• discocactus@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    Travelling in Kenya as a pretty sheltered 20yo. Saw a kid (9yo?) huffing gasoline at the gas station we stopped at. Just taking the last drops from the handle in a paper bag and sitting there destroying his brain all day. Couldn’t do anything about it. But it’s stuck with me for decades.

  • rabber@lemmy.ca
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    13 hours ago

    Most of your friends aren’t even friends. Went through a breakup a couple years ago and when I needed friends they all abandoned me. Most people only interact with you for their own personal gain, not because they genuinely care about you.

  • absGeekNZ@lemmy.nz
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    11 hours ago

    It’s not just a metaphor, when people say things like “picture yourself in X”, or “just imagine the audience naked”.

    Others can actually see things in their mind.

    Which was very quickly followed by, “getting a song stick in your head” means you can actually hear a song over and over in your mind. How annoying.

    This seems like some king of super power. I was 40…

  • msrb711@feddit.org
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    14 hours ago

    I used to own a business with employees. It was a small company objectively, but in a small town where I’m from that was a HUGE deal.

    The company survived COVID, but due to total chaos with supply chains that happened after covid, my business got on hard times. I saw the writing on the wall, and started firing my employees and closing the company in order not for things to get any worse. I closed my company and landed a job in another company; a never missed a single salary.

    It’s absolutely shocking how quickly everyone drops you once they hear you’ve gotten on “hard times”. All my friends, relatives, in-laws… EVERYONE drops you like you’re burning pile of shit. Want to call an old friend for drinks? You’re out of luck, nobody is taking your calls anymore, because now you’re a “failure”.

    And let me repeat once again that I haven’t gotten into any BIG trouble, just closed everything down before it did actually SHTF. It’s just the optics of “being in a bad place” and poof everyone’s gone! You’re on your own now.

  • DigitalDilemma@lemmy.ml
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    15 hours ago

    20 years old, self employed manual worker who broke his leg whilst on a night out drinking. The only night’s drinking I’d ever been on before or since.

    How quickly I ended up without any money and unable to pay rent was a real eye opener. The bank I’d used all my life denied me a very small loan, I had no friends I felt I could ask for money. Fortunately I live in a country where health care is free, and my sole client kept a place open for me to limp back into when the plaster came off. I managed to stay out of serious debt and kept a roof over my head, but skipped a lot of meals and went without heating for a few months. I’ve never forgotten the feeling of helplessness and that has been a driver for a lot of my life’s spending and saving habits. We take a lot of things for granted, but they can often be taken away so quickly.

    • msrb711@feddit.org
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      14 hours ago

      Oh boy yes. It’s absolutely brutal how quickly everyone drops you once you hit hard times.

  • Chippys_mittens@lemmy.world
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    21 hours ago

    I had just turned 19 and I was short on rent by 200 dollars thanks to a car repair. Asked my landlord a week prior if I could pay rent a week late. He politely told me if I plan on paying late he will begin the eviction process. I realized then people don’t really give a fuck about you when you’re talking about money.

    • Sanctus@anarchist.nexus
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      8 hours ago

      If any younger people here are ever in this situation the correct answer is always to tell them no they can’t and they should be fucking happy they are even getting a warning that one rent payment is going to be late. A landlord will always fuck you, I have never had one that didn’t, not even the bank.

    • Korhaka@sopuli.xyz
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      20 hours ago

      Huh, I don’t think you can even evict someone legally here if they are just a week late on rent. IIRC it has to be like 2/3 months behind before you can start the process.

      Landlords frequently complain about renters having rights.

  • SomGye@sh.itjust.works
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    20 hours ago

    One of them was working really hard on getting two college degrees and finding out the hard way that employers don’t give a fuck about those and that networking and sheer luck are the most important factors.

    • CarrotsHaveEars@lemmy.ml
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      3 hours ago

      On the other way around, it’s also a hard reality check that how (not) far you can go on the way to getting employed without a college degree, even though it being totally useless.

    • autriyo@feddit.org
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      5 minutes ago

      Not really, the writing has been on the wall for quite a while…

      If at all it’s the realisation that average people can’t really flee from it.

        • yermaw@sh.itjust.works
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          2 hours ago

          They’ve been telling us and warning us but i thought they were just being “hysterical” or overly sensitive to stuff. Nazi Germany is still taught in history basically everywhere right? We all understand its unforgivable and a black spot in the Human experience, and we all know to never repeat that.

          Its really weird and scary to see it actually gearing up again.

  • Björn@swg-empire.de
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    1 day ago

    During the pandemic my wife was panicking about Long Covid. I said the chances of getting that are too low. And we got vaccinated and we masked up. Then the children went back to school, everyone got sick and now I can only lie in bed 24/7.

      • Björn@swg-empire.de
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        19 hours ago

        I’m so glad to be living in Germany. And that I’m a good German who insured himself against being unable to work.

        I’m getting an early pension and my wife is paid by health insurance to care for me. Those together with the insurance mean that we can keep on living more or less like before.

  • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works
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    20 hours ago

    It Can’t Happen Here

    It can; it is; we have been watching the progression for decades; the vast majority of people didn’t notice because of how slow and creeping and careful it was for most of the preceding several decades.