u/PadamPadam92

Forgive me if this comes of chaotic or unorganized, but I’m literally just typing this off the dome.

Everytime I’m on Twitter and I see someone posting about how we shouldn’t support Mayor Mamdani because he went to a 10/7 memorial service, I go to their biography and it’s someone from fucking Sheboygan, Wisconsin who thinks they are an activist because they have a Palestinian flag emoji next to their name. My first thought is always YOU DON’T EVEN FUCKING LIVE HERE.

I’ve always been a very hardcore liberal but I’m starting to realize that the left might be as insufferable as republicans make us out to be - we finally have a mayor who is actively making changes in the city that impact everyone and you expect everyone to turn on him for going to a 10/7 silent memorial when over half of New York City is Jewish?!? Like I feel like I’m living in the twilight zone.

I have ALWAYS been pro-Palestine. What’s happening in Gaza is horrific. But What happened last October was also horrible. People are upset that Mamdani is showing empathy to all human life? AS HE SHOULD. he hasn’t reneged on anything and I feel like he’s made his pro-Palestine stance very clear.

My true opinion is that people want him to come out and say “fuck all Jews” but they won’t admit that. He’s a mayor for all of nyc, not just the folks who align with your belief.

He’s not the president of the US. redirect your anger.

I’ve worked in recruiting for over a decade. I started as a Recruiting Coordinator after coming from sales, moved into sourcing, and eventually went full-cycle recruiting.

I started as an RC on a temporary project, which eventually led me back into sales. Then I joined a large tech company as an RC, only for my contract to end early because of an acquisition.

Two months on the job market later, I landed my dream job. I spent 2 years sourcing, then 2 years recruiting before, you guessed it, getting laid off.
I was unemployed for 5 months before finally landing a 6-month contract as a Sourcer. I was told, “We’re having conversations about conversions. Hang tight!” Then this past Friday, I was told there aren’t enough roles and my contract is ending early.
So here I am again. Back where I started at the beginning of the year. No severance, no safety net, and most of my savings gone from the last round of unemployment.

The irony is I have a pretty big following on LinkedIn. People reach out to me CONSTANTLY asking for referrals, advice, introductions, etc. I respond probably 90% of the time. And when I ask for help? Crickets more often than not.

I’m tired.

The headache this industry has put me through is starting to outweigh the gratification I get from helping people get hired. I genuinely love recruiting, but I’m starting to wonder if loving the work is enough when the industry itself feels so unstable.

A major airline just opened applications for flight attendants, and honestly… I’m taking it as a sign. I also just turned 34 today, so apparently life decided to throw all of this at me at once.

It’s scary, but maybe it’s time to try something completely different.

Anyone else feeling like this?

A girl I went to college with, who was a super cool white chick and always a joy to be around, randomly started spewing MAGA talking points during this election. I ended up cutting her off, and apparently a lot of her friends and family stopped talking to her too.

She went live on Instagram the other day (I don’t follow her, someone recorded it and sent it to our old group chat) literally crying about how much she hates that she lost so many relationships and that nobody will talk to her.

I personally don’t feel much sympathy, but it did make me curious: for people who used to be MAGA, how has that shift affected your relationships with friends and family?

Growing up, I actually wanted to be a cop. My ultimate goal was to become a private detective. My favorite show was Cold Case, and I genuinely wanted to be the male Lilly Rush. I wanted to help solve cases involving children, elderly people, and people who had otherwise been forgotten.

I grew up in a really diverse suburb outside Dallas, and I remember having a pretty positive relationship with the police in my community. The cops knew the neighborhoods, knew the families, and, at least from my perspective as a kid, felt like part of the community. That’s the kind of cop I imagined becoming.

Obviously, as I got older, my perspective became much more complicated.

I absolutely recognize the history and very real consequences of over-policing, particularly in certain communities. I’m not oblivious to the reasons people have deep distrust of the police. There are plenty of things about policing in this country that deserve serious criticism, and I’m not trying to hand-wave any of that away.

But at some point over the last few years, I started casually watching police bodycam footage. Not just shootings or fatal encounters, either. There are actually a lot of mundane, bizarre, and sometimes genuinely funny interactions out there. Being completely transparent, most of what I watch isn’t exactly entertaining.

But I eventually started going back and watching the entire bodycam footage from some of the incidents involving people whose names I had heard for years in conversations, protests, and online discussions.
And honestly? There have been several situations where seeing the full context changed my opinion pretty dramatically.

Not all of them. There are cases where watching the footage only reinforced my original opinion. I’m specifically talking about some of the lesser-known situations where I realized I had formed an opinion based almost entirely on headlines, clips, social media posts, or what other people were saying.
And I think that’s worth acknowledging.

