As someone who peer reviewed papers, and got familiar with the process, most reviewers do not take the time to seriously examine papers. I would compare my comments to other reviewers for the same paper, and holy shit they barely read it. I would spot pretty blatant omissions–bad methodology, incomplete sections that make a paper impossible to reproduce, poor quality figures, need for major revisions. The other reviewers would offer minor suggestions and leave it at that. And the chief editor will push it out the door with minor revisions that don’t address any issues.

I have seen some truly blatant shit get published. Like figures that have made up data, or that we’re straight up copied from the authors’ previous publication and presented as new. The for-profit publishing industry doesn’t give a fuck. Those issues might get caught 10 years down the road, like in that case, but it’s usually a slap on the wrist for tenured faculty unless it gets lots of attention.

Prof in my department when I was a grad student blatantly copied work from another researcher, and the only sanctions he got were a moratorium on taking new grad students.

Thanks. I realize this is something only a professional can help with now. It’s up to her if she follows through. As far as support goes, I am going to encourage her to reach out to other trusted friends and family members, and to cut out people who have been causing her so much grief.

Yeah, in hindsight I think she might have been speaking in the sense that for my sake I shouldn’t propose right now.

Her reaction, and this is maybe me coping really hard right now, might be related to what happened last night. She attempted suicide last night and had the mindset to call my name before she did. Despite my pleas, she went to work this morning since she has no time off and doesn’t want to get fired.

We talked about what happened, and she admitted that she’s felt like attempting for the past couple months, which kind of follows what I was feeling yesterday. The past 3-4 months have been more difficult than usual.

I don’t know what my next steps are. I’m feeling from it and using this forum to vent in a safe way. There’s not much advice to give, I think. I’m just going to take this one step at a time.

There’s a lot to unpack now–more than even last night. But, yeah, she’s acutely aware of the cycle she’s putting me in, and she’s desperate to not make it a habit.

She tried to kill herself last night. And, it has me wondering if she’s been hard on me lately as some way to keep me away, emotionally. I don’t know if it was planned and she backed out, or if it was spur of the moment.

She told me she’s felt like potentially attempting for the past couple months, which tracks with how her behavior has changed. I said yesterday, I felt like the past 3-4 have been different–a lot harder on me than before.

I’m processing it now. She chose to go to work since she has no vacation time. I tried to persuade her not to, but at the same time, I don’t know what is or isn’t appropriate to do here.

I thought you were really insightful and I just wanted to give you an update because, if I was lost before, I’m really fucking lost now.

Last night she attempted suicide. I am reading these from my couch while we sort out what the fuck to do.

She went to the bedroom while I was reading on the couch around 8:30 after she took a shower. Within 5-10 minutes she called my name. I came in and she had a bottle.of her pills in one hand, and enough of them to kill a horse in the other.

She was shaking, but pretty numb when I gently took the bottle and pills out of her hands and held her. It took probably another 15-20 minutes for her to say anything else. Then she started sobbing.

This is the first time I’ve witnessed a suicide attempt, so I’m shaken up.

Anyway, thank you for the advice. It was thought provoking and I’m going to pick my way through it while I cope.

Thanks for the advice. I just got off work so I’m only now able to read these. I’m going to check this book out. It sounds like, if nothing else, it’ll give me another perspective on what’s going on.

I expect forgiveness to be part of my relationships, I just don’t know if I can forgive this. I think my ability to forgive has limits, and this incident is severe enough, in my mind, to test those limits. Forgiveness increasingly feels like a one way street for her and I. I forgive her, but she’s selective with what she’ll forgive and move past. It wasn’t always this way. It’s changed in the past 3-4 months, though.

She grew up in a dangerous environment. In a lot of ways, she’s always in fight or flight mode. Usually fight.

It’s something she is getting treated for. She’s on an anxiety med and visits a therapist once a month, but between that and a very stressful job, she’s worn down.

It’s a really complex situation all around and I don’t know of a straightforward way to deal with it.

I understand that. It’s hard to capture the depth of relationships on some forum. I’ll just say that we’ve both been through some difficult things, but we’ve supported each other. The past year or so, though, she’s been going through a lot more (relatives dying, dad now in prison, etc.) , and I’ve stepped up to the best of my ability.

Though she wants me to communicate more about how I’m doing, and she actually likes it when I do so, I just don’t have the time or emotional energy to do that and still be present for her. It’s a definite lose-lose. Because I know she’s not really in a good state to have me be vulnerable on the way she likes, but by not being vulnerable, she feels like I don’t trust her.

I try to approach this (and all my relationships) with a strong understanding that people aren’t perfect. We fuck up, make mistakes, and have to learn from them. Sometimes she doesn’t have that same grace. She holds waayyy more grudges than I do. I essentially do a monthly ritual of forgiving her for lashing out a bit when her cycle is on or her psychiatrist doesn’t give her a refill for her anxiety meds on time. But my mistakes are usually harder for her to move past. She does eventually, but nowhere near as often.

I am looking for a therapist for myself right now, actually. I think at least ironing out how I’m feeling before I approach what happened with her is important.

Yeah, I am starting to wonder if that’s the right call. We’ve had a great relationship for the most part, but while I forgive and move on from her minor mistakes–with the understanding that people fuck up sometimes and a sincere apology and effort to fix it going forward is sufficient–she’s far less inclined to do that.

It has gradually resulted in an imbalanced relationship, where she does stuff like this and I don’t. I’ve supported her through some tough stuff, yah know? And I feel like all that sacrifice got discarded because of a 10 second run in with some HVAC guy.

By virtue of having a disproportionately beneficial EU membership agreement, they actually caused friction with later EU members that received the standard agreements later on.

It’s hard to overstate how catastrophic the UK fucked up by leaving the EU. They joined on the bottom floor, had the leverage to negotiate a deal that gave them more benefits, let them keep their currency instead of promising to one day adopt the Euro, and had access to all the immigration controls they needed to deal with the ‘problem’ Tories perceived.

It’s incredible, really. Part of me still can’t believe they tossed all of that away. It’s got to be one of the biggest peacetime geopolitical fuckups ever.

This one is odd, I guess? So they had the autopsy stating the cause of death was homicide and a bunch of video evidence in September, and per the article, didn’t believe there was enough to charge these guys?

I wonder what changed.

Yeah, I’m basically where you are now with my mindset.

This CU helped me out during the pandemic, when I was on the struggle bus, but their rates are virtually unchanged since then. It’s pretty much just that and inertia that’s kept me with them so far.

Time to finally move on to somewhere that actually tries to keep up with the market.

Yeah, I am probably overthinking it. I’ll check around and open a trial account or 2 to see how good the places I’m thinking about moving to are.

And also, if I left, I definitely wouldn’t be eligible to rejoin. Moving and changing jobs has ended that.

It’s no more conditioned by society than polyamory. Animals exhibit both strategies. You seem to be conflating institutions like marriage with sexual selection.

Monogamy is a pair bonding strategy as old as humans. It developed at roughly the same time as polyamorous strategies. There’s a strong body of evidence that it became a very prominent strategy around 10-20k years ago, especially in areas with resource strains.

If you want to have multiple partners, by all means, do so, but don’t pretend it’s some construct. It’s a sexual selection strategy hardwired into many different species, including humans.

It just happens to coexist with polyamorous strategies in our species.

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The term “shakedown” has been used to describe frivolous lawsuits seeking to strong-arm settlements from defendants for decades. Language is descriptive, not prescriptive.