this post was submitted on 05 Apr 2026
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

Rules

  1. All posts must be showerthoughts
  2. The entire showerthought must be in the title
  3. No politics
    • If your topic is in a grey area, please phrase it to emphasize the fascinating aspects, not the dramatic aspects. You can do this by avoiding overly politicized terms such as "capitalism" and "communism". If you must make comparisons, you can say something is different without saying something is better/worse.
    • A good place for politics is c/politicaldiscussion
  4. Posts must be original/unique
  5. Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct and the TOS

If you made it this far, showerthoughts is accepting new mods. This community is generally tame so its not a lot of work, but having a few more mods would help reports get addressed a little sooner.

Whats it like to be a mod? Reports just show up as messages in your Lemmy inbox, and if a different mod has already addressed the report, the message goes away and you never worry about it.

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[–] surewhynotlem@lemmy.world 27 points 1 day ago (4 children)

This is only true if you would choose to use your freedom in ways that don't benefit others.

I'm free as hell. I choose to use my freedom to help my children, my wife, and my community. So no, they and I don't need to be more capable of taking care of ourselves. We can take care of each other. Because we choose to. Because we're free to.

[–] Carrotwurst@programming.dev 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

"I’m free as hell. I choose to use my freedom to help my children, my wife, and my community. So no, they and I don’t need to be more capable of taking care of ourselves. "

Yeah, as I said, this is the level of freedom you want for everyone. People who freely associate with each other take care of each other.

[–] protist@retrofed.com -1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You missed the part where there are people who don't/can't take care of themselves in this scenario

[–] Carrotwurst@programming.dev 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Nope, I spoke of collective freedom and ability. Read the statement again with some thought.

I didn't say "the more freedom you want for yourself, the more you must take care of yourself". I spoke of freedom any one person wants to have for everyone, meaning themselves and others (including people with disabilities OR people they don't like). And I said you'd also need ableness in proportion to the level of freedom you want. If you aren't able and can't take care of yourself, it would be in your best interest to support systems that enable getting you the kind of support you need (though you don't have to, if you want to grant everyone the freedom to refuse to support you). And if one is so disabled that they can't do anything for themselves, they probably aren't too concerned about abstract societal freedoms to begin with.

[–] amne@mander.xyz 0 points 1 day ago

What you're saying doesn't contradict OP?

[–] Broadfern@lemmy.world -3 points 1 day ago

Bingo. Same with religion - I already kill and harm as much as I want to, which is zero. I like helping my community and my family, and even for selfish reasons it benefits me because they have my back too as a result.

If a person needs a book or a threat to behave in prosocial ways, they have a problem.

[–] Paragone@lemmy.world 0 points 1 day ago

You probably live in a society which intentionally supresses gangs, serial-murderers, & other kinds of "freedom" that some really want to be indulging in..

"Freedom" is a code-word for lawlessness, for many.

& state-lawlessness allows personal-law-with-a-gun to be the only law.

Much of the ideology of the US seems to be predicated on that kind of "freedom": the freedom to be the only law, to be the enforcer, the judge, the jury, & the executioner.

As many have noted, the whole "free speech" thing means "only for me" kind of "freedom".

But it's the same logic with right-to-live, right to kill-others, etc: it's narcissism, all the way through that whole ideology, from the evidence it forces in the world's face.

DarkTriad's real.

It's committed to making itself the only "lord".

Every variant of oligarchy/feudalism bullshit, whether "communist-party" enforced feudalism, or fascist feudalism, or corporatist feudalism .. all of them demonstrate that removing livingwage from as much of the population as possible is the basis of the "freedom" they want to enforce, because of what it enables later..

I wish this world were sane.

I wish the system itself were rigged to be raising lives up as far in Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs as possible.

But the evidence is that criminality's the real ruler of this world.

& that healthy-freedom is only a temporary mirage..

All those reports about democracy being eradicated, globally .. it's civilrights which is being eradicated globally.

That's the "enemy" in the eyes of the ones who're highjacking our planet's governments..


I've read that in Scandinavia it's entirely possible for women to choose their careers by preference, not by being pressured into it by institutions or by men.

& the segregation-of-jobs is significantly greater than it is in the places where male-pressure ( North America for sure, probably some of Europe ) or institutional pressure ( Soviet Union was that way )..

That is a kind of freedom.

Parenting, simply being able to afford to be with one's children for their first 4 years, & to be providing them with proper nutrition, shelter, education, etc, is freedom.

That's been nearly-eradicated from North American lives, except for the most-fortunate..

Parenting is a luxury?!

Insanity.

Maybe I'm just too bitter..

I don't think the kind of freedom that you're having is normal, in North America.

& that's a problem, in my bitter eyes.

Sorry to have bothered with all these words.

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