public libraries are so sick. there are five books I want to read and they're all relatively new so they're only available in hardback which is so expensive but it just cost me $0 to place holds on them. five books for zero dollars. it requires nothing but clicking a button and then going to the library to pick them up when they're ready. zero dollars. that's crazy
Certified Library Post
There is no crime where torture is an acceptable punishment.
There is no crime where sexual assault is an acceptable punishment.
There is no crime where slavery is an acceptable punishment.
"Well obviously people arrested for drugs and other non-violent crimes shouldn't be forced to work but—"
No! There is no but!! There is nothing in the world that makes slavery okay!!!
I could talk about people being charged for crimes they didn't commit. I could talk about coerced confessions. I could talk about people being charged with more extreme crimes than what they did to fill prisons. I could talk about how slaves out of certain types of criminals creates an incentive to charge more people with certain crimes.
But I'm not going to actually talk about any of that because it doesn't matter. No one should be enslaved. No one should be defending or justifying slavery. This should not be controversial.
It’s practically 2014 and you guys still don’t know how to google if an article is real or not before giving it 100,000 notes
The whole "the brain isn't fully mature until age 25" bit is actually a fairly impressive bit of psuedoscience for how incredibly stupid the way it misinterprets the data it's based on is.
Okay, so: there's a part of the human brain called the "prefrontal cortex" which is, among other things, responsible for executive function and impulse control. Like most parts of the brain, it undergoes active "rewiring" over time (i.e., pruning unused neural connections and establishing new ones), and in the case of the prefrontal cortex in particular, this rewiring sharply accelerates during puberty.
Because the pace of rewiring in the prefrontal cortex is linked to specific developmental milestones, it was hypothesised that it would slow down and eventually stop in adulthood. However, the process can't be directly observed; the only way to tell how much neural rewiring is taking place in a particular part of the brain is to compare multiple brain scans of the same individual performed over a period of time.
Thus, something called a "longitudinal study" was commissioned: the same individuals would undergo regular brain scans over a period of mayn years, beginning in early childhood, so that their prefrontal development could accurately be tracked.
The longitudinal study was originally planned to follow its subjects up to age 21. However, when the predicted cessation of prefrontal rewiring was not observed by age 21, additional funding was obtained, and the study period was extended to age 25. The predicted cessation of prefrontal development wasn't observed by age 25, either, at which point the study was terminated.
When the mainstream press got hold of these results, the conclusion that prefrontal rewiring continues at least until age 25 was reported as prefrontal development finishing at age 25. Critically, this is the exact opposite of what the study actually concluded. The study was unable to identify a stopping point for prefrontal development because no such stopping point was observed for any subject during the study period. The only significance of the age 25 is that no subjects were tracked beyond this age because the study ran out of funding!
It gets me when people try to argue against the neuroscience-proves-everybody-under-25-is-a-child talking point by claiming that it's merely an average, or that prefrontal development doesn't tell the whole story. Like, no, it's not an average – it's just bullshit. There's no evidence that the cited phenomenon exists at all; if there is an age where prefrontal rewiring levels off and stops (and it's not clear that there is), we don't know what age that is; we merely know that it must be older than 25.
So many people do not understand the relationship between climate change and cold weather.
If you see this post it is important to send it to someone else so they too can understand
People hardly ever change their minds in front of you...the conversation becomes one of a series of slow drips that builds up to a realization
Saw your post from the author who was happy people were using Libby. I'm torn as I understand the author is happy to get the license renewed, but libraries only get 26 loans on a digital license vs 60-80 loans on a physical copy. I love the convenience of digital books, but if taking out the physical copy is better for the library I'm willing to make the trip. Just looking for thoughts from others about it.
It depends on the license agreement the library has and its different for every one. Some renew annually, others renew by X amount of rentals. The library does what is best for them, and the more people use their services the more they can usually argue for more funding.
This is not universal, of course, but most of the librarians I know are ecstatic when people use their services.
Library worker here! PLEASE take advantage of Libby. We have these digital services because people use them. They're critical accessibility aids for many people and mean the library is an option for people who otherwise can't get to a physical location regularly.
