8-Ball for president, fuck it

Ahh, I see. Well, it’s natural to congregate to groups you’re similar to - no one likes feeling uncomfortable. But a couple months of being uncomfortable is what it takes. Find some sort of common ground and work from there. Even if you remove any biases of your own, there are those who won’t do the same for you. It isn’t right, but it’s understandable. If someone doesn’t reciprocate any meaningful interest, move on to the next person. It just takes persistence and the desire to interact with other cultures. As I mentioned in my post, building stigmas and unconscious biases down the road often happen because there’s little to no real personal interaction with other groups. Not saying you will, just something I’ve noticed in people through the years, no matter how well-intentioned they may be.

Sure! It will be uncomfortable at first, and you will face some difficulties at first. The hardest thing is to build a friendship. But once you’re actually friends with someone, that’s your chance to fully dive in. Just be sure to learn and recognize any of your own unconscious biases and leave them at the door. Can’t realistically expect anyone else to accept you if you don’t do that first (this is for everyone. We all have these, which is why it’s important to recognize them and lose them)

I understand not all locales have this advantage, but I was fortunate that Boston often had festivals organized by these communities. If your city has any, go to them. Go to concerts, bars, community events, religious gatherings if you’re into it, or any other event where you can more easily interact with people. All it takes is to build one meaningful connection and then your network will naturally grow.

Posting my reply to someone else.

I was born in the US, in Mississippi, but moved to Boston, Massachusetts, as a young adult. I am mixed from white and pacific islander - I look mostly white, just with Asian features - but a significant portion of my friends were black as a child, and then I fell in with an international community of Haitian-, Nigerian-, and Latin-Americans when I moved to South Boston.

As with anywhere, most people are nice if you express interest in them and their cultures. There will be preconceived notions for some people towards you, and it’s important to understand that most stigmas stem from an absence of interaction. It can be surprisingly easy to break those barriers if you just make any sort of effort. It can sometimes be hard, but it’s so worth it. The kindest people I have met have been from these communities, mostly I think because they’ve worked so hard to build a better life for themselves and their families and friends.

Few things are as rewarding as being accepted into different communities. You learn and experience so much that you wouldn’t otherwise. My favorite experiences have been meeting the families of friends, being invited to cookouts with traditional foods and drink you have never had, and having an incredibly reliable community to lean on in times of hardship - we all help each other because we’re all in the rat race together. All it takes is some humility and a willingness to learn.

I was born in the US, in Mississippi, but moved to Boston, Massachusetts, as a young adult. A significant portion of my friends were black as a child, and then I fell in with an international community of Haitian-, Nigerian-, and Latin-Americans when I moved to South Boston.

As with anywhere, most people are nice if you express interest in them and their cultures. There will be preconceived notions for some people towards you, and it’s important to understand that most stigmas stem from an absence of interaction. It can be surprisingly easy to break those barriers if you just make any sort of effort. It can sometimes be hard, but it’s so worth it. The kindest people I have met have been from these communities, mostly I think because they’ve worked so hard to build a better life for themselves and their families and friends.

Few things are as rewarding as being accepted into different communities. You learn and experience so much that you wouldn’t otherwise. My favorite experiences have been meeting the families of friends, being invited to cookouts with traditional foods and drink you have never had, and having an incredibly reliable community to lean on in times of hardship - we all help each other because we’re all in the rat race together. All it takes is some humility and a willingness to learn.

Don’t say never - it can find you at the most unexpected time and place. It can be different for everyone, but generally you feel and know that this other person would do almost anything to help you. Regardless of what you go through, you know that everything will be fine since you have each other. Being loved means you have an advocate and someone who validates you, despite all your flaws and shortcomings. It means you can be brutally honest with them, and vice versa, because you want the best for them.

Being in love means you can fight and argue, but find some sort of common ground and go from there - because they’re interested in your perspective and you in theirs, even if you disagree with it. At the end of the day, they’re your rock and your fire.

Another person shouldn’t give you purpose or meaning - everyone has to make that for themselves, and it will likely change through time. But it does mean you have someone to stand alongside you in that journey, excited and eager to share and experience the journey.

You’re just like the people Op is talking about.

I didn’t say they are experiencing these slowdowns because of abatement policies, like you said with shark attacks and ice cream. Read my edit. I think I’m being misunderstood, and I don’t think I clearly communicated what I was trying to. Your second paragraph literally summarized what I was trying to convey, which I thought I did in the tldr, but I’m better at numbers and graphs than I am with words lol.

Right. There are many factors at play that lead to these outcomes, and there are always outliers

Ay cabrón

Edit: Since people seem to think I’m saying abating climate change causes fewer children, I’m not. Communication is not my strongpoint - but I have a B.B.A in Econ with an emphasis in Sustainable Supply Chains, and a Master’s in Quantitative Finance, so let me rephrase this. Countries that implement more policies to fight climate change are typically populated by people who care and are educated about climate change, who are also less likely to have more children due to the current path humanity is on.

Something vaguely related to this topic is the fact that countries with more laws designed to abate climate changing effects are also experiencing a slowdown in the rate with which they have children. Whereas many countries with relatively high birthrates generally do not have very strict climate standards. Overall levels of general education also play into this.

Tldr; Generally, the more people know about climate change, the less likely they are to have children.

Oh dear, not again

That’s all I needed to convince me to live like it’s the 60s again

Americans are more like the English than they realize lol

That seems excessive but I can do that. Thank you for being so thorough - it makes me feel more secure :)

And yet I still find wholesome comments on Lemmy :)