Hello

She/They/It Free Palestine Fuck Terfs Stowerling

[cal3ris]

is this gonna get me fired you think

[0ddoblivion]

This kills me every time

[shikiimisaki]

[orcarriagesthatwork]

I think about this cake every day

[tizzymcwizzy]

sorry for exposing your tags but this is hilarious

[microsuedemouse]

OP, I hope you don’t mind me making an addition:

When I turned 17, we ordered a cake at the grocery store for my party, as we’d done many times before. If you wanted something written on the cake you’d write it into a section of the order form. We requested, very simply, “Happy Birthday Courtney”. When we went to pick it up the day of the party, this is what we got.

The bakery employees had absolutely no explanation for this. The order form, attached to the box, very clearly did not contain any of those extra names. Whomever had done the writing was no longer in, so there was no one to ask how this had happened. The fact that the name ‘Juan’ is misspelled bewilders me to this day. (I’ve never seen ‘Miley’ without the E, either, but it’s believable that someone might spell it that way.) Did this cake slip in from an alternate universe where I’m one quarter of a set of Hispanic quadruplets? Dyslexic Hispanic quadruplets, maybe?

This cake became the focal point of my party. At least two of my friends regularly called me ‘Courtney Mily Jaun Pablo’ for years to come. My siblings and I still reference it sometimes, eleven years later. It is probably the funniest thing ever to occur at any birthday celebration of my life, and may well remain so for the rest of my days.

I love a botched cake.

[helenarth]

one time me and some pals spotted one of those big cookie cakes in a store. it was done up with red icing and little X's for kisses and in the middle it said

No One Like You

now, it took us a while to realise it meant "(there is) no one like you". at first, we all parsed it as a botched "no one like(s) you"

for ages after when we'd wind each other up we'd declare "NO ONE LIKE YOU ☹️👎"

[itseasytoremember]

I just feel like it's important to post the Sacred Texts

[itwashotwestayedinthewater]

[itwashotwestayedinthewater]

happy decade to the horrible beast i have wrought

[rosecrystal]

This amount of individualism is exactly whats gonna kill us all btw

[ashintheairlikesnow]

"Going a couple hours without eating a single kind of food? No thanks, I would rather kill a child" is such a wildly horrifying take to see MULTIPLE people proudly stating.

[lifeafterpsychiatry]

If you're comfortable accusing anyone of faking disability, you're not a real ally to disabled people

[teaboot]

One time when I was a kid a group of girls and I had to treat another student for hypothermia by ourselves because she had so many invisible health issues that the adults we asked for help didn't believe us. The student in question was actively hallucinating. When I finally ran for help the people I grabbed were slow as shit to respond, casually joking about how "dramatic" the person in question was.

The kid was picked up by an ambulance 30 minutes later.

Now as an adult working in security I get SO MANY folks- upper-middle aged mostly- coming to me to 'rat out' people they think are faking it.

I was once sent into a bathroom because a client demanded that the "fucker won't get out, so go drag them out"- I was NEVER going to do that, so I did a wellness check instead. You know who it was? A person recently released from the hospital after a car accident. They had a hole in their skull and major hearing loss. They couldn't answer the owner because they couldn't HEAR the owner.

Another time about a homeless man who got around town by kicking the ground from his wheelchair. "You know he doesn't actually need that thing, his legs work fine, it's just for pity points"- Oh, so he's not paralyzed, his wheelchair is performative? Funny story Dale, I actually know that guy, he was backed over by a truck and has chronic pain from his shattered pelvis. But sure, let's make him stand up and walk everywhere so nobody feels too bad for him and tries to help him or something.

"She doesn't need that scooter, I've seen her get out of it."

"Look how fat he is, because he just rides around and refuses to get up."

"She doesn't really need that cane- she comes here without it all the time"

Sincerely, truly, from the bottom of my heart- as someone who isn't physically disabled but hears this shit all the time- fuck off

[jaypilled]

are those my only options

[prower-labs]

[babyanimalgifs]

Little fish eats his foods 

(Source)

[bunigojade]

[aflo]

this is so sad he doesn’t even know there’s a double barreled shotgun pointed at him

[identifying-fish-in-posts]

Pacific spiny lumpsucker (Eumicrotremus orbis)

[duke-of-fire]

[splickedylit]

His Foods :) 👍

[lipsredxasarose]

I hate the push that you can quit addictions by pure willpower because it perpetuates the idea that people who can't have committed a moral failing of some kind. We all may know some people who did quit an addiction cold turkey, and with no aid, you may be one of them. And that's fantastic, but it is not the norm. It is more than okay to need help to quit an addiction. Relapse is also part of the process. Many people relapse several times before they are able to quit for good. Let's have compassion.

