Walker88

The belief in deities has a Darwinian element to it (Dr. Robert Sapolsky). Virtually every human society has manufactured deities. (Obviously all cannot be right, but all can be wrong.) Most cultures have covered all the bases by having more than one deity, but in the interest of efficiency, some cultures boiled it down to only one. That saves time and allows folks to get work done, rather than having to appease every worship-needing entity their minds created. The mere thought that existence is both random and essentially meaningless is too tough to take for most people. It causes stress, and stress can kill. Constant high cortisol levels wreak havoc on the body. Going back hundreds of thousands of years, humans who comforted themselves with a fantasy that there is some entity or entities who control things, and the additional belief that one can petition them for favors, is stress-reducing. Being around others who believe the same thing offers fellowship and a retreat from loneliness. Building rituals around the belief additionally reinforces the comforting belief. Those with reduced stress levels are more likely to survive, thus passing on their genes. They are "selected into the species" in a Darwinian sense. It doesn't matter if their beliefs are wrong, because truth is not the goal. Survival is the goal.

Could be. I've long been partial to #3, the aggressiveness of the cellos and bass hits me in the stomach. I also love the power that von Karajan brings as the piece resolves into the final stanzas. Very German. But other times I'm partial to Brahms' 1st, sometimes called Beethoven's 10th.

I sense some woeful, even debilitating insecurity, on the part of those who claim they are "prizes" or "Alpha" types. It seems almost Dunning-Kreuger-ish. If they're so Alpha, why the need to rant to all of us "Simps" and Betas regarding what we need to do or how we have to view ourselves? What difference does it make to these Alphas? Also, wouldn't it be better if they kept their thoughts to themselves, lest we, too, become Alphas and thus compete with them for the best of the best? Isn't it "good to be the King"? I really am too cynical to think these folks handing out advice to turn us into Alphas Like Us are just so altruistic. In my apparent Simpish-ness, I don't view myself as any prize. I certainly don't view myself as superior to Thai women. Yes, I am luckier...no doubt about that...but my circumstances of birth and the incredible opportunities that afforded me do not make me superior. Maybe the proverbial Isaan farmgirl, had she been born with my circumstances, would have outperformed me. There is no contrafactual data to determine that. I am who I am largely---exclusively, perhaps---because of where, when and how I was born. Dr Robert Sapolsky of Stanford University has a term 'The Myth of the Self-made Man' (Sapolsky does not believe in free will). Objectively I can look at myself and see lots of positives---tall, fit, athletic, multi-millionaire in my 20s, advanced degrees from the US' preeminent universities---but if I am honest, I accept that in a relative sense I began life on 3rd base. I had nothing to do with the traits that allowed me to succeed in this world. It was easy to score from 3rd base, and it's merely an accident of birth. It doesn't make me a prize. Acceptance of my own dumb luck allows me to view each person---to stay with the thread, Thai women---as individuals with both good and bad, having dealt with luck both good and bad. We are equal. Of course that doesn't mean I can let down my guard, but it does mean I would be silly to view myself as some prize. The guy who insists he's a prize, but who really is insecure, is easy to manipulate. A former US President comes to mind as one manipulated by few 'love letters' and gratuitous compliments.) Unlike some here, I could consider a relationship with just about any Thai woman, hi-so or Isaan farmgirl who ended up in a bar, because the bottom line is what she is individually and how she addressed the circumstances of her own birth and life. No matter her background, it's up to me to vett and decide if she has the qualities I find attractive in a person. The hi-so could turn out to be a conniving, self-serving Narcissist out to siphon off my wealth and leave me bone dry, while the Isaan farmgirl could be a salt of the Earth....and vice versa. If I do her any favor it would be bringing respect to any relationship, not me viewing myself as some prize. If I've vetted well, I won't lose. So, Mr OP, you do you and let us do us. Better for you anyway if we're all Simps and Betas, as that will leave more 'good women' for you, in addition to not-so-good women who will subsequently possess our wealth. Maybe you can use those women as middlemen to siphon off the wealth of us Simps, and since you're such a prize and so superior, it should be easy for you to take from those 'uneducated, barefoot, lowlife' farmgirls.

