Uh, that was kind of my entire point. The sports card example I provided IS being marketed to children now. Directly to children. And their junkie parents with lottery-grade five and six-figure potential payouts if the stars align as Insta-tok advertises those cardboard dragon payouts as 'easy'. Makes Las Vegas marketing look like Mormons marching for manure costs.

And sadly, all you need is a parents approved signature on any debit/line of credit card and damn near any age kid can abuse one today. And plenty of parents do give their children a card, to simply avoid the "annoyance" of their kids bugging them for all those 'micro' transactions that shockingly add up to a $100/month spending habit, addicted to fucking Fortnite skins by the time they're 12 years old, voraciously spending under the innocent guise of "V-Bucks" being spent instead of dollars that would have normally paid the water bill.

Capitalism, grooms them early.

Giving children a solid gambling addiction by age 16 via the sports card industry pimping "1 of 1" golden tickets to parents spending the mortgage chasing a cardboard dragon, with that effort only being financially worth it with the drunken gamble of spending hundreds of dollars to submit it for professional grading in which only a dice roll of a perfect PSA10 will avoid bankruptcy in a viral market begging for a recession that has fucking ruined card collecting.

Credit cards, weren't being marketed and sold to children before. BIG difference. This makes candy cigarette imprinting look like a fart in church by comparison.

Believe the "influencer"?

Oh yeah. I'm always worried about the impact on my axe throwing plans when I'm considering an anti-inflammatory to take after a skydive.

A North Korean soap opera about who won World War 3, has more authenticity.

Even the best critical thinking skills are still ignorantly human. As AI marketing advances, you won't even know the bot on the other end scamming you, isn't real. Even when you're looking right at it.

30 years from now you won't be able to tell when it's walking right at you.

The real dipshits in society, are the ones who assume otherwise. PT Barnum would have been the first multi-trillionaire today.

Yes. And I said and delineated as such:

The one trying to carry their emotional support iguana into the testing facility claiming permanent victim status on behalf of the suffering their Great-Great-Great-Great ancestors surely had sometime in the somehow-relevant and fully blame-worthy 19th Century that naturally affects testing anxiety today bad enough that they have also two 15-minute cry closet breaks approved by the positive wellness counselor, is more the self-diagnosed I was referring to.

Tested and verified would be where we start with fine tuning. Yours would be a respected and recognized definition of disability. There is a considerable difference between a trained service dog, and an “emotional support animal”. Starts with who actually qualifies for the former.

If people would like to get their “disability” tested and verified with more than an echo chamber and paid for personally, then the results will speak for who should be recognized vs. who should be questioned instead of coddled.

A society does not grow well or benefit from the problem of grown-ass children. If policy feeds that problem, question the policy. Not the child defending it.

These fines turn into the cost of doing business if you’re allowed to simply pay those instead of any actual punishment. Forever.

The questionable definition of “disabled” today, reflects considerable coddling that likely isn’t justified for many given the hockey-stick shaped statistical chart tracking that. That is already a handicap for them in adulthood. Perhaps we not coddle them further and assume “slow and easy” is a speed their boss won’t use to replace them. Quickly.

Reality comes fast and hard the minute you step off that graduation stage. Are we helping or hurting with more college tolerance? What should have been left behind in high school? Anything at all? America moves at the speed of greed.

Timed tests have been around for a very long time. If they were that crippling, why would it have not have shown itself in society, long ago? And in the test results?

If the kids are looking for the real surprise, it’s at the bottom of the box.

When “disabled” college students graduate and find out what “word” got added to the default rejection filter at LinkedIn.

Then they’ll find out the value of honesty and integrity.

Not competing? Citizens campaigning to run entire countries had to compete against what society turned a blind eye to. And lost.

America ended up with a DEI administration comprised of a man suffering from dementia (an actual disability) that was normalized and dismissed while labeling critics liars, and a wholly incompetent VP suffering from sobriety and word salad mouth that was normalized with random cackles, while labeling critics sexist.

Yeah. I’d say Average Joe is gonna be competing in the United States of Coddled.

Downmod the truth all you want. Doesn’t change it.

Undoubtably an incredible amount of, we’ll call it “consideration and accommodation” to be kind, has been going on all throughout early and latter educational years to allow this problem to grow to stress resources at the university level.

It would appear a LOT more now have some sort of qualifying disability to enable a benefit on timed tests and education in general. A disabled statistical increase not unlike the LGBTQ+ hockey stick chart that suggests all of Gen Beta will be gay, bi, or trans. Somehow.

If we suspect the new campus arrivals are perhaps not exactly disabled and are gaming the system, gently remind that grown-ass adult college freshman that in a Recession, the fastest way employers might filter out potential hires in the future without having to absorb this newfound university stress in their business, is to add one word to the rejection filter. I’m betting we’ll have a drastic reduction in the statistics. And those who are actually disabled can be properly recognized and provided for again.

Society already watered down “racist” to mean nothing, and make actual racism damn near invisible among the noise and bullshit. Do not punish “disabled” like that, because spoiled liars.

As opposed to what? A ‘funny’ language?

Is Ruby still an optimum language or valid choice, is the correct way to frame that question.

The fucking compiler is only worried about how ‘serious’ you are when you feed it a joke of a coding session after assuming those two bong hits would give your mind Redbull “wings” at 2AM.

Stop with the emotional association already. Coddling shit like this will get you sued by AI for ‘emotional distress’ when you ask the wrong question.

Uh, too easy?

I’m picturing the lowly employee forced to drive into an office to physically retrieve a dead-tree hours-old fax off ‘ol Faxy McFaxface, who was unfortunately struck and killed by a street sweeper upon exiting the ass end of an outdated office policy that had the balls to send an untimely death notice via email.

You know, email. That newfangled dial-up era tech that now alerts you immediately upon receiving. From the comfort of your own shitter. At 5AM. And not a street sweeper in sight.

Too easy my ass.

Start paying closer attention to all of your credit/debit processing fees.

Found my local water company charging almost $4 for processing my debit card. Looked on their website and found the local office. Found they accepted payment there. Started paying by check via the mail. Stamp is a lot cheaper. Never once had an issue.

Book of 100 checks is probably ten bucks. You can also get a sheet of three checks printed at your bank, often for free.

Perhaps unsprung weight doesn’t matter.

In a tank-track-driven solar-powered SUV-class PGA-certified (*laugh-cough* diesel-parred) golf cart. Ooh, or maybe it’s a hoverboard! Yeah, that’s it. A hoverboard. Sweeeet.

Wait, did that dude just say the fucking waterbed makes it unsprung? And how much draft is needed in the new parking lots?

(Billowing from the Aptera Marketing Bi-Weekly Bong Brief Brainshittin sesh.)