[anarchistmemedistro]

not only that but depending on the substance quitting cold turkey can kill you

[sileana]

ALCOHOL. It’s a very common dependence and cold turkey CAN KILL YOU. A lot of people don’t know this. Doctors can literally prescribe beer in the ER to save a life.

Be careful out there.

[anarchistmemedistro]

[beemovieerotica]

the cognitive dissonance from people who want the products of modern medicine but get weird about animal research. like im sorry but this is necessary for the survival of the society we currently live in. and the scientists who work on these things are not evil cackling psychopaths. anyone you talk to in animal research has incredibly complex feelings about their work and incredibly complex relationships to the animals in their care. there are regulations and oversight and penalties in place to make the work as humane as possible and scientists are overwhelmingly the ones enforcing and advocating for better care.

[beemovieerotica]

@velvetdemon I'm doing a full reply because I want to give this question the time and space it deserves, and I really do appreciate your curiosity about this.

The short answer: It is deeply unethical. There are nowhere near enough willing patients in the world to be able to do this, and it would be criminal to put them through this.

The long answer: The one side of the equation you're focusing on is: how much of a drug is too much, to the point where it will cause negative side effects or even death? And this is crucial to know. But it's not just a matter of finding out the lethal dosage of a heart cholesterol medication, you need to know that it can actually lower the cholesterol of any living thing. There is no way to know this without giving it first to...a living thing.

But beyond this, I need to emphasize: The goal of a drug trial is to effectively cure people who are already suffering from disease, who are living on limited time.

Drug trials don't just happen on any member of the public, they need to happen specifically on people affected by the disease you're trying to treat. There is at any time a very limited and very marginalized population of the world affected by early onset, familial Parkinson's disease. Because you cannot ethically induce disease in a human being, you are working with, speaking with, and helping patients and their families who are hopeful and desperate for a cure.

If you were to jump straight to human trials from petri dishes, not knowing absolutely anything about how the drug functions in a living, breathing animal body, it would look like this:

We didn't know that minute quantities of the drug interact lethally with x, y, z medication that people are commonly also taking. X number of patients have died as a result.

We didn't know that the drug is fatal to people with [common variant] in their genetics. X more patients have died.

We didn't know the drug exacerbates x, y, z chronic illnesses. X number of people have acquired permanent, lifelong disabilities.

We didn't know the best way to deliver the drug, so we tried multiple ways: the people who received it intravenously are now suffering from a painful, costly, and debilitating condition that did not happen with the ingested form.

I could go on, and on, and on.

The vast majority of these problems can be nearly or almost entirely averted by testing other animals first.

These are all people who possibly could have waited for the normal progression from animal testing to human testing and thus received better outcomes. Some people will pass away in the time it takes to get to that point, and that's heartbreaking, and we all wish science could be faster.

But the cost of expediting science could mean a life of profoundly greater suffering or an even shorter life than the one where no intervention happens at all. And at that point, you have completely exhausted your trust, your goodwill, and your patients' hope, after you've failed to do anything or even worsened the lives of people who are already deeply suffering.

[manslaughter]

hi, i’m an animal research professional. making sure laboratory animals stay alive, healthy, and enriched has been my full-time job for several years now.

animal research is not the mad scientist wild west that PETA wants you to think it is. there are extremely strict federal laws in place to protect the well being of these animals. animal welfare organizations like AAALAC ensure that lab animals are treated with dignity & respect and are given enough specialized care & enrichment to be happy and content in captivity, just like AZA accreditation with zoos.

not a single animal from a zebrafish to a mouse to a dog to a macaque goes unaccounted for. if an animal gets moved to a new cage, paired for breeding, has a procedure performed on it, gives birth, gets sick or injured, dies, etc. it is legally required that this information is recorded and kept on file for the US federal government to access. failing to record & retain this information is very much punishable by US federal law.

let me tell you - if you abuse or kill an animal, even a mouse - you are almost certainly getting both fired & blacklisted from the industry. if you abuse or kill a more ‘advanced’ animal, such as a dog or monkey, you will likely face criminal charges. killing a monkey is as serious and disastrous as a nuclear meltdown. you are expected to reasonably explain every illness, injury, or death of an animal under your care. you must record all of this information. animals that are clearly suffering with low QOL are required to be euthanized according to AVMA guidelines.

research animals are highly expensive. yes, even the "lesser" animals like mice. the cheapest mice will run you a few hundred $ per individual, with some of the most expensive mice i've cared for being $25,000 per individual. in research we have the "three Rs" - reduction (reduce amount of necessary animals to a minimum), refinement (refine processes to ensure research is accurate and animals feel no pain or distress), and replacement (replace animals with non-living research models as they become available). i can assure you no proper research team is wasting animals (*do not* say "b-b-but elon musk--" his research team is actively being investigated for animal abuse by the government).

research methods that do not require live animals are currently being looked into & efforts spearheaded by - you guessed it - the animal research industry itself (notice how the animal rights people are strangely silent & unhelpful when it comes to this?) but current technology is rudimentary and does not compare to live animal models.

