Skip Navigation
How long do you think it will take for Western imperialism to collapse?
  • I think the next financial crisis is going to trigger total dedollarization. The US has already set themselves up with their trade war bullshit and sanctions regimes, but as soon as getting dollars becomes difficult the rest of the world is going to dump them immediately.

  • Going to the grocery store be like
  • My pineapple comes from a can and that's the way I like it! šŸ˜ 

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • All they need is oxygen, water, nutrients, and disposal for CO2/waste. If we can clone entire systems, we could keep them alive too.

    As for the brain, I find the ethical minefield of brain death is a helpful topic for understanding a possible path towards ethical testing environment. If the technology exists to grow cloned organs and keep them alive outside the body, growing cloned brains should also be possible. From there, growing a vegetative brain that can never wake up (because there was never any 'there' there to wake up) would open up many possibilities for testing on the brain. Imagine if we could test on human brains without needing to translate from animal models. It'd be a huge leap forward.

    And no one has to get hurt anymore.

    This could at least be a goal, even if you want to keep hurting animals in the meantime and aren't willing to halt all animal testing. Do you really think we'll be forced to test on animals forever? In a thousand years will we be testing new drugs on mice? I doubt it.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • Oh don't get me wrong, I understand nothing I'm talking about is something that will realistically happen. I'm hardly idealistic about that.

    My only point is that it's something we, as a society, could choose to do. We simply choose not to, and choose instead to let business interests get away with everything.

    It's a question of political will, not technical feasibility.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • Testing on animals is morally questionable! Although I'm talking about cloning full systems, so they could still all be kept separate rather than just being a whole cloned body. You'd have one model that's a clone of the entire digestive system, another that's a clone of the nervous system, another that's a clone of the circulatory system, and they'd be connected or disconnected from each other as needed.

    Also, yeah, I'm very aware this isn't something we can do yet! That's why I called it the next Human Genome project.

    Animal testing, beyond just being wrong, is a crutch and it's holding us back.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • And we couldn't construct a holistic cloned testing environment that can break A down into B and C and D, and then observe the effects? So you aren't just testing it on isolated tissue samples, but on entire cloned systems with all of the interactions of an actual human body?

    That's not something possible at the moment, I understand that. I just think it would be better to focus all of our efforts on making it possible.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • This is a problem that needs to be solved right now, or as soon as possible.

    As for letting businesses run rampant without testing or scrutiny, who says they'd be allowed to do new things? We don't have to let them do whatever they want. Just put a pause on introducing new potentially toxic shit into our water and food and air etc.

    But that would hurt the money's feelings, so it won't happen. Obviously.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • I figured it was pretty clear I wasn't talking about entire human clones? It'd all be piecemeal, different cloned systems would be used as testing environments. There'd never be a whole human clone involved, that's just creating an entirely new set of ethical problems.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • Okay, so the problem is that industry is allowed to move faster than toxicology. That seems extremely stupid.

    As for in-vivo testing, the goal should be to eliminate the need for animals and move towards a holistic lab grown testing environment of cloned organs, circulatory systems, body parts, etc. That's a bit beyond what we can do, which is why we should devote everything we have to making it happen. Like I said, the next Human Genome Project.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • What stops them from testing on unrelated organs? If you want to know if a stroke medicine increases the risk of heart failure, test it on heart tissue. If you want to know if it increases the risk of internal bleeding, grow gastrointestinal tract and blood vessels to test it.

  • Dead Florida dolphin was infected with highly pathogenic bird flu
  • That was about the time we started hearing about bird flu infecting seals, wasn't it? Seems like marine mammals were the bridge species, and then it went from them to cows.

    The next jump might be ferrets or mink (I remember from COVID that they have very similar respiratory systems to humans). Or it might just jump over them right to morons drinking raw milk I guess.

