I'm starting to get the new car itch, and I'm looking around there is just about nothing out there that interests me that is at a price I'd be willing to pay.

I've never really been in this situation before. I've always loved to look at what new cars are out and even think about what I'd buy if something happened to my daily driver, but man is the selection out there bleak as hell. New or slightly used. Here is my short list, but even the cars on the list all have at least one (and most have 2 or 3) thing I've not crazy about.

New Mustang. Never been a Mustang-guy before but I saw the new one in person and I liked it more than I thought I would.

New or slightly used Camaro. Like the Mustang, it's more impractical that I really want, but still tempted.

WRX. I still haven't forgiven Subaru for phoning-it-in with this redesign. I'm actually hoping a mid-cycle refresh solves this issue.

Genesis G70. I really want to like this car.

Kia Stinger. The lack of a manual is really the biggest issue - love the hatch design. There's just something about this car that feels cheap. Which is weird because in higher trims, it really isn't a cheap car.

CT5-V. No not the Blackwing. I wish. I'd definitely onky be looking at used ones. I feel it is underrated car. It's got probably the best proportions of any regularly priced car on sale today. That long hood, short deck proportions is phenomenal.

Chevy Trax. The new one. This one is a total left field pick, but I'm totally digging the super low price and small, but not too small, size. A neighbor has one ans it's lower than most other crossovers so the wagon-ness of it really appeals to me.

Nizzan Z. Like the Camaro and Mustang, this is very impractical but the old-school nature of it (manual, RWD) is incredibly appealing.

Toyota GR Corolla. Lots to like about this, but I get the feeling it would be unobtainium because I sure fuck am not paying a dealer markup.

What's your short list of cars?

Important quotes from the article:

Gen Z workers are already getting flak from businesses for lacking the basic skills needed to navigate the working world

youngest generation to enter the workforce doesn't have the skills to debate, disagree, or work alongside people with different opinions.

Using the Samsung News app on my tablet now and it's one endless clickbait article after another. Plus they inject ads onto the page too.

I know it might not be the apps fault if the source of the news is shit, but there doesn't seem to be a great way of culling all the terrible sources. I can remove them individually but wondering if there is a better option. Something that takes advantage of the larger screen that a tablet has over a phone would be especially welcome.

We can attack religion all day long and not get anywhere with the general public. Here's why: Your local church is entrenched in everyone's community. And it can be a church or mosque or temple. It doesn't matter. It is the center of the community in a whole hell of a lot of places.

The older I get the more I see this from family, friends and neighbors. None of them are hardcore religious fanatics, but these "regular" people are the ones who give religious institutions their power. Yeah, the really hard core religious people are the ones who get the headlines, but average parishioners who give their weekly donation and go to church a couple of times a month are the ones who fill the coffers of the various churches around the country and around the world.

Why do these people go? Again, most average people aren't hard core religious fanatics. They aren't trying to follow every last word of the Bible. But they also aren't trying to push those ideas on peoples throat either. They aren't the "bad" kind of religious people. But they go to church because ultimately life is hard. And boring. And lonely. And average people just feel the need to have a sense of community. It doesn't matter where that place is, but people are social animals and need a certain level of human interaction once in a while. A community church gives them that. It gives them a place to get married. And to hold funerals in. There might be a local strawberry festival at the church where they see their aunt Mary or at service every few weeks where they see that cute girl they have been trying to build up the nerve to talk to. People don't have a ton of those opportunities elsewhere. They really don't. Once you are out of college, the number of friends you have drops dramatically and the opportunities to make new ones drops even more. You aren't typically going to be going out to the bars every week past your 30s and asking someone out at a grocery story is creepy. Worse yet is trying to make friends or find partners at work. Your ability to actually socialize is incredibly limited after a certain age and church is a very easy way to do that.

But it isn't just a way to socialize. When a flood hits or there's a fire or some other disaster, a church is an easy location to organize these things. Some places use it as a voting location. It is an easy way for the church to embed itself into the community.

So why am I saying all these things? Because if atheists really want to rid the world of religion, it has to give people an alternative to the local church. Atheist groups should hold festivals. You don't need to push the atheist-angle, but give people something to do and somewhere to go. If some building collapses and people are out of a house, try to organize shelter for them. Hold gathering celebrations for your town's centennial or something along those lines. Make it a regular event that gives folks a sense of community that isn't tied to a religious event.

I realize that very few people (if anyone) will actually read this, but as someone who has despised religion for a long, long time I see the uphill battle that atheists fight and unfortunately we fight the wrong people. The older I get, I realize that fighting the hard core religious fanatics is a waste of time. Giving the average people an alternative to going to church is the single best way to attack religion. No one event, no matter how heinous (i.e. priests and kids) will kill off a church, but a slow decline in attendance over the years will.

I'm just curious what people's experiences have been. I know I have my opinions based on my experiences. Curious to hear from others.

Just noticed yesterday that I can't downvote anything. Is that an issue with the app or Lemmy itself?

Plug it in, no lights. Hit the power button, nothing. Hold it down (saw some suggestion to hold it down for like 40 seconds), still nothing. I haven't tried opening it up yet. I don't even care if the battery is toast, I'm fine with it being tied to a wall adapter.

It's probably about 8 years old, so obviously it is slow by modern standards, but at the time it was fairly high-end, so it might serve my purposes as a secondary machine.

Coming from Reddit, there were multiple car-related subs and they all saw some fairly heavy traffic with lots of posts and comments. Heck, even some of the model-specific ones seem to get more interaction than this sub does. What's the deal?