Our western culture of individualism is older than capitalism. Much older. It stems from our agricultural and pastoral modes of production. Grains like wheat as well as livestock like sheep, goats, and cattle are highly amenable to work by an individual farmer or shepherd or rancher. Wheat is sown in ploughed fields that have been worked by oxen or horses.

Compare with a different grain like rice which must be transplanted into flooded fields by large groups of people or crops like potatoes or yams which must be planted and dug up individually by mass labour.

The structure of individualism or collectivism is in the roots of our cultures going back thousands of years. So rather than capitalism giving rise to individualism I think the opposite is the case.

You have not denied that Rossmann engages in rage baiting. Everything you’ve said dances around that point. You’ve tried to make this a discussion about who is paying for it. THAT DOESN’T MATTER. It’s the subject matter which is toxic. And Louis Rossmann is guilty of it. I’ve watched plenty of his videos and they’re all the same. Endless rage masturbation. It’s garbage content. The modern day equivalent of Jerry Springer.

His activism could cure cancer and end world hunger but that wouldn’t excuse him for it, because others are doing the same activism WITHOUT THE TOXICITY.

You just named them yourself. FUTO. His company.

Without views he has nothing. It doesn’t matter who is paying him, he’s not getting paid if he doesn’t get views. The algorithm brings him views when he gives the algorithm what it wants. What does it want? Engagement. And the path he has taken to generating engagement is outrage, toxicity, and negativity.

He says “my finances don’t depend on YouTube” then why is he still publishing on YouTube? Shut it down! Oh wait, he can’t, because then he’ll stop getting paid by his sponsors.

YouTube has consistently reduced the amount it pays creators per ad view over time. Yet creators are making more videos than ever. Why? Because they make money through 3rd party sponsors. YouTube is a platform. The value it provides to creators is the audience it brings to them through network effects and through the algorithm.

I’ve already addressed Rossmann’s political activism in a previous comment. I appreciate all the work he’s done on it. But he’s by no means the only person fighting for right to repair. There are tons of others doing so as well, such as iFixit, the EFF, and loads of organizations representing farmers all over North America.

My criticism of Rossmann is specifically with the style of content he puts out. Negativity-based reaction videos are his bread and butter. That’s how he makes money. This puts an asterisk on all of the good things he does, just as MKB’s occasional soft takes put an asterisk on the work he does.

This kind of toxic negativity is heavily favoured by the YouTube algorithm and it leads people into mental health spirals. That’s my point. Louis Rossmann makes money by damaging the mental health of vulnerable people in his audience. None of his beneficial activism makes up for this. You can look at other right to repair activists and see that they are working towards their goals without this odious behaviour.

There are thousands of youtubers just like Rossmann. They sit there in front of the camera and react to other videos or news. People watch because they get a thrill out of seeing someone get angry and “pwn” the bad guys. There’s no creativity in it. It’s just emotional dumping. It’s totally toxic.

Louis used to be all about creativity. He used to make repair videos and teach people useful skills. He stopped doing those when he realized the algorithm would give him a bigger audience for these negative takes.

Call him a victim if you like. Algorithmic capture I’ve heard it called. Many many youtubers have gone down that road.

As for MKB. I like his videos because he’s a very good speaker, he puts a lot of thought and creativity into the whole production, and he is actually honest about the drawbacks in products he reviews. Is he perfect though? Clearly not. I would prefer if he didn’t interview Apple mouthpieces to let them deliver well-practiced marketing directly to his audience.

Sometimes I also think MKB gets a bit too starstruck because he can’t quite believe where he is and what he gets to do for a living. If you go back through his videos and sort by increasing date you can see his very first videos. It’s rather stark how far he’s come.

Both guys are in the business of self-promotion. One is based on positivity, the other negativity.

You want to fill your life with negativity? Go ahead. I’ll pass.

I’m a big fan of right to repair and I appreciate all Louis Rossmann has done for the movement. Having said that, I wouldn’t say he’s strictly a pro-consumer guy. He’s a professional gadfly.

I dunno what it is, and I’m not saying the person you’re replying to is doing this, but tons of people seem to throw shade at MKB. Like they think he’s being sneaky or is in any way untrustworthy. All I’ve ever seen the guy do is be honest with his opinions. Yes, he is generally a very tech-positive guy. But he’s not afraid to explain in detail why he thinks a product sucks.

There definitely are some of those and I’ve met them. But when I’ve dug further with them I found there were plenty of government programs they benefited from that they would be unwilling to give up. In other words, “government benefits for me but not for thee!”These people I would call selfish hypocrites rather than libertarians.

No, when I think of a libertarian I think of someone like Milton Friedman. He believed everyone would be better off with less government intervention in people’s lives. In the few cases where he thought government was still necessary (such as law enforcement, national defence, and the disbursement of a negative income tax benefit) he believed it should be kept.

What’s wrong with libertarians? I think they get a bad rap and some of their ideas might be unworkable but their hearts are in the right place.

The tech isn’t the difficult part, it’s the enrichment process itself. It involves vast numbers of gas centrifuges spinning uranium hexafluoride 24/7 for a very long time.

It’s not really any more interesting. We’re never going to see an epidemic of women killing each other. There’s no all-female gangs out there that I know of. The most common female-on-female violence is high school bullying.

That doesn’t solve anything. This is not a competition. If we’re discussing this issue in good faith then we should be trying to dig deeper into the root causes rather than just tallying up the scores.

I think it’s pretty firmly established scientifically that men are a lot more violent and dangerous than women. We tend to have a lot larger muscle mass and higher bone density as well as higher propensity for violent aggression.

However I think it’s also pretty firmly established that, although by far most of the violent crimes are committed by men, by far most men never commit a violent crime of any sort. So what we’re actually dealing with is a small percentage of all men who commit nearly all violent crimes.

So then what are we to do about it? We need to find ways to detect these men (men with a high propensity for violent aggression) and intervene to help steer them away from aggression, to better manage their anger, or to otherwise find ways to mitigate their risk of offending.

Everyone’s hoarding resources. Some are just better at it and luckier than others. Compound interest is the most powerful force in the universe!

Sustaining this level of growth forever wouldn’t work even if all resources were distributed fairly. Norman Borlaug bought us some time but that’s essentially a constant factor on linear production vs exponential growth. Exponential growth always wins.

They’re probably under orders to do this. Very sad!

Yes. Taking money from a dirty country (an empire in freefall) and putting it to a good cause!