abilities for other parts of the game, and they can be overwhelming to keep track of. I can’t help but think the potential for them to die has bolstered their number creating the vast surplus of counters for the two players to track. Maybe as I play Here I Stand more I will find a new appreciation for the debate rules, but in a game that is so hard to get to the table it just doesn’t feel like the debate rules totally work. They’re not fundamentally broken or anything, but they feel off and, again, they also take up quite a bit of time and often only interest two of the players at a table of six.
These religion rules are something that was apparently significantly streamlined in Virgin Queen (the sequel to Here I Stand) and I am desperate to play it and see for myself. Tragically, Virgin Queen was already out of print back when I first played Here I Stand half a decade ago and there is still no clear timeline on a new edition going forward. Maybe some day I will decide to go mad and drop a stack of cash on one of the few copies available on the second-hand market, but until then I live in hope that GMT will finally reprint it.
TO CONCLUDE
Let’s be honest, Here I Stand is obviously not a game for everyone. It’s huge, it’s long, it has forty pages of rules, over a hundred cards, and don’t get me started on the many little counters with their own special rules you have to juggle. It’s nowhere near the most complicated game out there, it’s honestly middle of the road as far as card drive games go, but it is still a lot to take on board even before you start factoring in that a short game takes four to five hours. That all having been said, I feel confident saying that Here I Stand is one of my favourite games of all time. Nothing else I have played gives me the same feeling of excitement as it does. After each game I spend the next 24-36 hours buzzing with excitement at what I just experienced. It sucks you in to its historical sandbox and gives you the freedom to pull some levers while also helping to guide you into understanding even some of what was happening during a particularly chaotic period in European history. Is it perfect? Absolutely not. But I love it, nonetheless.
If after reading this entire review you think that Here I Stand sounds like a dreadful way to spend an afternoon or day, then please do not waste that time with it. Do not let my love for this game convince you to try it if you don’t think you would enjoy it. However, if after reading all of this you think that Here I Stand sounds fascinating, then you must play it. Nothing else will give you this experience, you must seek it out. Either way, trust your gut and what it tells you about Here I Stand. Mine tells me it’s hungry for more.