  • Humans need to stop being cruel
  • Halt all animal testing and put 100% of those freed up resources towards developing lab grown organs and tissues. If we want to study heart disease we should be growing human hearts and testing them, not using a "good enough" animal model. It could be the next big leap, like the Human Genome Project was.

  • UN says 800,000 people have fled Rafah as Israel kills dozens in Gaza
  • Imagine not just being a refugee, but one that has to keep running and can never settle down anywhere. Forced to become nomadic, essentially.

  • Taiwanese Parliament member reportedly stole a bill and ran away with it to stop it from being passed
  • That's because it's fun and whimsical when the worst people do it, so they are allowed to get away with shenanigans.

    If someone did this to delay bombs for Israel they'd be stopped by force.

  • It's kind of odd China is seemingly the only country that has figured out MREs are good convenience food
  • I just throw in fresh green onion and sugar snap peas into the bowl before I pour the ramen in on top. Gives that veggie crumch that I crave.

  • You know what really chaps my ass?
  • Sorry, we can only do a 10 minute video with an ad break in the middle.

  • bUt BoTh SiDeS dA sAmE
  • Stopping the US empire means siding with its enemies. Pick a side.

    Also, here's an account from an actual gay defector. Doesn't sound like genocide to me. It doesn't sound good, of course, but he wasn't tortured or killed or imprisoned or anything like that. I'm sure you can find some nonsense from a South Korean tabloid or the US State Department, but I do not think they're doing genocide over there.

  • Potato Shipwreck

    Carmelized onions and garlic, cubed potatoes, bell peppers, and egg substitute; topped with hot-sauce, with a cup of white chai on the side.

    0
    Chili Topped With Airfried Beans

    Just a simple chili made with four tomatoes, one onion, half a bell pepper, a three chipotles in abado sauce, a clove of garlic, a couple tbsp of chili powder, a tbsp of oil, and then topped with nooch and air fried kidney beans.

    I think I'll spring for mango or pineapple next time.

    0
    damn April Fools got me good

    Okay so I knew we had a holiday on Easter weekend at my job and I assumed we'd have Good Friday off, since that's what literally every other job I've had has done and since it's a semi-holiday.

    Nope, we got Monday off. April fools! šŸ˜‚

    So now I just burned two attendance points because I was a no-call-no-show and lost out on holiday pay.

    Death to America.

    0
    Biden considering executive action to close southern border, sources say
    www.cnn.com Biden considering executive action to close southern border, sources say | CNN Politics

    The White House is considering executive action that would allow President Joe Biden to effectively shut down the borderĀ to migrants crossing unlawfully,Ā accordingĀ to three sources familiar with the matterā€”a maneuverĀ reminiscent ofĀ controversial action from the Donald Trump era and is sure to invite...

    Biden considering executive action to close southern border, sources say | CNN Politics

    And you all told me the blue maga border bill that Republicans rejected was 4d chess.

    201
    Israel orders more Gazans to flee, bombs areas where it sends them
    www.reuters.com Israel orders more Gazans to flee, bombs areas where it sends them

    Israel ordered people out of swathes of the main southern city in the Gaza Strip on Monday as it pressed its ground campaign deep into the south, sending desperate residents fleeing even as it dropped bombs on areas where it told them to go.

    Israel orders more Gazans to flee, bombs areas where it sends them

    In Khan Younis, many of those taking flight on Monday were already displaced from other areas. Abu Mohammed told Reuters it was now the third time he had been forced to flee since abandoning his home in Gaza City in the north.

    "Why did they eject us from our homes in Gaza (City) if they planned to kill us here?" he said.

    At a home in Khan Younis that was struck overnight, flames licked the collapsed masonry and grey smoke billowed out from the rubble. A child's stuffed toy of a sheep lay in a pile of dust. Boys were picking through the wreckage. Next door, Nesrine Abdelmoty stood amid damaged furniture in the rented room where she lives with her divorced daughter and two-year-old baby.