Did you read your own post? A foreigner had a 16 year old girl in his room in 'the early hours of the morning'. If you are arguing something absurd like, "she came to his room at 3 in the afternoon", so what. The article states she claims "The victim’s mother filed a complaint against her foreign boyfriend accusing him of sexually harassing her daughter in the early hours of this morning, January 4. Thus, the alleged harrassment happened in the early hours of the morning. Unless the hotel is a dump, CCTV would have the evidence of her presence at that early morning time. Here, let me give you several chances to disagree, as you always do to any comment anyone makes: I say "up" (Come on, say "down") I say "black" I say "East".

Nothing makes much sense in this article: "in the early hours of the morning".... -a mother allows her daughter to go to mom's boyfriend's hotel room, "because boyfriend is going to take the daughter somewhere to look for a job"...in the early hours of the morning? What sort of job for a 16 year old? -a foreign guy thinks it's okay to have a 16 year old girl come into his hotel room "in the early hours of the morning"? In what universe is that okay? It's either a poorly written and detailed article, or ain't nobody innocent in this sordid mess.

You have a child's understanding of geopolitics. You have a woefully ignorant understanding of the Russia investigation. You are even ignorant of what the Republican-led SSCI concluded and then published in their 1000+ page report. Lots and lots of cooperation with Russia. You have absolutely no proof of any "corruption" by Biden. None. Neither do the R goobers in the House, whose 'key witness' turned out to be a liar, and who is now on the run from 1) violating oil sanctions against Iran, and 2) trying to arrange arms sales to Iran. The clown is not only running from US authorities, but likely Mossad. Despite what you think is his place on the FDA Food Pyramid, that vegetable Biden has accomplished infinitely more than the ACTUAL corrupt trump (remember he is a convicted charity fraudster, a convicted sex offender and a convicted business fraudster, while 91 felony charges suggest there are more convictions to come). trump inherited 4.8% unemployment and a growing economy from Obama, but left Biden 6.8% unemployment and a Recession. Oh, and trump has added Word Salad Chef to his list of titles. Listen to his rallies. He doesn't even know what State he is in half the time. Hey, but at least trump knows Frederick Douglass is an up and coming sort.

You have a child's understanding of geopolitics. You have a woefully ignorant understanding of the Russia investigation. You are even ignorant of what the Republican-led SSCI concluded and then published in their 1000+ page report. Lots and lots of cooperation with Russia. You have absolutely no proof of any "corruption" by Biden. None. Neither do the R goobers in the House, whose 'key witness' turned out to be a liar, and who is now on the run from 1) violating oil sanctions against Iran, and 2) trying to arrange arms sales to Iran. The clown is not only running from US authorities, but likely Mossad. Despite what you think is his place on the FDA Food Pyramid, that vegetable Biden has accomplished infinitely more than the ACTUAL corrupt trump (remember he is a convicted charity fraudster, a convicted sex offender and a convicted business fraudster, while 91 felony charges suggest there are more convictions to come). trump inherited 4.8% unemployment and a growing economy from Obama, but left Biden 6.8% unemployment and a Recession. Oh, and trump has added Word Salad Chef to his list of titles. Listen to his rallies. He doesn't even know what State he is in half the time. Hey, but at least trump knows Frederick Douglass is an up and coming sort.

Not sure which President Joe Biden you're talking about. Biden took the 6.8% unemployment trump left him and has it down to 3.5%. Under Biden, more Americans are working than ever before, while trump is the first President since Herbert Hoover to leave office with fewer Americans working than when he entered office. Biden inherited the trump Recession. Today, America is growing faster than any EU nation. Biden got a bipartisan Infrastructure Bill passed. trump announced endless "Infrastructure Weeks" but never got anything done. Biden reinvigorated the NATO trump tried hard to destroy (as putin wanted), and now NATO stands united against the heinous invasion of Ukraine by trump's buddy putin. Biden and the Fed even have the trump-generated inflation under control. Pretty good job. Certainly beats the disaster that was trump. Most important, Biden believes in democracy; trump pulled out all the stops to destroy US democracy with his fake elector scheme, fomenting the terrorist attack on 6 January 2021, browbeating the GA SecState to "just find me 11,780 votes" that do not exist. Oh, and trump stole highly classified documents such as TS/SCI, SAP, Codeword, HCS and RD. That represents a major threat to US national security.