Sometimes we react to a 30-second clip without knowing what happened during the previous 45 minutes. Sometimes the viral version of an incident leaves out context that completely changes how you understand what happened. That doesn’t mean police were automatically right, and it certainly doesn’t mean someone’s behavior justifies excessive or abusive policing.

It just means context matters.

I actually think more people, regardless of their political beliefs, would benefit from watching full police bodycam footage from ordinary calls in middle America, big cities, suburbs, wherever. Not because bodycam footage is some magical objective record of the truth, but because it forces you to see how messy and complicated these interactions can actually be.

You can believe that policing has serious systemic problems and still acknowledge that individual officers aren’t automatically villains.

You can believe certain communities have been disproportionately harmed by policing and still think some officers are genuinely trying to do their jobs well.

And you can criticize the institution while recognizing that sometimes the person standing there in the uniform is actually responding reasonably to a shitty situation.

I don’t think that’s a contradiction.

If anything, I think being willing to change your mind when you see more information is probably one of the more important parts of having political beliefs in the first place.

I (33M) have a childhood friend (33F) who I’ve known since the first day of 7th grade. We grew up in a small town outside Dallas and have stayed close despite living in different cities. She’s in Atlanta and I’m in Brooklyn.

Every year around her birthday, she talks about coming to NYC, but it never ends up happening. This year, I reached out and asked if she was considering coming. She said yes and asked if she could stay with me, presumably with a friend. I said of course. I have a large two-bedroom apartment, an air mattress, and I’ve hosted plenty of our mutual friends over the years. I genuinely enjoy having people visit.

A few days later, she asked how I could show her and her friend how to use the subway “from their hotel.” I was confused because I thought they were staying with me. She explained that her best friend was coming, and apparently the friend’s husband is extremely uncomfortable with her being around any men, regardless of who they are.

For context, I am very openly gay, and my friend has known this for more than 20 years.

I said, “You know I’m gay, right?” She said she knows, but apparently her friend’s husband “doesn’t care.” She also mentioned that he has caused issues on previous trips when his wife has been around male friends.

I told her I understood, but since NYC hotels are expensive and I had already offered my place, I didn’t really see the point of them getting one. I told her they were welcome to stay with me, and she said she’d think about it.

A week goes by, and she messages me asking, “So where are we gonna sleep? Do you have the air mattress?”

At this point, I had thought about the situation more and realized I’m actually not comfortable hosting them. I don’t want someone staying in my home who may not feel comfortable being there, and I really don’t want a situation where her husband is calling or texting constantly or there’s drama about where his wife is sleeping. I’ve dealt with situations like that before, and I don’t want that dynamic in my home.

So I told her that, actually, the offer was off the table. I explained that I don’t want anyone staying with me if they don’t genuinely feel comfortable doing so, and I don’t want the potential drama.
I also told her that if they still come to NYC, I’ll absolutely make time for them, show them how to use the subway, take them to brunch, give them recommendations, etc. I just don’t want to host them.

She seemed annoyed, which I understand. I do feel a little bad because I originally offered my place and NYC hotels are expensive. At the same time, I feel like the circumstances changed enough that I’m allowed to reconsider.

I’m also not judging them for getting a hotel or whatever their situation is. I just don’t want to inconvenience myself to accommodate a situation that already sounds like it could bring unnecessary drama into my home.

AITA for reneging on my offer?

Do you think HxG makes the girls make certain songs knowing this? I didn’t like Internet Girl, Pinky up or Gnarly at first listen but after hearing them on the dance floor At basically every gay bar in NYC for the last few months and seeing the energy they bring..I’m hooked.

I think Hooti Frutti is gonna have the Gays, theys, and the dolls shaking all type of ass. I’m a 33 year old gay and all of my friends love Katseye - HxG HAS to know the millennial gays are a core demographic

Edit; NYC GAYKONS - RISE BAR IN HELLS KITCHEN IS DOING A LISTENING PARTY TONIGHT AT MIDNIGHT.

USA and internationally, what rinks do you think are worth traveling to just to say you’ve skated there before. It could be based on location, history, or aesthetics.

While I wouldn’t consider it unique, Cascades is somewhere I think everyone needs to go just because it’s so iconic to the south. Thinking of more unique ones, I’d say somewhere like the Classic Fun Center in Utah.

I grew up going to Arlington Skatium in Arlington, TX (shoutout to the 817) but now living in Brooklyn and being a regular at Xanadu, I’ve realized that rinks don’t have to just be a big large…box with a big oval wooden rink, carpet, and lockers.

That’s honestly it. That’s it’s a serious issue down on the orange line platform. Borderline unbearable, and I’m praying that the mayor does something about it.

