No, your comment is an example of "argument by joke" and "false equivalency".
The bad faith free speech argument that somehow applies to only some people, to only one side of the political divide, but never to the other was prevalent mainstream argument for years now. Some peoples free speech was sacred and if you criticized or opposed them, the criticism and opposition themselves did not counted as free speech - even if it in fact consisted of speech only.
So like, kicking at those people is entirely fair. Because they actively damaged "free speech". Not that they care or ever cared.
For this to be anything like "so you hate waffles" there would have to somebody going around declaring to all that "all breakfast foods are good and can not be criticized" and them only showing up to defend pancakes on the basis of "all breakfast foods" but then deafening silence when waffles or bacon or scrambled eggs get trampled on in a far more prevalant manner.
Even the one reply to me from a self-proclaimed absolutist didn't bother to defend the political speech and petition of government, just said that they were present!
This has been a dream project of mine too, so happy to see that it exists.
One thing that I've also wanted was to be able to reason about the total timeline using the Holocene calendar[1] instead of the standard BC/BCE AD/CE timeline. It makes it easier to internalize how long ago (or how recent) certain civilizations were without having to do the wrap-around math in one's head. Would be nice to be able to maybe toggle that view.
The biggest problem with news is that it's fundamentally an exercise in elevating anecdotes over data. Every time the news reports on an incident or a happening, it's a deep dive into one single data point — and how that deep dive is characterized can influence how the reader thinks about society as a whole. The narratives used to characterize that data point vary based on the biases of the news institution, but either way it (more often than not) paints a distorted picture relative to the macro reality.
> The narratives used to characterize that data point vary based on the biases of the news institution, but either way it (more often than not) paints a distorted picture relative to the macro reality.
That's true, but I'd dispute that some kind of objective understanding of "macro reality" through "data" is even possible or practical outside a few narrow areas.
To be clear, there is certainly a spectrum/degree for bias.
The best kind of news/journalism informs readers based on factually accurate and unbiased data — and perhaps uses noteworthy current events and human interest anecdotes to corroborate that data.
A worse kind of news/journalism partially misinforms readers by presenting factually accurate data in a biased way.
The worst kind of news/journalism entirely misinforms readers by presenting an anecdote (or a statistically insignificant collection of anecdotes).
Unfortunately the majority of news today (at least in the US) falls into that 3rd bucket.
I'm a strong proponent of the right to freedom of speech (and I'm pro-choice), but we have to be clear about the fact that these are derived from axioms, which are by definition maxims derived from subjective leaps of faith and not evidence-based objectivity.
I think that's Rayiner's point; you can't admonish people deriving philosophical views from the theistic beliefs and value systems they practice when the opposing side of those views are essentially derived from secular/atheistic beliefs and value systems. At some point in the chain of derived arguments and justifications, you arrive at an axiom whose only justification is "because I believe this should be so" or "because my in-group believes this should be so" or "because <authority figure> believes this should be so" — it's still a leap of faith.
"Humanism" is just another subjective belief system, and its adherents are no more immune to the forces of tribalism and faith-based reasoning as adherents of older belief systems.
I work in this industry and can provide some insight.
Every payer has the concept of "UCR Rates" or "Usual, Customary, and Reasonable Rates" for every procedure code, for every ZIP code. For example, the median cost of an X-ray should be a certain dollar amount in Topeka, Kansas and a different (higher) dollar amount in Manhattan, NY.
When a provider is out-of-network, they'll bill as much as they possibly can to see what the insurance company will pay — the insurance company will only pay up to the "UCR Rate" for the treatments (or in your case, apply that to the deductible before the payments start to kick in). Whatever the difference is between the UCR rate and the requested amount is almost always ignored, since the doctors' motivation for the high requested rate was to try and maximize payment from the insurance company. In your case, since you paid out of pocket, you're unfortunately on the hook for that difference. In other situations the provider might also invoice the patient for that difference, but it's relatively rare.
In contrast, when a provider is in-network, they have contracted rates for all of the procedures (also typically varies by ZIP code). These are called the "fee schedule" rates, and every payer (including Medicare/Medicaid) has their fee schedule rates defined and agreed upon with the physicians/providers.
It sounds like pure fantasy to come up with a number they should charge and it is the same for every provider in a zip code. Different hospitals, clinics and offices would pay different rents, staffing expenses, supplies, marketing, utilities, and the list goes on. Not even McDonalds charges the same price for the same meal in every location in a zip code. Malls, airports, entertainment venues are easy examples of divergent pricing.
Right, the UCR is usually pegged at the 75th percentile price for that ZIP code — though that can vary from payer to payer, some can even go up to 90th percentile — it's usually determined by actuaries. It's basically a guidance that conveys "we've never met you before, but you're asking us to reimburse for a treatment, and we as an insurance company think this is the highest reasonable amount to charge for that treatment". It's also important to note that payers don't advertise whether they're doing 75th percentile or 90th percentile or 50th percentile or whatever, because then it just becomes an incentive for providers to anchor at that amount, even if it may be higher than they would otherwise bill for that treatment — they'd just submit a claim for that amount and say "cool, thanks, pay me". In single-payer countries in which the state is a monopsony buyer, there is only 1 rate (sometimes a narrow range), often per location.
In either case, the goal is to try to keep prices down, and in many cases to prevent so called "upcoding" by providers. You'd be surprised how prevalent upcoding is among providers. I've been on the phone with a provider that included in a claim an $80 line item for "oral hygiene instructions", which is a fancy way of saying "instructing the patient to floss more". I've seen another claim that asked for $300 for sign language because the patient was deaf. I've seen yet another claim that asked for $200 for a swaddle for an infant patient. In all 3 of those cases, I personally informed the clinical administrator on the other end "this is not covered", and their response was something to the tune of "oh yeah that's okay, we just put that on there to see who covers it, you can go ahead and ignore that line item".
All of this is characteristic of the fee-for-service model, which is increasingly being seen as quite flawed, regardless of whether it's done by the public sector or the private sector.
And people wonder why health care in America costs so much. You have two businesses (at least one of which is totally removed from the services being provided) trying to scam each other every time someone goes to the doctor.
Additionally, I've found that they're a bit less risqué than Western productions and that creates broad appeal.
Crash Landing on You was a heartwarming (and cheesy) story told in a very "PG" way. It not only appealed to me, my wife, and our friends, it appealed to my modest Indian in-laws.
A colleague from Singapore told me that caning isn’t much of a thing anymore. If you are sentenced to a number of strikes, these will be broken up into a number of „appointments“. Apparently you can easily avoid them with a letter from your doctor.
