At the height of the Colin Kaepernick nonsense, my cousin got married to a cop.

So the reception is going normally when everyone is asked to stand and they started playing the National fucking Anthem. Literally everyone was surprised and taken aback by this, but most complied and faced the flag.

My Very Conservative Uncle, however, was busy having a conversation with me. Next to my chair. On one knee. During the anthem.

To his credit, nobody laughed harder about it than he did. “Of course I’m the guy taking a knee during the anthem!” He also was blocking me in and gave me the perfect excuse to do what I’d planned to anyway and remain seated because what the fuck? Are we in North Korea and need to tribute Glorious Leader at every event?

That was probably one of the last family functions I’ve been to, come to think of it.

Most American thing ever: What are we, a bunch of Asians?!

Touché, but I was going for the most overtly despotic nation I am aware of, and I don’t think its unfair to call that regime despotic.

You don’t know anything about the DPRK that the CIA hasn’t told you.

You know absolutely nothing about how they were massacred, then held under siege by the West for 70 years.

You know what’s way better than berating ignorance?

Educating it. Especially when it was genuinely innocent instead of willfully malicious.

Assuming I’m an idiot because of where I’m from makes you no better than the majority of those in my country you so clearly spurn. Be better than a typical American, yeah?

You can’t receive education if you don’t accept your own ignorance. Do you accept your ignorance about the DPRK?

You are no different than an Amerikkkan if you lap from the same propaganda fountain.

My reply prior to this one did admit it. Get off your high horse you arrogant fuck.

No you didn’t. You may have implied it, but you didn’t directly admit it (or apologize for your ignorant comments).

For someone who was so focused on being treated kindly, you’ve been very unkind. You understand that you can’t learn with this attitude, right?

A) I didn’t come out sideways at a stranger on the internet.

B) I absolutely admitted genuine innocent ignorance. You then doubled down on “Amerikkans suck lol” so, uh, no.

Troll less, love more, and leave me the fuck alone.

I totally misread your “be better than a typical American” as being from a non-American trying to take some moral high ground, or whatever.

I’m not trolling, I get pretty upset at the way the DPRK is popularly considered in the U$, but if you’re legitimately able to adjust your view, then I’m not upset with you.

Give me actual information instead of anger and I am more than happy to engage in discourse. Everyone is anonymous here. My country of birth doesn’t define who I am any more than yours does you.

I kind of think being American does define us, if we let it. Many Americans are happy being “non-political” while benefiting (if only a little) from a massive monstrous war machine. I’m American, and I’m not stopping that machine either, so there’s that.

You are probably aware of the Korean war, but you may not be aware that situations like the Jeju Island Massacre (1) preceded it, that the US destroyed 80% of all buildings (including civilian structures)(2), or the massacres that regularly took place during it(3).

U$ sanctions are responsible for, at minimum, hundreds of thousands of deaths globally due to deprivation and starvation(4). Sanctions typically mean that an entity that does business with a sanctioned entity is blocked from any trade with the U$, and blocked from using the SWIFT network for international payments which has been the only game in town until recently.

Sanctions from the U$ are siege warfare, meant to starve and hurt civilians.

The DPRK isn’t despotic, they’re desperately trying to stay afloat and survive while their abuser of 70 years keeps telling everyone not to sell them food.

People usually bring up the Kim family as a “dynasty”, but they’ve all held different positions with different responsibilities, and Kim Jong-Un is basically a foreign liaison. They have a whole democratic government structure, but the West is happy allying with monarchies and slave states, so I don’t think it’s worth spending much time refuting the dynasty point.

1. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeju_uprising 2.https://apjjf.org/charles-k-armstrong/3460/article 3.https://www.military.com/daily-news/investigations-and-features/2026/01/26/no-gun-ri-massacre-when-american-soldiers-killed-hundreds-of-south-korean-refugees.html 4.https://www.thelancet.com/journals/langlo/article/PIIS2214-109X(25)00278-5/fulltext

Mine. I got married at city hall and the justice made every sentence sound like a question. We showed up with her mom in the fanciest Goodwill, Kmart stuff we could put together. And I think he dunked on us.

Hahaha that description is hilarious. Goodwill has some nice clothes so no need to sell yourself short lmao.

Cousin had a 1.5h hellfire and brimstone service with an altar call in an unairconditioned church on a weekday afternoon on the Midwest prairie on a hot August day 120 miles (~192km) away from my house.

Weak perkolator coffee, grocery store sheet cake, and bite-size sandwiches (limit 2) served in the basement afterwards.

We were asked to clean up after ourselves and break down the tables and chairs after 30 min. Church doors were locked and we were ushered out after another 30min.

Last cousin wedding I went to.

I went to one of these. Hated it. Helped set it up and break it down. Extremely small wedding, has base table cloths, put almost no effort in their own wedding which yes the day was for them but awful wedding party experience. I haven’t been to a house party with that little effort … And the couple had money… They are very cheap though…

The ones bombed by US

Christian Orthodox wedding for my best friend’s ex girlfriend who was marrying a guy with the same name as my friend. It was a two hour ceremony. Lots of begatting. One of the groomsmen locked his knees, fainted, fell over, woke up and barfed. The priest didn’t stop talking while all of this was happening.

We learned at the reception that it was a dry wedding. The food was good, but we left as soon as possible because it was in the basement of a church, they didn’t turn the fluorescent lights on in the half that didn’t have tables, and the average age of the people there was hovering in the 60s. The bride and groom were 21.

When we finally left, we stopped at the first liquor store, which also happened to be a combination liquor store/gun store with a drive-through for both. We got as many types of bourbon as we could afford, went to our hotel, sampled much of it and then needed real dinner, so we were responsible adults and walked to the nearest restaurant, Burger King. Only the drive through was open, and it wasn’t busy, so we walked in formation through the drive through, and were told that we couldn’t do that. We went to Waffle House instead.

At least it was entertaining, but that couple is going to go to a lot of weddings where they think to themselves “wow, ours could have gone better”.