    "We were sleeping at 5 a.m. when we felt things collapse, everything went upside down," she told Reuters. "They told (people) to move from the north to Khan Younis, since the south is safer. And now, they've bombed Khan Younis. Even Khan Younis is not safe now, and even if we move to Rafah, Rafah is not safe as well. Where do they want us to go?"

    6
    ā€˜All men 16 years and above, raise your handsā€™: how al-Shifa raid unfolded
    www.theguardian.com ā€˜All men 16 years and above, raise your handsā€™: how al-Shifa raid unfolded

    Israeli troops entered Gazaā€™s al-Shifa hospital in a ā€˜targeted operationā€™ at 3am and remained there well into the afternoon

    ā€˜All men 16 years and above, raise your handsā€™: how al-Shifa raid unfolded

    The end of the article jumped out at me:

    >The Palestinian health ministry said 40 patients died on Tuesday, after five days without the fuel needed to power generators that fed dialysis machines and other vital medical equipment. The hospital had also run out of clean water, and doctors said they were subsisting on dates to survive as food supplies dwindled to nothing.

    >Corpses were piled in front of the hospital, with staff too terrified to move between buildings. The UNā€™s office for humanitarian affairs said staff at al-Shifa, for decades the linchpin of Gazaā€™s medical system, had begun preparations for a mass grave to entomb 180 bodies in front of the facility, as there was no way for them to leave in order to bury the dead.

    15
    36-hour shifts, 80-hour weeks: Workers are being burnt out by overtime
    www.nbcnews.com 36-hour shifts, 80-hour weeks: Workers are being burnt out by overtime

    Americans say they are being required to work an exorbitant amount of overtime to compensate for staffing shortages that have plagued the economy.

    36-hour shifts, 80-hour weeks: Workers are being burnt out by overtime

    Of particular note:

    >The Association of American Railroads, which represents freight railway operators, said its members have been hiring in recent years to address staffing needs and recognize employees' desire for better scheduling. The group said the number of overtime hours worked by BMWE union members increased to 4.7 hours per week in 2022, compared to 4 hours in 2016.

    >Cory Ludwig, who works as a machine operator repairing railway tracks in Iowa, said heā€™s been working Saturdays and some Sundays along with 10- to 12-hour shifts since September. Recently, he worked 13 days without a day off. With the mandatory Saturday work, heā€™s had to rely on friends and relatives to take care of his five-year-old and nine-year-old kids. He said the overtime demands have increased as heā€™s seen the number of workers assigned to his crew go down.

    >ā€œYou fall asleep and then you wake up in the morning and you go right back to work. It can really break a person down, it gets really wearing on a person after a while,ā€ Ludwig said. ā€œWith less people trying to do the same amount of work, working long hours, working multiple weeks in a row without one day off, you get irritated and you get burnt out.ā€

    >Recently one of the unionā€™s members had been working 22 hours straight when he fell asleep on the job, an error that could have put his colleaguesā€™ lives at risk but also could have been avoided had the employee had a rest period, said Ballew. Another member was recently disciplined for refusing to work through his scheduled days off on short notice so he could care for a family member having health issues, Ballew said.

    >ā€œThe stress it puts on marriages and parenting and the things you leave behind for your spouse to deal with or the things you miss, that kind of stress builds up,ā€ said Ballew. ā€œIn the rail industry, we have noticed recently a spat of suicides and I canā€™t help but think there is a correlation there.ā€

    Thank God Biden stopped the railroad strike!

    I swear if I hear another fucker say that the railroad workers got everything they wanted because Biden helped them negotiate I'll lose it.