Hillary won the popular vote by several million, despite being not so great of a candidate. trump willingly took aid from putin. Read the Republican-produced SSCI report that details trump's Campaign Manager manafort going to SPain to meet with GRU asset Kilimnik, where manafort handed over detailed internal polling data from the campaign. Such data includes extremely detailed info on individual voters, such as income, spending habits, memberships, etc. Kilimnik gave the data to the Internet Research Agency (A GRU entity) in St Pete, and the GRU then microtargeted voters in key swing States with fake news about HRC. Campaign aid Roger Stone was in continual contact with Wikileaks and knew when the emails a GRU asset had hacked from Dem officials would be released. trump even noted an upcoming release in one of his rallies, saying, "Early next week you will see some very interesting information revealed about my opponent". putin's effort to aid trump was multi-faceted. It also included funneling camapign contributions to trump's camapign through the National Rifle Association. It also included funding the camapign of tree-hugger Jill Stein, as putin had learned lessons from 1992 (Perot) and 2000 (Nader). Stein received more votes in WI and MI than trump's margin over HRC, and it was close in PA. Oh, and in 2020, Biden beat trump's flabby "a$$ like a drum....in a total beat down in humiliating fashion".

Very silly post. In case you missed it, 91 felony charges have been leveled against The Bloated Self-Proclaimed Small Kitten Grabber. The indictments resulted from under oath testimony to a grand jury by people who worked for trump in his Administration. There are also tapes of phone calls where trump is implicated in the fake elector scheme, as well as trying to pressure the GA SecState to break the law and 'just find me 11,780 votes'. That seems to violate GA State RICO laws, and with the help of former Administration officials who will testify in GA, trump faces a mandatory 5 years in jail in GA for what he tried to do with Raffensperger. As for Epstein, in yesterday's Epstein article many people noted to this effect: "one flight on the Lolita Express is not proof of guilt, but many flights suggest guilt, as after the first time folks would know the Epstein game" trump had at least 7 flights on the Lolita Express. SEVEN. So either trump is dumb as a brick and clueless (he is) or he knew full well the heinousness of Epstein and still went along with him. Maybe both.

In case you missed it, there are 3 eligibility requirements for someone to stand as a candidate for the Presidency. None requires that a individual prohibited from running first have his ineligibility addressed in court. 1) Must be 35 years old or older 2) Must be a natural born US citizen 3) Must not have engaged in insurrection against the USA #3 is trump. US States have the authority to make determinations re elections. CO and ME have already made that determination. So ironic/hypocritical trump is whining about 'democracy', when he tried to get his goobers to stop the certification process plus he was intimately involved---according to his own Administration officials---in a fake elector scheme. Obviously trump hates democracy.

With the attitude you evidenced in your opening statement? I'll take the other side of that bet.....and give odds.

.....vs delusions of grandeur? "Prize"? Most expats I see, ostensibly 'living the dream', are obese, tatted-up, Chang wife beater-wearing, guys thinking they are doing Thai women a favor. They wouldn't be a prize in a carnival ring toss game. Like I said, be fit, be neat, be clean, have a personality, ideally be financially sound...and just maybe one can be an actual prize, or at least be on a level playing field with lovely Thai women. It's not hard to do. Maybe you might consider giving it a shot.

There's some decent regular mozzarella available that some pizza restaurants seem to use, and there definitely is one good Bangkok-based company that makes Buffalo Mozzarella. I see their truck sometimes delivering to restaurants. The name is Antica Luna, and they also sell through some retail outlets. They import buffalo milk from Italy.

