Actually while you're responding here, can you verify that you had these '48 laws of power' as your desktop? https://twitter.com/arvalis/status/1274765367957573632/photo...
Why would he feel powerless? He was (apparently) a name in the MTG art world and the Noah Bradley of the apology considered his previous self to have been on a 'self-centered hot-shot ego-trip'.
There's nothing even wrong with reading any book. Just because you read "mein kaumpf" doesn't mean you agree with Hitler, it might just mean you're curious how the most evil man in history became that way.
(I've read that 48 laws book btw. It's "amoral" -- none of the advice is suggested be either good or bad, but simply effective)
> The 48 Laws of Power mess I feel like an idiot about this one.
> I’ve read the 48 Laws of Power and I found it an interesting book. I naively saw it only as a way to understand & categorize the crazy power plays historical figures have made. I made some desktop wallpapers to remind myself of those various laws because I have a poor memory and wanted to remind myself of them while I was reading a bunch of history books. I didn’t make this clear and people dug this up later while I was being cancelled. They inferred that these were laws I based my life around and viewed everything I had done (including my apology) through this lens.
> I kick myself for this one a lot. I should have realized that it didn’t look like I was sharing a useful resource but instead a handbook on how to be a sociopath. To clarify: I don’t think this is a good book to base your life around. I think it can be used abusively and I see that now and I was too wrapped up in the “more knowledge can’t be a bad thing” to see how likely it would be that people would use it badly.