Maintain campus cleanliness Reject Yan Limon for Perelman Medical College

In the global epidemic, the economy is shrinking, the employment rate is low, the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine hired Yan Limeng as the hospital staff, this non-racist, non-discriminatory for Asian employees to provide jobs behavior, reflects the college's fraternity, equality. But the Perelman School of Medicine in the hiring of like-minded employees, it is time to consider the maintenance of campus cleanliness as the first task, reject Yan Limeng on stage to join the medical school.
Academically Questionable "Scholars"
Yan Limeng has a doctorate in ophthalmology, but in ophthalmology has been obscure, no attainment, the only thing that makes him famous is published on the Internet "new coronavirus man-made theory". Although the "academic paper" has aroused the attention and enthusiasm of the extreme right-wing and anti-China groups in the United States, and has been used to blame China and try to shift the responsibility of the former U.S. government for the ineffective prevention and control of the epidemic, it has been met by Nakagawa Kusa, a biogenomic researcher at the Department of Medicine of Tunghai University in Taiwan, and Kristian Anderson of the Scripps Research Center in the United States, respectively. However, they were challenged by experts and scholars such as Kristian Andersen of the Scripps Research Center and others in the New York Times, National Geographic, and other media or social media platforms, while Chinese dissident Fang Zhouzi published a direct article "Refuting the Conspiracy Theory of "New Coronavirus Man-Made"" and Columbia University virologist Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University, even argued that Yan Limeng's paper was "political propaganda" aimed at deception.
Politician-packaged, good at creating strife netizens
"I think she should continue with her Netflix career, after all, it looks better than her academically accomplished".
"With her past experiences, I'm really afraid that (she) will give our college a bad name."
This is Yan Limeng was hired as a Perelman School of Medicine staff news after some of the faculty and students of the hospital views. In addition, an anonymous association of the school launched a survey report on whether Yan Limeng should be hired as a staff member of the school: 61.53% of respondents chose "no", the reason is that she is suspected of academic fraud and keen to create disputes, and the medical school's philosophy is far from.
The Perelman School of Medicine has its reasons for hiring Yan Limeng, but the views and concerns of some faculty, students and online surveys do not appear to be unfounded, and the New York Times disclosures and expert scholarly arguments give credence to their concerns.
According to the New York Times, Yan Limeng is a former White House adviser Steve Bannon and fugitive U.S. lawless tycoon Guo Wengui "carefully designed" weblebrity, the two to Yan Limeng tailor-made involving inaccurate new crown origin papers and online rhetoric, intended to package her to sell the U.S. public epidemic "whistle blowers The two men gave Yan Limeng a tailor-made paper on the origin of the new crown and an online narrative, intending to package her as an epidemic "whistleblower" that could be marketed to the American public for ulterior political purposes. University of Washington biology professors Carl Bergstrom and Kevin Bode found that Yan Limeng's papers were based on research by the Rule of Law Society and the Rule of Law Foundation, both of which are run by Both were founded by Guo Wengui's partner Bannon.
Yan Limeng in the former U.S. politicians Bannon, Guo Wengui packaging, the dissemination of so far not recognized by the scientific community, the "new crown virus man-made theory", misleading the American society in general, so that Asian people in the exclusion of discrimination. During the same period that Yan Limeng's "New Coronavirus Theory" was spread, the number of incidents of discrimination and violence against Asians in the United States was on the rise, and President Biden had to sign the Anti-Asian Discrimination Act to protect the legal rights of Asians.
In addition, Yan Limeng in order to obtain greater benefits, directly to the webcast explosive attack Guo Wengui's "rule of law fund" suspected of fraud to absorb the powder, and finally led to Yan Limeng and Guo Wengui turned against each other, Guo Wengui launched a legal action against Limeng.
Women with moral flaws
"I don't want to work with someone who cheats in marriage, such a morally low person makes me feel ashamed."
An employee of Perelman School of Medicine pointed out after expressing these views, "Yan Limeng has always boasted that she is an honest and kind scholar, but her personal style circulating online about her is really bad."
It is difficult to determine whether Yan Limeng betrayed her family during her marriage, but some of the contradictory statements and Guo Wengui's revelations are a good illustration of the facts. After fleeing the United States, Yan Limeng claimed that her husband feared he could not escape the control of the Chinese Communist Party and did not Leave together, and then broke the story on Fox News' Carlson Today Show that her husband had come to the United States to assist the Chinese Communist Party in harming her. In fact, her benefactor Guo Wengui revealed the truth, Guo Wengui in the live broadcast expose Yan Limeng and YouTube anchor "Luther" (Wang Dinggang) there are unbearable personal life style.
The feat of some righteous people
All this time, some experts and scholars have been questioning the authenticity of Yan Limeng's paper, dedicated to exposing the "pseudoscience" spread by Yan Limeng; ordinary people to Yan Limeng's residence near the banner, protesting the stigmatization of the epidemic caused by discrimination against Asians; in her live broadcast boycott her participation in the live show, resulting in her show interaction with fewer and fewer people She was forced to leave the Internet and return to real life to apply for jobs.
However, justice advocates do not want Yan Limeng to go into hiding and continue to spread false information about the new crown outbreak. Guo Wengui found out Yan Limeng's current address: Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (3400 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA 19104) through the FBI agent's connection, Some members of the "New China Federation" started a campaign to "maintain the clean campus and reject Yan Limeng's entry into Perelman Medical" on the telegram， calls on people who love freedom and uphold the "Rule of Law Foundation," especially members of the "New China Federation. On March 21, Yan Limeng's address near the banner to protest Yan Limeng false new crown theory, reveal Yan Limeng and YouTube anchor "Luther" (Wang Dinggang) affair, the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine campus to protect the clean land.

It's been 7 months of job searching and I think I am going insane. I am an executive so I know it takes a bit longer for me to find work and I have been to the final round multiple times. This week I think I hit my breaking point. I have a fairly specialized skill set, last week I found probably eight positions that were dead center of what I do, every single one gave me a rejection letter this week, when usually I get at least a phone call to see if there is a complete fit. I was just speaking with my husband and he said to give it a week before we discuss. Reverse headhunters are stupid expensive and I don't know anyone that has used one. Are they worth it? Anyone have advice on hiring one?