I see what you mean. However, it was at no point my intention to equate the severity of those two different contexts. But given your interpretation, I understand why you found it to be a ridiculous comparison. I just wanted to highlight that even seemingly harmless things can become a tool for harming someone regardless of the actual severity. Sorry if that wasn’t clear enough before.

Given that this protest is performed by adults and not 5 year olds, and assuming that they are not shy about their hostility towards tourists, I would argue that the severity of such an confrontation can linger for a while with someone. I am absolutely sure that this would keep my mind busy for a while if it were to happen to me or those close to me. Therefore, I would rank this higher in terms of severity than a child being silly. (Of course it would be no match with being bullied.)

my response was to demean the overdramatic use of the word “attacked”.

Maybe it’s just me, but I didn’t interpret the wording in such a dramatic manner like you did. I’ve seen it in a more general, abstract manner. Not in a way that would motivate me to call the police, no. Almost like the phrasing “verbal attack”, which is also understood rather lightly. It seems this is why we’ve got into this misunderstanding. So thank you for clarifying this. :)

How so?

It illustrates the hostility experienced by the target. It’s just water, which is by itself harmless.

But:

In the one case it is a demeaning gesture by bullies, which does imply so much more than “just water”.

In the other case it is experiencing aggression, possibly being shouted at or insulted, which also causes more than “just water”.

How would you feel?

You plan a trip to the city, with your partner and kids. And then you come accross angry people who tell you to fuck off while shooting at you and your family with water pistols.

Would you feel the same way about this as if it was just raining?

To me, and probably a lot of people, this is certainly another and far more hostile experience, which is also not a pleasant one.

In a hostile context even the most harmless of things can become weapons.

For example, do you care if the guy in school gets a bucket of water emptied above them while being ridiculed by bullies?

It’s just water at the end, so what?

Mostly they like wear black, true. But that’s not being “a dark messenger for Satanism”, which seems to be implied by your previous comment.

I like to think so too. Humans have a lot of potential, for the good and the bad. It’s important to nurture the good and diminish the bad.

Who are also not like that. My goodness. Let’s throw in another round of prejudices, shall we?

They are mere tools for power-hungry egomaniacs, who have no regard for the well-being of others. Tools which make it especially easy for them.

Replace religion and capitalism by something else and you get a similar picture.

Hell is other people. It’s humanity itself which is the bane of human existence.

Translation:
“Shutdown. Fucking shutdown, trash!”

Because it’s always so easy to compile everything you need from source! Just make sure to download, compile and install the dependencies first as well. Oh, and the dependencies’ dependencies. And the ones from them. And so on. Unless you’re lucky enough that there are already packaged dependencies available for you. Don’t know how to compile? No problem, just read the documentation. You can be absolutely 1000000% dead serious sure that everything you need to know is documented and extremely super duper easy to understand if you don’t know the source code or barely know how to code at all. And if not, maybe you can find the bits of information on the respective Discord server. It will probably be also very intuitive to know which build options you have to set in which way and which ones even exist. And that without causing conflicts with other packages you need to compile. Still got got problems with compiling? EZ, just open a bunch of issues on the respective GitHub pages. (If present. Otherwise, try to find another way to contact devs and get support, Discord for example.) Maybe, about six months later you’re lucky to get a response. And if not, don’t worry. Some will tell you, you should RTFM or are an idiot. Some will just close the issue because your platform isn’t supported anyway. Then you know, what you did wrong. Also don’t mind if your issue gets ignored.
If you finally managed to compile everything from source, congratulations! Now run the program and test if everything is working. If it’s not or if it is crashing, don’t worry! In developed and civilised countries you can just buy a shotgun and blast your own head away to end this suffering.

EZ! Just compile from source! /s

• Disruption doesn’t sour public opinion toward a cause, but it’s not clear if it’s more effective than noon-disruptive methods

Meh. I hoped there would be news on that. I’m following and reading through various materials on the topic of “effective protest”, especially regarding the disruptive forms. And it seems as always: not enough data to draw conclusions or contradicting data.

Proof that a free market doesn’t magically create value.

Sorry, replied in the wrong comment level apparently.

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Like becoming rich?

Yes. Exactly. Although there isn’t much left worth stealing from Microsoft.

(This was a low-key “Microsoft bad, Linux supreme”, comment.)

(And now it’s no longer low-key.)

(I’m using a touch-screen keyboard for writing this. And yet I can’t open my doors using the keyboard. Ever wondered why that is?)

(Correct, because I forgot my keys at home and didn’t put them on my keyboard.)

(Now it’s just a –board.)

(Oral diarrhea over. Go get some guhd Linux!)

That depends on where you live.

Yes, I know. That’s why I said:

However, not a simple solution for everyone in every country.

No one is preventing you from visiting a library, which would be a fesible alternative.

However, not a simple solution for everyone in every country. Knowlegde should be a free and shared common good.

Capitalism wherever it is found. Not just the USA.

Ecosia did something similar.

“If you don’t have anything to hide, you won’t mind us looking, would you?”