Prize? The value of an appealing/attractive Thai woman exceeds the value of what many Western men bring to market. Her attributes are valued more by the international market than the skills and talents many Western men bring to their own society or the international market. She is more in demand, he is not. She is rare; too many Western men are cookie-cutter cogs in the international low-wage labor machine: nothing special, nothing unique. The prototypical 'farang' retiree in Thailand---fat, old, on a meager pension---is hardly a 'prize'. Thirty years ago, maybe he was. Those days are dead and gone. To be a 'prize', up your game. Be fit. Be neat. Be clean. Have a personality. Be skilled. Be successful. Being a white male is no longer enough. Sorry, losers. Bring something of value to the table, and maybe you will find a partner.

Goodness, I've wandered into the La Brea Tar Pits....full of dinosaurs! The article, as far from 'news' as can be, may be about Thailand, but in the larger scheme of things, the world has changed. Iron your own damn clothes. Tiger Woods, even when he was married and was worth hundreds of $millions, ironed his outfit before stepping out on the golf course. Here's the new reality: in the US, women age 21-30 now earn more than males age 21-30. Female university graduates are pushing 60% of all graduates, and will likely top that number next year. More never-married women own houses in the US than never-married men. 40% of US males under age 35 live with their parents. If men were supposed to be 'success objects', allowing them to have expectations of what a female brings to a relationship, US men are failing miserably. When avenues for advancement opened up for Western women, they hit the road running. Too many males, feeling entitled simply because they had a Johnson, sat on the laurels and have been overtaken in terms of success by women. So many Western males have become losers, offer women nothing, yet expect women to kowtow to them and their desires. Guys, up your game, clean yourself up, hit the gym, study, develop some social skills---and the world is your oyster, better than ever. Here's a secret: guys who are successful, fit, neat and clean, who do more than watch porn, get tatted, and play video games, have never had it better. Guys fitting that description are maybe 10% of the male population. They are sought-after partners by maybe 80% of the female population. Plenty of choice for them, plenty of partners. There's even a term for them: Porsche Polygamists. (For the alliteration...though it might have been Lambo Lotharios.....the left out males might be F-150 Fappers) Guys who cannot achieve, pine for the days when simply having a Y chromosome afforded guys a host of benefits. Now that young women---at least in the US---are on average more successful than their male peers, those with a Y chromosome have to earn their benefits, whether that is sex or having someone be kind enough to do some chores for them. Oh, and the concept of Porsche Polygamy travels well internationally...even to Thailand. Fat old guys on a meager pension are no longer the 'catch' they were when Thailand was an economic backwater. The La Brea Tar Pits is no place to be.

"Woke" is the silly passion of a small, albeit vocal, minority of the far left, while far far more ubiquitous is the absurd "Alternative Facts", fascism and lies of the right. The first is an irritant that may well already be long in the tooth, while the latter threatens the very foundations upon which all good has emerged---perhaps since Locke and Rousseau---and certainly through the Founders, who set the new nation of the USA on a path toward "a more perfect Union". The cult of personality that is the refuge of the failed, the forlorn, the losers of society---people incapable of accepting personal responsibility for their abject failure at life---could destroy what infinitely superior people, through hard work and sacrifice, built up over 250 years. Far more dangerous is the insane ramblings of the quintessential loser, who now has even adopted hate speech and even Orwellian doublespeak, that resonates with his loser cult. Give the forlorn an excuse for their failures, give them a target to blame, and become their messiah. The vernacular of "Woke" may be the opposite of what it states in many ways, and to a great extent---like the Cult of Personality on the other side---it tries to re-manufacture or redefine reality (e.g., there is absolutely nothing 'body positive' about obesity; it is merely an excuse for laziness, lack of discipline and self-control, as it is with ALL fat people, whether woke or of the Cult of Orange Blubberbutt). What the Cult of Personality represents was best expressed by the now-disgraced former "America's Mayor" Giuliani, when he said, "Truth isn't truth". Hence, a free and fair election was 'stolen', phone calls with obvious ulterior and self-serving motives are 'perfect', the 'best economy ever' isn't even in the top 30% since WWII ended (even before Covid), a silly clownish man-child can create NFT playing cards where he is portrayed as everything he never was and never could be, an independent govt entity is 'biased' when every witness related to major criminal charges was of the same Party and even part of the Administration of the alleged felon, and where people encouraged to 'march to the Capitol", and to 'fight like Hell', when all that was happening is a pro forma confirmation of free and fair election results, and who subsequently attacked and injured 137 law enforcement officers and threatened to hang the VP, were 'just typical tourists' and have now become---in the bizarre ramblings of the wounded loser---"hostages". "Woke" proponents speak of 'inclusion' and 'fairness' when neither is their actual goal, while the Cult pines for a 'greatness' that never existed in fact, while it tries to run to ground where their ilk is awarded the kind of privilege their (lack of) skills and talents do not deserve. Nobody wins those wars and all either does is increase the inefficiency of society. Merit becomes meaningless. The difference is that one can be fixed while the other will completely destroy everything good about the society, because it is based purely on hate and its goal is destruction. Its vernacular include violent words like 'stolen', 'deranged', 'radical, 'rot in Hell', 'vermin' and 'spoiling the blood'. Also, the 'woke' are verbally violent and address transgressors to their dogma by 'cancelling', while the Cult addresses infidels and apostates to its dogma through physical threats, genuine violence, and calls for retribution. The cited author recommends not doing business with woke. I will neither do business nor spend a satang on anyone who is a member of the Cult.

