children in gaza are losing their sight due to malnutrition. losing their sight. in the 21st century. in an entirely engineered famine, constructed by the "only democracy in the middle east" and facilitated by the rest of the civilized world including the united states and egypt. all in the name of defeating hamas, one of many groups to take up arms as a response to israeli determination to forcibly bring the myth of a land with no people for a people without a land to reality.
the problem is when you try to impose a settler colonial state on an indigenous people and they resist, you will be doing things like starving children until they lose their sight. and there's nobody else in the world to blame for that except the people who let you do it.
Hey do y’all remember when Boeing fucking killed a guy last year. And we all said “huh I guess Boeing fucking killed a guy” and then went on with our lives. And everybody knew that Boeing had fully just fucking executed a guy and nothing came of it. Like there was no police investigation no justice no nothing. Like literally EVERYBODY knew that Boeing had full on murdered a guy to silence him and there wasn’t any consequences for them. Kinda crazy.
So for those who are, very understandably uninitiated on this story:
On 23 October last year (2024) the New York Times published an interview with former OpenAI researcher Suchir Balaji who worked on organising and gathering data for OpenAI until 2022 when he begun thinking about the morality of it. He eventually came to the conclusion that what OpenAI is doing blatantly violates copyright law and decided to leave the company altogether in August 2024.
After he came out with this accusation he was set to appear in court to testify against OpenAI’s data-gathering practices, something which had the potential of being a complete disaster for the company and the generative AI industry as a whole.
That was until 26 November, just days before he was due to appear in court, when he suddenly and mysteriously was found dead inside his own apartment. Investigators concluded that the death was self-inflicted, something which his family has disputed.
There was also “sign of struggle in the bathroom and looks like someone hit him in the bathroom based on blood spots”, and his apartment showed signs of having been ransacked for evidence: “The pin drive is missing. His computer was messed up.”.
Overall it feels pretty clear-cut what happened, that is to say that OpenAI had him killed because he was a legitimate threat to their business, indicating that they are fully aware that the way they’re gathering data is completely illegal.
Sources:
Alys Davies, 14.12.2024, OpenAI whistleblower found dead in San Francisco apartment. BBC News
Barney Davis, 16.1.2025, Suchir Balaji’s family demand outside investigation into OpenAI whistleblower’s death. The Independent
Cade Metz, 23.11.2024, Former OpenAI Researcher Says the Company Broke Copyright Law. The New York Times
For those of you who don't know about the Boeing case, a whistleblower named John Barnett was found dead in the middle of his deposition: https://www.qcnews.com/news/boeing-whistleblower-set-to-testify-is-found-shot-to-death/
And there actually was an investigation, but it concluded that it was suicide: https://apnews.com/article/boeing-whistleblower-suicide-9fe771a97c5745b9c53f24c04141e474
It is possible that it was suicide (which doesn't make Boeing look any better, obviously), but I wouldn't be surprised if the "surveillance footage" was doctored in some way, especially since another Boeing whistleblower, Joshua Dean, also died after he testified: https://www.snopes.com/news/2024/05/07/boeing-whistleblower-deaths/
That being said, the deaths motivated even more whistleblowers to come forward against Boeing: https://fortune.com/2024/05/09/more-boeing-whistleblowers-emerge-law-firm/
Hopefully Suchir Balaji's story will have a similar effect, especially with all the evidence pointing to assassination.
"Inside, we’re ageless. And when we talk to ourselves, it’s the same person we were talking to, the same age, when we were little, and it’s the body that’s changing around that ageless center."
-David Lynch
“There’s a myth that adult friendships are harder wrought and hollower, but for me the opposite is true: it’s only now that I feel capable of intuiting boundaries, letting relationships determine themselves, sharing headspace without considering it an incursion. It’s not enough to think of friendships in reciprocal terms, or as clusters of mutual interest. Even the term empathy is insufficient; it suggests a binary. My friends and I are different people, but we’re increasingly attuned to the thing that we all are.”