Use Libby, visit your library if possible, vote in local elections and attend town council meetings - all of these make material differences to libraries by providing them with increased funding. Never feel guilty for accessing our online services. You're helping your library and so, so, so many people in you community when you use our resources, no matter if they're physical or digital
Quoting myself from another post:
Please, PLEASE use Libby. OverDrive. Hoopla. CloudLibrary. Kanopy. Flipster. Freegal. Transparent Language. Mango. Jstor. Your library would not offer it if they could not afford it, and we afford things by reporting the number of people who use that service, so if you don't use the service we can't afford it. It's a cycle. Keep it going, keep using it, and we'll keep providing because we'll be able to justify the cost to the bean counters in government.
"Under the new rule, which goes into effect Sept. 30, food will no longer count toward calculations for eligibility for benefits, known as In-Kind Support and Maintenance, or ISM.
The new rule means SSI beneficiaries will no longer have to worry that the groceries or meals they receive from family or friends may reduce their monthly benefits, said Darcy Milburn, director of Social Security and health care policy at The Arc, a nonprofit organization serving people with developmental and intellectual disabilities.
The Social Security Administration, in turn, will no longer have to use its limited resources to document every time a beneficiary received free food and then cut their monthly benefit by as much as a third, she said."
It's very jarring to hear about news items like this, where it's basically "great news! this government agency is retiring the 'get beaten with hoses for benefits' policy and is now just giving people benefits, hose-free!"
Like, great! Glad we're not doing that anymore! But also, why in the fuck would we have that policy in the first place?
General reminder to the pagans out there:
Making a supreme goddess figure part of your spirituality? Great! Worshiping a mother goddess? Wonderful! If that brings joy and meaning into your life, excellent!
"Once upon a time long ago, people all worshiped a great goddess until THE PATRIARCHY conspired to overthrow her and replace her with a CRUEL PATRIARCHAL GOD" - that's pseudohistory and conspiracism; there's literally no evidence for it whatsoever, and it can and does drag people down the new age to alt right pipeline.
All of my in person sex work clients and the majority of the phone ones were more respectful and less traumatizing than the average Target shopper was when I worked there through six departments in two years
The one TRULY disrespectful and potentially dangerous irl client I've had doing sex work ended up getting his ass beat and getting booted without a refund. At Target, for an entire year, a child employee (16) was forced to hide in the breakroom any time one specific stalker came in looking for her. Management wouldn't ban him.
Just. Thinking about that sex work clients post. Yes, some of them say horrible things. No worse than any retail or call center customer. Ever.
When the pervy guy calls the hotel reservations line jerking off and moaning, my supervisor had a duty to keep him on the line and keep trying to book him even though he just hung up when he came after making her uncomfortable for 20 minutes. Phone sex averages $2/minute and you can hang up on anyone for any reason, they might just get a refund.
Why are sex work customers and clients seen as the inherent slimebags? When they're the ones exercising an understanding of consensual exchange of money and services within specific limitations. Not the multiple people who reached over my register to touch me when I was 18. Or the woman who told me I was everything wrong with the world and I should die bc we were out of soft pretzels when i was also 18. Nobody's ever said soulcrushing shit like that to me as a sex worker lmao, "ugly fat whore" is just facts
I’m willing to be 100000 dollars you’re some rich white woman from upstate New York. Little girls are being human trafficked and women can’t even leave prostitution most of the time, but you’re pandering so hard for these depraved men who want to use your body?
Baby, I'm a disabled intersex dyke who has lost 30lbs in half a year from poverty and starvation, who cannot hold a normal job because of body. I was raised in military housing in dumptrunk Virginia and I started whoring at 18 to get away from abusive parents who also had no money. I'm 32 now and I'll still continue pandering for depraved men who want to use my body over Walmart wanting to use it for much less money and more damage. Better than depraved terfs and swerfs who fantasize about what abuse I should be facing while yall also deny me food and housing and threaten to assault me if I ever use the bathroom I've always belonged in.
I've been struggling to make ends meet because sex workers have been shoved out of every safe avenue for advertising and you people have made it endlessly more dangerous for us. And rather than listen to actual disabled impoverished whores about our lives, you erase it entirely with a lie you've created about a privilege that will never be close to my existence while you froth at the mouth over fantasies of whores being abused by men. You are the predator in this scenario.