    Good thing I voted for the lesser evil in 2020! Gosh if I had stuck to principles we'd have had a genocide or something šŸ˜’

    56
    Was listening to Democracy Now and an Al Jazeera journalist said something that had me screaming
    www.democracynow.org Al Jazeera Reporter on Israeli Strike That Killed Gaza Bureau Chiefā€™s Family

    We speak with Al Jazeera correspondent Youmna ElSayed in Gaza, where an Israeli airstrike killed the family of the news outletā€™s Gaza bureau chief Wael Dahdouh on Wednesday. The Qatar-based news network is one of the few international outlets with reporters in Gaza. The Israeli strike on the Nuseira...

    Al Jazeera Reporter on Israeli Strike That Killed Gaza Bureau Chiefā€™s Family

    I recommend listening to the whole thing, but here's the nug:

    >YOUMNA ELSAYED: Yes, I just want to say one thing. I want to say this, and I want the world to remember my words. In my culture, in my language, we say, ā€Kama tadinu tudan, walaw baā€™ada heen.ā€ In your culture, in your language, they say, ā€œWhat goes around comes around.ā€ And when it comes around, like this whole world is watching the genocides happening in the Gaza Strip, we shall be watching, too.

    Israel fucked up. God damn journalists saying this openly? I mean, obviously the Western press won't cover this, but this is after Biden went whining to Qatar to reign in Al Jazeera lol

    I held my nose for that shit in 2020 "to stop fascism" but fuck, this motherfucker endorsed genocide anyway. Not making that mistake again šŸ¤¢

    0
    Did Israel bomb a civilian evacuation route in Gaza? | Financial Times
    www.ft.com Did Israel bomb a civilian evacuation route in Gaza?

    Evidence points to IDF weapons as blasts hit multiple cars along main road south

    Did Israel bomb a civilian evacuation route in Gaza?

    The nug:

    >While assertions have been made by both sides about the incident and death toll, the available evidence is less clear. However, analysis of the video footage rules out most explanations aside from an Israeli strike.

    >The devastation underlines the heightened risk civilians are facing as tens of thousands flee the north, on Israeli orders, during hostilities. The bodies of at least three children can be seen in multiple clips verified by the FT.

    >At least 1,400 Israelis have been killed, according to the government, including many women and children. At least 2,500 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli bombardment, about half of them women and below the age of 18, according to Palestinian officials.

    >On Saturday, Israel told Gazans that it would refrain from bombing two evacuation routes for six hours, including Salah-ad-Din street, where these explosions took place, so that civilians could continue to move south

    13
    A 57-year-old UPS driver in Texas died after collapsing in the heat while making deliveries

    >Following months of negotiations with Teamsters, UPS announced in June that it would install air conditioning in new trucks starting next year. The company said it would send new trucks to the hottest parts of the country first, if possible. The company also said it would retrofit its existing package cars with cab fans, exhaust heat shields, and cargo area ventilation.

    >"While these improvements will make a difference in the months and years ahead, we had to fight like hell to secure them," the Teamsters union said in its social media post Thursday. "Chris Begley should still be alive to experience them. All companies, including UPS, need to remember that their past failings to protect workers can have deadly serious consequences in the future."

    Chris Bagley should still be alive and it's a damn shame the Teamsters failed to protect him from social murder. Only new trucks? Only next year? They drove trucks without fans, heat shields, and ventilation? What the fuck.

    The Teamsters could have, at the very least, demand a total halt on driving trucks without fucking fans. "Oh but that'll cause package delays!" Well I guess we just have to murder drivers for the sake of logistics.

    If anyone tells me how great and historic the new contract is one more fucking time I'll fucking lose it.

    91
    United States | News & Politics @lemmy.ml queermunist she/her @lemmy.ml
    Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on How Sheā€™s Changed - The New York Times

    >I want to read you two recent headlines from New York magazine. They were written within a week of each other. The first is ā€œA.O.C. Is Just a Regular Old Democrat Now,ā€ and that accuses you of compromising on your progressive ideals as you work within the party system. And then came the rebuttal, which was ā€œThe ā€˜A.O.C. Leftā€™ Has Achieved Plenty,ā€ which argued that your wing has pushed the party leftward. Why do you think your role is still being parsed this way by Democrats and by those on the left?