some research animal fun facts (US edition):

all species of animals are only allowed to have one single major surgery performed on them in their entire lifetime.

institutions with nonhuman primates must have a behavior program in place (run by knowledgeable primate specialists) to ensure that they are happy and receiving enough daily enrichment and social interaction.

institutions with dogs are required to have physical exercise programs in place. this means every individual dog gets a substantial amount of leashed AND free-roaming exercise daily, including playgroups with other dogs.

a majority of nonhuman primates get to retire to sanctuaries like peaceable primate sanctuary, and almost all dogs get retired and adopted out by organizations like homes for animal heroes. some institutions will also adopt out unneeded young rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, etc.

some strains of mice glow neon green (or orange or blue) under UV light. this is not harmful to them and is commonly seen in cancer research.

so yes, you can rest knowing that laboratory animals are treated with the utmost respect by their caretakers. and you can stop this awful, ignorant talk of human experimentation that will only end in the abuse of nonwhite people, LGBT people, disabled people, indigenous people, and so many others. please just take a look at this wikipedia page if you think “ethical” human experimentation can exist.

[texasdreamer01]

If you want to reduce animal testing - or at least, reduce the amount of things we need animals to be tested with - there is some growing traction in regards to mathematical modelling (also known as in silico studies), in vitro studies (i.e. test tubes), and 3D printing of organoids.

At the moment, this is not a substitute for animal testing. Bodies are incredibly complex and interconnected environments that we're still scratching our heads about, and animal testing is in a lot of ways the most efficient and least harmful way of testing things like medications.

If anyone wants to read more about these subjects, here are a few starting points (you will probably learn some new words, this is okay!):

Advances and Applications of Predictive Toxicology in Knowledge Discovery, Risk Assessment, and Drug Development research topic by the Frontiers in Pharmacology journal

Novel methods and technologies for the evaluation of drug outcomes and policies research topic by the Frontiers in Pharmacology journal

Spotlight on Artificial Intelligence in Experimental Pharmacology and Drug Discovery research topic by the Frontiers in Pharmacology journal

The Emerging Discipline of Quantitative Systems Pharmacology research topic by the Frontiers in Pharmacology journal

PDF Drug Combinations: Mathematical Modeling and Networking Methods by Vahideh Vakil and Wade Trappe

PDF Machine learning-based drug-drug interaction prediction: a critical review of models, limitations, and data challenges by Flaviu-Ioan Gheorghita et al.

PDF A review of 3D bioprinting for organoids by Zeqing Li et al.

3D Bioprinting for Engineering Organoids and Organ-on-a-Chip: Developments and Applications by Yuqing Ren, Congying Yuan, et al.

3D bioprinting of human iPSC-Derived kidney organoids using a low-cost, high-throughput customizable 3D bioprinting system by Jaemyung Shin, Hyunjae Chung, et al.

PDF Advancing organoid development with 3D bioprinting by Wenping Ma et al.

[pukicho]

No one has ever made money

[beardedmrbean]

[themarchrabbit]

The example I like to use is roses.

Roses come in almost every color except blue (and black). We've worked very hard to breed all sorts of roses: climbers, shrubs, long-stem, tea roses, scented, and on and on. But in true human fashion, we want the one we don't have, and that's a blue rose. A true blue rose. We can't get them naturally, roses don't carry the gene(s) necessary to be bred blue on their own.

So of course, when genetic modification became real, one of the first projects started, and in fact still ongoing, is to create a blue rose. Efforts have been ongoing for about forty-something years now, and not from small labs. The first one to the finish line will have the patent on the color [yes, rose colors are patented] and the process. They will make money hand over fist. Not to mention the progress it will represent in the entire field.

40+ years.

[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A photo depicting a smiling Japanese woman with two large bouquets of Suntory's "Applause" roses, which are a lavender-grey color]

Closest we've gotten. And these make money, don't get me wrong. They're beautiful. But they're purple. Lavender. Technically blue, in the sense that "purple" doesn't exist in horticulture. (Thus why in the rhyme, "violets are blue")

"But when I put 'blue roses' in a search engine -"

Those are either photoshopped, or they're white roses that have been dyed blue. It's a really easy process. Florists do it all the time for specialty requests. It's so commonly done it even comes in spray paint form. They don't grow that color. They cannot grow that color.

(Yes, whatever one you think is real is photoshopped or dyed. Yes, I'm sure.)

All that work, from some of the best labs in the world. Decades of work. Absolute dedication to the task, the science needed being created just to do this, this one thing, make a rose blue. And we still can't do it.

Biology isn't just full of coconuts; biology is full of uncooperative coconuts who can react in entirely unpredictable ways to our meddling.