This is pretty good for Thailand:

Purests will still find fault, but there are a few places, at least in Bangkok, where the restaurant ages the dough, uses a wood-fired oven, uses Typo "00" flour, and uses fresh Bufala Mozzarella, which is made by Italian cheesemasters resident in Bangkok who import the buffalo milk from Italy.

For those who think they know everything, go into Siam Paragon, EmQuartier, BTS Stations....even K-Bank branches in various parts of Bangkok, and try to deposit to your account via the CDM/ATM. Perhaps those residing in Nakhon Nowhere, the changes are slow to be introduced, but in Bangkok the law is fully enforced.

Louie, it's the law, as of 11 Nov 2023. Maybe the rollout of the new ATMs/software is slow, but eventually it will be everywhere. I asked in all of my banks, and was told that foreigners must now go to a teller and provide their passport...not even a passport copy.

Apparently you are in a different Thailand than I am, or you are not in Thailand at all. Maybe you can go inform the folks at SCB, K-Bank, Bangkok Bank, et al that you, as a foreigner, can still deposit using the ATM machines. The first screen that comes up when one enters "Cash Deposit" is "Enter your Thai ID". Oddly, this is done whether one uses Thai or English.

After 1929 the Dow did not reach a new high until 1954---and only because the index replaced the bankrupt companies. Japan peaked in Dec 1989 at 38.915.87 on the Nikkei, and 34 years later has yet to fully recover. Of course both of those instances involved wildly overpriced markets. That is not quite the case today. Let us not forget Oct 19, 1987, when the Dow fell 23% in one day.

I suspect those machines have merely been overlooked, or K-bank is waiting for delivery of new ones. I first noticed it in BTS stations, but it was the same at my banks (K-Bank, SCB & Bangkok Bank) in shopping malls such as Siam Paragon and EmQuartier. The tellers at K-bank told me that it is now the law, ostensibly aimed at money laundering. Ask any Thai person, and they will tell you they now must enter their Thai ID #. Before 11 Nov '23, all anyone needed was the bank account number into which they wanted to deposit funds. Enjoy it while you can. Soon enough you'll be in a bank, taking a number, and then sitting and waiting for the next available teller to call you.

It's all Thai banks as of 11 Nov 2023. You need a Thai ID to deposit cash in an ATM. Foreigners---even business owners---must go to the bank teller, show their passport, and then deposit at the teller window. You might have noticed all the ATMs with a deposit drawer that were outside, in BTS stations, even in bank lobbies, have been replaced with machines that now ask for a Thai ID. My staff can deposit cash in my various company or personal accounts, but I must go to the teller at a bank branch.