ALoafOfBread

lol get rotated commies

I didn’t (and don’t) believe in the supernatural metaphysical claims made by any religion, and don’t like that it seems to give hateful people a reason to be more biggoted and spaces to find each other and organize behind hateful causes

There are plenty of good religious folks though. By 25 I had moved much more into a “live and let live” mindset about religion. I’d also started to look more into Buddhism and realized there was a lot of value in the Buddha’s teachings even if you set aside the supernatural claims about the nature of the soul, rebirth, etc.

This anti-homeless architecture has really gotten out of hand

Funny enough given it was in Utah, that’s essentially the exact opposite of what mormons think about why people are black

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curses_of_Cain_and_Ham_(LDS_Church)

Yeah, like I said I’m not certain. And I have since seen random people circulating this on various social media, but I noticed it myself first. At 15%, it could just be water loss, but also it could be something more than that. Mainly it’s just an annoyance.

Also, at least in my area, I believe there is a mislabeling scam going on. At least twice now I have bought boneless skinless chicken thighs from 2 different grocery stores (different chains) and the weight has been like ~15% lower than advertized.

Like a package of chicken thighs labeled at 3.11lbs (1.4kg) actually weighed roughly 2.67lbs (1.2kg), 14% less. One labeled at 2.49lbs (1.13kg) actually weighed roughly 2.1lbs (0.95kg), 16% less.

Some of that may be accounted for by the absorbant pad sucking out some of that excess liquid they pump in, but it shouldn’t be so radically different

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My theory is that technology provides cognitive shortcuts/a way to offload cognitive labor.

If you learn the basics without technology, you have to have fundamental understanding and skills.

If you start with technological assistance right away, you may never build that fundamental level of understanding and skill.

The more the tech does for you, the worse it is. You may never learn critical thinking, problem solving, memory, or concentration skills if the answers are just handed to you.

I wonder then if other sorts of vagus nerve stimulation are effective. Because you can stimulate your vagus nerve with deep breathing, Valsalva maneuver, and lots of other things.

FMHY - not exactly a megathread, but kinda

He has a tremendous hog, though. It’s a matter of public record.

Iirc this affects roughly 1/3 people and does so by activating the gastrocolic reflex

I get vertigo when I’m high up - ain’t no way I’m getting within like 2m of an exposed ledge. No sirree, the view is fine from back here thanks

That seems pretty neat. I like that it’s a “dumb” phone that can still use most apps.

Price seems a bit steep at $600, though.

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Thank you! I really don’t mean to complain. We really have it very good. I think it’s a common sort of story here. We are extremely lucky to not be lower SES, a targeted racial minority, etc.

We’ve considered it, but my wife really doesn’t want to move far from her family, and especially not out of country. I have some friends who moved to Canada, though, and have found it to be very welcoming & they have had a lot of success with the process. My sister has definitely thought about emmigrating if things get worse - I believe she has a plan to get out. Luckily she seems to have a great group of friends who are able to support each other

Oh nice. I may have to try it out

It makes it risky to have kids here. We have some risk factors for it. Some of our friends had a rough time, and all had to make emergency plans to leave the state if worse came to worse. They also had to be careful to hide the pregnancy since the government was talking about tracking who was pregnant to catch people who left the state to get abortions - that hasn’t happened yet though. And if we left the state permanently, we’d have to do it without family support which would be hard.

So, no direct harm of course, but it has caused us to delay having kids. More than anything it causes anxiety - which is why all this stuff affects most people: not because of direct harm right now, but because it makes the future uncertain.

No worries. I’ve heard (not that you said this, but in general) people say that folks are anxious just because of politics & things that don’t affect them - I think that’s sometimes true, but more often the politics affect people’s lives directly, or at least threaten to, and that causes real stress,anxiety, and harm.

That’s why I tried to tie systemic causes into my rant. Literally every single stressful thing in my life I can point back to a systemic, “political” cause. And I have it pretty freakin good, all things considered. There’s a lot of folks I know who are much less fortunate who are impacted much worse by… gestures at stuff broadly

I’m pretty anxious.

Fascism is advancing very rapidly in my country and is dismantling everything from science funding to the basic rule of law to basic public health and disease prevention while being openly corrupt and literally just stealing tax money.

My country is helping to perpetrate a genocide and has launched a completely voluntary war against Iran for no reason. It also did something that “was totally not war” to Venezuela and is threatening both Cuba and Mexico now.

I work minimum 45 hours/week, usually closer to 55 hours/week. This is nice because I was working 70-80 hour weeks last year, but things have slowed down for me a bit. Idk who in the US is working 35 hours, but it’s not me…

Trying to plan for the future is very difficult because my government is running pump and dump schemes on the market literally constantly while also effectively destroying the bond market, threatening the dollar’s status as world reserve currency, etc. There’s no safe place to put money away for retirement and it is very unlikely the Social Security program will exist by the time I retire. I am lucky to have begun saving for retirement early and live well below my means in a low cost of living area, but even though I have saved like half my income for my entire working life that may not be enough.

Speaking of the future, it is very dangerous for women to get pregnant in my state because if they have an ectopic pregnancy or the fetus dies, the doctors will basically make the woman get sepsis before treating her because of the anti-abortion laws here. Many women have died. So even though we’re lucky enough to be in a position to afford to have kids, we’ve had to put our lives on hold & consider fleeing our home state where our families live.

My relationship with my family is strained - my parents, older relatives, and one of my sisters are all completely brainwashed by fascist propaganda. It is getting better, but during Trump 1 and Biden, they became more hateful and crazy than they ever had been prior. My other sister is trans but hasn’t come out to them yet. I expect that to be very difficult because they’re bigots and have been spewing hate about trans people for years at this point. My sister is doing a very good job of prepping them, and I’m helping how I can, but I’m worried for her. Our government has labeled trans right organizations as domestic terrorist organizations. Trans people are constantly under attack.

My younger siblings and older family members are also hurt by the economic state of affairs, either struggling to get a start in life or having a hard time making ends meet in retirement, paying for health-related expenses, etc. That causes me some anxiety.

I have a good standard of living because my wife and I are highly educated professionals. We are lucky to have had a lot of advantages. So really, we don’t have a lot of financial stress many others do. But even still, prices have risen on most goods like 30-50% or more over the past 6 years or so. If this continues, it may or may not threaten us right now, but it does call into question if we can afford kids, retirement, etc.

The environment & ecology is rapidly getting worse and the government is doing worse than nothing to help. We have flesh eating parasites coming back after having been eradicated since the 60s. Our government is attempting to destroy the national parks and wildlife system and allow.strip mining and drilling. Temperatures are rising and rainfall is decreasing, fires are becoming much more widespread, tornadoes have been hitting our area much more than in the past, etc. New Orleans, a city my wife, I, and our families have a connection to is projected to literally sink into the sea within our lifetimes.