It's starting to feel like the media is slowly lining up behind manufacturing consent for the "well ok, we fucked up and this is really bad now, but it wasn't our fault because they lied to us just like you said," narrative, no?

catholics: oh hey u guys are back early me: pope's woke catholics: what? me: *grabs rosary, heads toward the confessional* pope's woke

I just realized that what I've come to consider my "working bag," a big canvas tote that can contain several smaller canvas totes, each of which contains a notebook/binder and supplies/tools for a given activity or project, is very much a replication of the way I organized my school materials.

Tapping the sign

I've been ignoring Merlin's occasional detection of a pine siskin on sound ID because it was unlikely and low-confidence, but last night I heard a pretty distinctive call, and between the two I'm reasonably confident! A new lifer for me! Hoping I can catch it visually soon, but it's been hiding.

Why I don't trust anyone a little too obsessed about falling fertility rates

This brought a smile to my face. Look how happy & excited those #astronauts are! What an incredible experience they have had, and the photos are amazing. #ArtemisII www.abc.net.au/news/2026-04...

Some weirdo wrote a thing that I read this morning that still moves me deeply. I can plant the seeds I can plant.

"I grant you one wish," the magic fish said. "To eat my mother's pancakes again, just like when I was a child." "Are you sure?" "You think it frivolous?" "No. But to grant it I must send you back to the child you were, with no adult memories." "Would my life change?" "You ask that every time."

"No," the swordmaster said. "One does not refuse the king," the herald said. "I do. I will not train his soldiers or officers, I will not tell my students to join his army, I will not support his unjust war." "You will regret this!" "No," the swordmaster said.

I just realized I DON'T have cat food in my emergency kit, just a week of food for two dogs who died 1 & 4 years ago. Off to remedy.

OH. MY. GOD. THIS IS THE MILKY WAY SHOT BY THE ARTEMIS II CREW. LOOK AT ALL THOSE STARS!!!!

I’m not the only survivor noting this today. 👇🏼

Reading an @nkjemisin.bsky.social book right now might not make you feel better, but it will make you feel stronger, and that's not nothing.

We're all being held hostage by this administration.

I know that I should be relieved, but I am mad as hell that we were made to go through it in the first place. This is not the first time and it will not be the last. Enough of this terror already we are exhausted!

Remember how you felt about people defending their neighbors in Chicago, Minneapolis, and other cities around the US? Extend that empathy a bit further, to people Trump is calling animals. It may hurt to stop and think about how much you have in common with those people. That's okay. Let it.

You have more in common with the people of Iran than you do with anyone in this administration, any member of the technocracy, anyone who is profiting from this war, or any billionaire. When you see Iranians forming human chains outside key infrastructure sites, you should feel a sense of kinship.

Anybody telling you to put your shit in writing is either a fed or might as well be. Don't do it. Shut the fuck up Friday is every day. Don't do their work for them.

I noticed an interesting trend in recent television shows and movies: collectivism or people coming together to fight their enemies and reach toward a greater good. I wrote about this phenomenon, and how it explains our fascination with the Artemis II crew, for @theflytrapmedia.com.

If you've not already had a look at the NASA Artemis photostream on a day like this one, I really recommend it. www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2...

hard not to fall into even deeper despair when the solution we're all being given is to call our reps and slowly explain to them that people die when they are killed

The Moon: oh wow you guys decided to come back Artemis II crew: earth’s haunted

As I keep saying: Because no matter what abusers take from their victims, they don't want to take the blame. And one of the prerogatives of power is to be in charge of blame, and abusers routinely exercise that power to make their own acts someone else's fault.

The first individual or body to actually make clear and obvious action to stop this is going to get so much goodwill from the world. Everybody's so desperate they'd forgive most prior failings! Be courageous and remembered for it! What better legacy??

If you were scuba diving and saw somebody drowning, and had enough air in your tank to get you both to shore, why would you not pop your respirator onto the drowning person's face? Why would that not be your first instinct? I think I'd be justified in feeling at least a little skeptical about you.

nasa employee: oh hey, shouldn't u b back by now astronaut: earth's stupid nasa employee: what? astronaut: *eating zero g Nutella and diverting to Venus*: earth's stupid

I will always maintain that part of the reason this site is better than GR etc is that finding your next read is best led by people you trust, not by a star rating system based on the input of thousands of people whose tastes you don't know.

This is not what the below is getting at, but I think a lot of people looking for more community could really benefit from knowing the difference between your circle and your corner, in both a positive and negative sense.

It has been brought to my attention that my household rule wherein parents can only overrule a child's comfort preferences for genuine health and safety reasons is...radical.

Anybody familiar with this fellow?

The thing I miss about the old internet is the concept of "mutuals" where you actually became close friends instead of people who just talk to sometimes on platform. Early internet didn't collapse when one platform did because we were friends on several platforms at once.

Just going to leave this here.

This is such a good thread. So good.

"Welfare fraud" is such a steaming pile of shit. Oh no, not a person getting [checks notes] at most eight dollars a day for food. What a horrible thing. We need that money to [checks notes again] kill innocent people in Iran for only vaguely defined reasons.

People on here rightly are pissed by the way Democratic politicians post as if they are witnesses to what's happening instead of ACTORS in what's happening. It's absolutely pathetic and weak.

The "you should have to prove you understand the meaning of citizenship" is just an empty argument to me. You think these people have never been part of a community before? Have never experienced a duty of care?

THEY TRAINED THE AI ON ACTUAL WRITERS. YOU CANNOT TELL IF SOMETHING IS AI SIMPLY BASED ON IT USING PROPER GRAMMAR. IT STOLE FROM US!!! IT STOLE!!! IT IS A THIEF AND I WILL NOT EVER BE QUIET ABOUT IT!!!!

There's a lot of depressing shit in the world right now but the collapse of LA&S education is fuckin CRUSHING ME.

It should be *easy* to get citizenship. It should be next to automatic to get permanent residence if you've declared intent. I've never heard a convincing humane argument for why it needs to be otherwise, anywhere.

I am a medieval historian!! The world always is in a state, it has never not been in a state, joy and delight and beauty is what humanity exists for

I'd just like our nation's great institutions to show a smidge of the courage we've seen from our great children's entertainers.

Oh no the Numbers

images that spring to mind unbidden, part 788: "The Long-Run History Of Child Mortality"

images that spring to mind unbidden, part 771: "the importance of a liberal education"

In recent years my household has normalized that when one of us is engaging in negative self talk, it gets called out, and practicing doing it for people I love has made it so, so much easier for me to start redirecting myself. "That was not a lazy choice, it was an exhausted one, go sit down," etc.

Means testing almost *always* consumes more overall resources than just meeting needs. For example: I use the library, and the money I might otherwise spend on the activity of accessing information and entertainment goes into my mutual aid savings.

I can't recall who first said it, but the proper measure of a society's wealth is not whether poor people own cars but whether rich people ride the train.

IF YOU ARE RICH YOU SUPPORT COMMUNITY INFRASTRUCTURE BY USING IT. Don't treat public transit, public schools, or public or libraries as beneath you just because you can afford private ownership. Supporting and sustaining the commons needs everybody to participate.