    >>Part of it is because we havenā€™t really had a political presence like this in the United States before. I think very often you had this consummate insider that was bankrolled by corporate money and advancing this, frankly, very neoliberal agenda. And those were the people that we were used to seeing in power. And so I think over time thereā€™s been an inherent association between power, ascent and quote-unquote selling out.

    >>I often say to my grass-roots companions that the left, for a very long time, was not used to having power in the United States. And so when we encounter power, weā€™re so bewildered by it ā€”

    Yes, the reason we are suspicious of you is because we're too fucking stupid to understand. Thank you boss queen!!!

    >Moving your ideas internationally, even if they might conflict with the foreign policy of the leader of your own party?

    >>I wouldnā€™t necessarily characterize my foreign policy goals as oppositional to the presidentā€™s or to the United States. I am a member of Congress. I have sworn an oath to this country, and I take that oath very seriously.

    That says it all, doesn't it?

    >Do you feel more comfortable in the Democratic Party now? The way you described it initially was fraught. They rejected you, and you were definitely trying to change the party. You have said youā€™ve pushed the party leftward. Many would agree. So is it OK to be a regular Democrat now?

    >>The activist in me always seeks to agitate for more. I think despite there being progress, many people are still woefully underserved in this country. But the Democratic Party has changed dramatically in the last five years. Even if you just look at the numbers, I believe itā€™s something around 50 percent of House Democrats have been elected since 2018. And so what is considered center and moderate now is dramatically different than what it was five years ago.

    No no wait, that says it all.

    Being center and moderate is good now folks!

    17
    What the hell is this horror show shit that keeps showing up in Pocket?

    Look at it! What is that? It looks kind of like a cross section of a human, kind of, except the eyes are pools of blackened fire and the brain is sending electrical pulses out to... are those Jupiters? Why? Why??? This is absolute nightmare shit lol

    50
    Why Every Kid Needs At Least 3 Parents
    www.romper.com Why Every Kid Needs At Least 3 Parents

    Rather than struggling to rebalance the division of labor, why not spread the roles among a greater number of committed adults?

    Why Every Kid Needs At Least 3 Parents

    >Rather than struggling to rebalance the division of labor between breadwinning and caregiving, why not spread the roles out more broadly among a greater number of committed adults?

    HMM YEAH WHY NOT HMMMMMM

    >ā€œGiven all of the physical, financial, mental, and emotional labors of raising children,ā€ a college professor colleague of mine explained to me, ā€œwhy wouldnā€™t you want to spread that around?ā€ He spent over a decade as one of three legal parents to his now adult twins, and although he believes the arrangement worked out well for everyone involved, he preferred to remain anonymous because formal tri-parenting is still so rare.

    We used to fucking do that before capitalism crammed us all into nuclear families, and now that capitalism has entered decay we're finding out that we need extended families. But do they recommend moving in with parents or siblings? Nah. If families didn't keep buying new houses then how would the economy grow???

    >Finally, as increasing numbers of millennials and members of Generation Z decide to forgo childbearing in protest against climate change, the housing crisis, or the growing precarity of their financial futures in a brutal gig economy, the growing acceptance of alloparenting might offer unique opportunities for them to experience parenthood. Rather than struggling to rebalance the division of labor between breadwinning and caregiving, why not spread the necessary roles out more broadly among a greater number of committed adults?

    "Finally, as increasing numbers of people see the end of the world approaching and wish only for a quick death, the growing acceptacne of alloparenting might allow them to get a taste of what was once a fundamental human experience!"

    You will own nothing and be happy.

    0
    queermunist queermunist she/her @lemmy.ml

    /u/outwrangle before everything went to shit in 2020, /u/emma_lazarus for a while after that, now Iā€™m all queermunist!

    Posts 14
    Comments 5.3K