—
Alexandra Molotkow on Joy as the Lodestar: A Year in Reading and Living
What you call self-sabotage might just be your body saying: "Familiar pain feels safer than unfamiliar peace"
What you call procrastination might just be your body saying: "I'm overwhelmed and everything feels too much"
What you call anxiety might just be your body saying: "I've been in danger before, and I don't know if it's over yet"
What you call neediness might just be your body saying: "I didn't get what I needed, and I'm still longing"
What you call overreacting might just be your body saying: "This feels like danger to me because it once was"
What you call emotional instability might just be your body saying: "I was never taught that feeling emotions could be safe"
What you call resistance might just be your body saying: "I don't feel safe enough to do what you want me to"
What you call laziness might just be your body saying: "I'm frozen because I had to work hard for too long"*
What you call numbness might just be your body saying: "I had to shut down to keep you safe"
What you call avoidance might just be your body saying: "Im not ready to face this yet. I need slower exposure to it"
(the.trauma.educator on ig)
*gentle reminder that body gets tired also after doing mentally draining work/job (which includes feeling stressed too, not just studying or working 9-5 in front of a computer -which holds responsabilities, anyway)
thinking about that toni morrison quote that went to the effect of ‘you’re looking in your children’s face to make sure their face is clean and their hair is combed and they’re looking in your face to see love.’ because it’s saur true.
Thousands of acres of rainforest is being cleared to produce palm oil, used in popular Nestlé and Mondelēz brands
West Papua’s Indigenous people have called for a boycott of KitKat, Smarties and Aero chocolate, Oreo biscuits and Ritz crackers, and the cosmetics brands Pantene and Herbal Essences, over alleged ecocide in their territory.
All are products that contain palm oil and are made, say the campaigners, by companies that source the ingredient directly from West Papua, which has been under Indonesian control since 1963 and where thousands of acres of rainforest are being cleared for agriculture.
More than 90 West Papuan tribes, political organisations and religious groups have endorsed the call for a boycott, which they say should continue until the people of West Papua are given the right to self-determination.
Raki Ap, a spokesperson for the United Liberation Movement for West Papua, which is overseeing the call, said: “These products are linked to human rights violations, in the first place, because West Papuans are being forced, with violence, to get off the land where they’ve lived for thousands of years, which has now resulted in ecocide.
“This is a signal to the countries who are dealing with Indonesia, especially those in the Pacific region, to take notice of who they’re dealing with and how they are basically allowing Indonesia to continue the colonial project in West Papua, the human rights violations, and also ecocide.”
West Papuans say more than 500,000 of their people have been killed by the occupation in the past six decades, while millions of acres of their ancestral lands have been destroyed for corporate profit. Indonesia, already the world’s largest palm oil exporter, is now breaking ground in West Papua on the world’s biggest single palm oil plantation, as well as a sugar cane and biofuel plantation that will be the largest deforestation project ever launched.
“West Papuans’, especially the ULMWP, position is very clear: we are a modern-day colony,” said Ap, speaking from the Netherlands.
“Indonesia hijacked the right to self-determination in 1962 when the Netherlands and Indonesia signed an agreement without any consultation in West Papua … After that, in 1969, there was a so-called referendum, which wasn’t fair, which wasn’t under international law, one man, one vote: just 1,025 men were handpicked at gunpoint to vote for integration to Indonesia.
“So this is the foundation of the Indonesia’s colonial project. When we became part of Indonesia against our will, basically the genocide unfolded.”
Most liberating thing ever is realizing people are so fickle and you can fall out of their favor so easily so u might as well just do your thing . Literally does not matter
There is a very simple secret to being happy. Just let go of your demand on this moment. Any time you have a demand on the moment to give you something or remove something, there is suffering. Your demands keep you chained to the dream state of conditioned mind. The problem is that when there is a demand, you completely miss what is now. Letting go applies to the highest sacred demand, and even to the demand for love. If you demand in some subtle way to be loved, even if you get love, it is never enough. In the next moment, the demand reasserts itself, and you need to be loved again. But as soon as you let go, there is knowing in that instant that there is love here already. The mind is afraid to let go of its demand because the mind thinks that if it lets go, it is not going to get what it wants - as if demanding works. This is not the way things work. Stop chasing peace and stop chasing love, and your heart becomes full. Stop trying to be a better person, and you are a better person. Stop trying to forgive, and forgiveness happens. Stop and be still.
vaporwave
dailybridgerton
yousharknotpass
annaxmalina
romaincrisis