If you can work a normal job without your body breaking down over half an hour, without constant violent harassment because you're intersex, without death threats for being a woman in the wrong field constantly, you are the privileged one. This is not an option I have. Ive been though a dozen jobs and they're all violent exploitation.
If you think sex is worse than allowing people to verbally degrade and humiliate you for eight to twelve hours without sitting, you simply hate sex. And that's fine, but that's your problem, not mine. I love sex. I love sex with strangers. I love using strangers to get off. For money. :) Stupid fucking swerf. I'll suck a dick for free for every rad idiot that says stupid shit on my post lmfao
He’s so right actually
[ID1: tweet by Pop Crave @PopCrave:
"Daniel Radcliffe on critics calling him ungrateful to J.K. Rowling:
“Obviously Harry Potter would not have happened without her, so nothing in my life would have probably happened the way it is without that person. But that doesn't mean you owe the things you truly believe to someone else for your entire life.”"
Attached images show Daniel Radcliffe, a younger white man looking at the viewer, and J.K. Rowling, an older white woman smiling and posing respectively.
ID2: another tweet by @PopCrave:
"Daniel Radcliffe on J.K. Rowling saying she wouldn't forgive the stars who spoke out against her anti-trans rhetotic:
“I will continue to support the rights of all LGBTQ people, and have no further comment than that.”"
Attached images show Radcliffe resting his head on his hands with a concerned or confused expression and Rowling sitting and resting her arm on her leg respectively. End of ID.]
the full article is very well written and definitely worth a read! it’s by Chris Heath writing for the june 2024 print edition of The Atlantic. (link is to an archived version)
sustainable.
innovation under capitalism
Thank you everyone who got me to 5 reblogs!
this is the funniest possible post for this feature to bug out and proc on.
Please communicate with your friends oh my god. When I was 12, my best friend who I grew up with got a massive crush and would only ever talk about that. I hated it. I felt left behind. At the time I didn't know I was aromantic but that was pretty much my first taste of feeling less important to someone because they have a romantic interest now. And guess what? I told her how I felt about that and she apologized to me and although she still talked about her crush, I wasn't being put aside anymore and we had other things to talk about too
So please. It is inevitable that your friends will find somebody which will most likely mean the friendship won't be a priority for them but when that happens please just tell them how you feel about that, I promise that they will listen to you. Your friends still love you and most of the time they just don't realize that they're putting you aside when they're preoccupied with their love life. If you don't tell them they won't know what the problem is
The Iranian Regime is going to execute rapper Toomaj Salehi for supporting protests of Jina Amini’s murder by the regime in his songs.
Iranian activist Elica Le Bon says, “Iranians in the diaspora picked up on the fact that the regime tends not to execute people who become known to the international community. We have seen many examples of prisoners that were either released on bail or had their sentences commuted through our “say their names to save their lives” campaign on social media, using hashtags to garner attention for their causes, and even before social media existed, through getting the stories of political prisoners to international media outlets. Once reported on, and once the eyes shift to the regime and the reality of its pending brutality, realizing that the action is not worth the repercussions, we have seen them back down and not execute. For that reason, this is part of an urgent campaign for readers to talk about Toomaj as much as you can, using the hashtag #FreeToomaj or #ToomajSalehi. Every comment makes a difference, and if we were wrong, what did we lose by trying?”
Reminder to avoid buying anything crochet new from big stores. Crochet (unlike knit) CANNOT be done by a machine and must be done by an actual human being. The person who made it was definitely not paid an appropriate amount for their labour. Most big stores use sweatshops anyway and I know it’s hard to completely avoid buying anything from a major store. But if those specific items don’t sell, we can send a message to companies that we don’t want items made fully by hand using slave labour
This summer, avoid any new crochet items. You don’t need THAT specific top that badly
https://www.xerces.org/blog/want-to-save-bees-focus-on-habitat-not-honey-bees
Five reasons why honey bees can be a problem
Native plants need native bees. Native bees coevolved with our native plants and often have behavioral adaptations that make them better pollinators than honey bees. For example, buzz-pollination, in which a bee grasps a flower and shakes the pollen loose, is a behavior at which bumble bees and other large-bodied native bees excel, and one that honey bees lack.