I live a few blocks from Xanadu in Brooklyn, and it’s honestly become my happy place.

They’re doing Beyoncé Night tomorrow, so I texted basically every gay in my phone to come out. 😂 Almost every single person hit me with some version of, “I can’t skate.”

It got me wondering… is this a common problem? Do your friends avoid the rink because they’re afraid they’ll fall or embarrass themselves? I grew up in the South where even if you were clinging to the wall all night, you still went with your friends.

Maybe adults are just way more afraid of looking bad? I don’t mind skating solo, but I’d love to convince more of my friends to actually give it a shot.

Let me preface this by saying I’m not perfect, and no gay is. We’ve all done dumb shit or had moments where we weren’t our best.

But one thing I’ve noticed in NYC is that a lot of gay guys don’t call their friends out when they’re rude or dismissive to other gays.

In my friend group, calling each other out is normal. One of my close friends (married, open relationship) used to only be nice to guys he was attracted to. If he wasn’t into you, he could come off pretty cold. We called him out on it more than once, and eventually he changed. He’s still blunt, but he’s much more aware of how he comes across now. That’s the kind of friendship I want. If I’m acting like an asshole, I’d rather my friends tell me than enable it.

The exact opposite happened to me the other night at Hush. I ran into a friend I hadn’t seen in months, maybe even years. We were both genuinely excited to see each other, and he introduced me to his friend. I introduced myself and tried to make some small talk—asked where he was from, how long they had been out, just normal conversation. Every answer was one word. No questions back. The whole vibe was basically, “Why are you talking to me?”

I’m pretty direct, so after a minute I asked, “Yo, you good?” Then I looked at my friend and said, “Yo…is your friend good?” My friend immediately apologized and said, “I don’t know what’s going on.”
A few weeks before that, I was leaving a circuit party and saying bye to two guys I know. They were talking to another guy, so I introduced myself and reached out to shake his hand. He looked me dead in the face and didn’t say anything. I figured maybe he didn’t hear me, so I introduced myself again. Same thing. My friends just looked at me like, “Well…this is awkward.” I walked away, and less than a minute later the three of them were making out and having sex on the dance floor.

Those situations stuck with me because my issue isn’t that random people are rude. People are going to be rude sometimes. It’s that I rarely see anyone call their friends out for it.

If someone treated one of my friends like that, I’d immediately say something like, “Dude, he just introduced himself.” Instead, it feels like people overlook it because the person is attractive, they don’t want to make things awkward, or they just don’t think it’s a big deal.

I’m not saying anyone owes me a conversation. Nobody owes anyone their time or attention. But I do think we owe our friends accountability. There’s a difference between someone being shy and someone being intentionally dismissive. And I think we’ve all met people who do just enough to let you know they don’t want to engage, but not enough that calling it out doesn’t make you look dramatic.
Maybe I’ve just been lucky, but going out in NYC has made me appreciate my friend group a lot more. We aren’t perfect, but we hold each other accountable. I’d rather have friends who check me than friends who just let me be a shitty person.

Curious if anyone else has noticed this, or if I’m way off.

Something people don’t always quote, but people know.

“BRANDING. MY. LASHES. BRANDING. MY. LASHES.”

Who has been and what’s everybody’s opinion? It’s the same owners as Hush and the word on the curb is that they built it (or rather..purchased) to be a direct competitor to The Eagle.

The issue that I’m having and going there is people keep telling me that it’s small - so why would I pay $25 to go there when I could just pay 25 to go to the eagle?

What are everyone’s thoughts for the folks who have been?

And why is it Amy A?

Honorable mention: Jenna last season of AS, Anisha from Season 1 of AS , Kamie.

Has anyone seen this new trend of kids as soon as the subway doors open, they throw themselves on the ground and pretend like they have passed out or something is wrong? Like they AGGRESSIVELY throw themselves on the floor.

I was on the L train today and some kid (Latino I assume) threw himself on the floor so hard that it made the car shake and scared the shit out of everyone because we literally thought he was dead. Everyone on the train panicked and tried to help him up, and he was completely silent. He then took a seat and had a subtle smile on his face. The women next to me whispered “I’ve seen him do this before”. He exited the train with a guy who was already on the train before him and had a cellphone in his hand…proving that it was a skit.

Im sure the videos will be on social media soon but I’m wondering if anyone has seen this or knows who this kid is?

If you see this , I highly encourage you to not engage or just call out that it’s fake. He really needs to stop as some people on the train, were visibly upset and were about to press the emergency button.

EDIT: found him. The video hasn’t been posted yet but you can see some others. If you search “nyc fainting prank” there’s a bunch that pop up of other people

https://www.instagram.com/andygottago?igsh=MTF5dHB0bG4xN2tnNg==