[telomeke]

[ID of image at the start of this thread–

Screenshot of a post on Threads by "ztwang87". The post reads:

A techbro told me that biology is easy because DNA is just code, right? I told him that DNA is 4 billion year old, completely undocumented, vibe-coded spaghetti, built by a blind evolutionary algorithm, which codes for its own compiler and runtime environment. His confidence popped like a balloon. I think of that programmer investigating Team Fortress 2, who found a jpg of a coconut in the game files and has no idea what it's doing there but if you remove it the game doesn't start. Biology is full of coconuts

End ID.]

‌

[tpwrtrmnky]

Analyzing the politics of a work that's meant to be apolitical is actually a really interesting exercise because it asks you to critically examine what the creator considers to be "political" in the first place. Which ideas are just How Things Are, and which ones are Political, and how is that influenced by the creator's beliefs?

[takashi0]

Usually this just ends up with you looking like a moron btw

[tpwrtrmnky]

Angrily lashing out at the suggestion that it's possible to do basic media analysis was foundational to the ragebait ecosystem of the 2010s, from which we got basically the entire culture of modern far right politics, btw.

[iteh3xael]

I genuinely believe myself and others are being so sincere and literal when we say TOUCH GRASS

[tpwrtrmnky]

I went outside and got an education, that's where I learned that you can obtain knowledge and insight through analytical methods, then noticed that some people who sit on the internet yelling at strangers get really mad about that constantly.

[pensivegladiola]

Don’t make me point to the Omar Sakar poem

[manu-script]

[wispy--willows]

You have ranked up with the {Elf Faction}, you may now use the [Touch Ears Inappropriately] action without incurring reputation loss.

[penny-anna]

what the hell is going on

[penny-anna]

i believe in you Binface. you can do it. this could be your moment.

[penny-anna]

Please god it would be so funny

[penny-anna]

there is no downside to voting for Count Binface. its not taking away from other candidates bcos they aren't any and the more votes he gets the stupider Farage looks.

[penny-anna]

for people out of the loop:

Nigel Farage is the leader of Reform UK, a far right party who are currently in the process of a serious bid to become the UK government. they are just straight up evil.

Count Binface is an intergalactic space warrior with a bin on his head. he likes to run as a novelty candidate in general and mayoral elections. a big thing he likes to do is run as a candidate against the incumbent prime minister:

(Also pictured: Boris Johnson, Elmo)

Anyway, in brief:

Nigel Farage is currently in the midst of a big scandal about his finances

He has decided to deal with this by 1) making a show of nobly resigning from parliament and then 2) immediately running in the resulting by-election

He has stated that he is letting 'the people' judge his actions and implied that if he wins that will prove that he has been exonerated in the court of public opinion

His goal was presumably to get a big resounding win over the other parties, proving that The People still love him.

the other parties have thus far decided that this is a 'vanity election' and, well, there is one very easy way to ensure that he will not beat any of them, and that is simply not to play.

and as a result the only person who has so far confirmed they are running against him is Count Binface. no matter the outcome this makes Nigel Farage look like, u know, a fucking clown.

[butterflyslinky]

So what happens if Count Binface actually wins? Does he join Parliament? Does he have to take the bin off his face?

[penny-anna]

I've seen some people saying he would have to give up his title but it would seem that is no longer the case as of 1999; so, no, he can keep his ceremonial bin if he wishes.

Important to note also that Count Binface is the alter ego of comedian & political satirist Jon Harvey who seems to be an intelligent individual with reasonable politics. As I said no real downside.

[sparrowthemormon]

Charlie Kirk is scheduled to speak at UVU. I have the opportunity to do the funniest thing of all time

[sparrowthemormon]

IT WASN'T ME I PROMISE

[sapphire-wine]

[normal-horoscopes]

I legitimately think the first video game to ever say the word "bisexual" out loud was Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. There is a nonzero chance it was actually the first video game to print "bisexual" in a text format.

[normal-horoscopes]

It is very possible that the first video game character to ever say the word "Bisexual" out loud was Solid Snake.

[lakemojave]

Based on what I found, the first ever bisexual character in a video game was Curtis Craig from Phantasmagoria 2 (1996) but I have yet to find out if he says the word "bisexual" in the scene where this is revealed

[lakemojave]

He does not. He says he's attracted to his male best friend but he never says the word "bisexual."

The first ever character to ever correctly and overtly identify a person as bisexual was Solid Snake in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (2001)

[nyanbinyuri]

I once again have to point out for those who've never played mgs2 he says this when asked if another character that goes by the name of vamp is a vampire

[laliluleho]

Everyone here who hasn’t yet needs to see how fucking incredible this whole conversation is.

Snake: “He was at church when a bomb went off, got pierced by a crucifix, survived by drinking his family’s blood.”

Raiden: “So that’s why he’s called Vamp?”

Snake: “No it’s because he’s bisexual.”