Honey bees are sub-par pollinators. The way that honey bees interact with flowers means that they sometimes contribute little or nothing to pollination. Honey bees groom their pollen and carry it in neat pollen cakes, where it’s less likely to contact the stigma of another flower and pollinate it. They are also known “nectar robbers” of many plants, accessing their nectar in a way that means they don’t touch the pollen, often by biting a hole in the base of the flower. By contrast, many of our native bees tend to be messier, carrying pollen as dry grains, often all over their bodies where it’s more likely to pollinate the plant.
Hungry hives crowd out native pollinators. Introducing a single honey bee hive means 15,000 to 50,000 additional mouths to feed in an area that may already lack sufficient flowering resources. This increases competition with our native bees and raises the energy costs of foraging, which can be significant. One study calculated that over a period of three months, a single hive collects as much pollen as could support the development of 100,000 native solitary bees!
Honey bees can spread disease. Unfortunately, honey bees can spread diseases to our native bees—deformed wing virus, for example, can be passed from honey bees to bumble bees—and can also amplify and distribute diseases within a bee community.
Urban honey bee hive densities are often too high. There is growing evidence of negative impacts in towns and cities from the presence of honey bees. A recent study from Montreal showed that the number of species of native bees found in an area decreased when the number of honey bees went up. In Britain, the London Beekeepers Association found that some parts of that city had four times as many hives as the city’s gardens and parks could support. The conservation organization Buglife recommends creating two hectares (five acres) of habitat for each hive, several times the size of an average residential lot in the United States.
I'm touring my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me TONIGHT (May 3) in CALGARY, then TOMORROW (May 4) in VANCOUVER, then onto Tartu, Estonia, and beyond!
Even Google admits – grudgingly – that it is losing the spam wars. The explosive proliferation of botshit has supercharged the sleazy "search engine optimization" business, such that results to common queries are 50% Google ads to spam sites, and 50% links to spam sites that tricked Google into a high rank (without paying for an ad):
It's nice that Google has finally stopped gaslighting the rest of us with claims that its search was still the same bedrock utility that so many of us relied upon as a key piece of internet infrastructure. This not only feels wildly wrong, it is empirically, provably false:
Not only that, but we know why Google search sucks. Memos released as part of the DOJ's antitrust case against Google reveal that the company deliberately chose to worsen search quality to increase the number of queries you'd have to make (and the number of ads you'd have to see) to find a decent result:
Google's antitrust case turns on the idea that the company bought its way to dominance, spending the some of the billions it extracted from advertisers and publishers to buy the default position on every platform, so that no one ever tried another search engine, which meant that no one would invest in another search engine, either.
Google's tacit defense is that its monopoly billions only incidentally fund these kind of anticompetitive deals. Mostly, Google says, it uses its billions to build the greatest search engine, ad platform, mobile OS, etc that the public could dream of. Only a company as big as Google (says Google) can afford to fund the R&D and security to keep its platform useful for the rest of us.
That's the "monopolistic bargain" – let the monopolist become a dictator, and they will be a benevolent dictator. Shriven of "wasteful competition," the monopolist can split their profits with the public by funding public goods and the public interest.
Google has clearly reneged on that bargain. A company experiencing the dramatic security failures and declining quality should be pouring everything it has to righting the ship. Instead, Google repeatedly blew tens of billions of dollars on stock buybacks while doing mass layoffs:
Those layoffs have now reached the company's "core" teams, even as its core services continue to decay:
(Google's antitrust trial was shrouded in secrecy, thanks to the judge's deference to the company's insistence on confidentiality. The case is moving along though, and warrants your continued attention:)
Google wormed its way into so many corners of our lives that its enshittification keeps erupting in odd places, like ordering takeout food:
Back in February, Housefresh – a rigorous review site for home air purifiers – published a viral, damning account of how Google had allowed itself to be overrun by spammers who purport to provide reviews of air purifiers, but who do little to no testing and often employ AI chatbots to write automated garbage:
