Welcome Traveller

Call me Qwerty, she/they, adult Low Maintenance Soul High Maintenance Brain

[that-one-idiot-11]

i think about this scene often.

[charlesoberonn]

America has a weird relationship with cults where they’re terrified of small cults (or organizations they think are cults) but completely normalized massive cults that hurt many more people (eg: LDS Church, Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Amish, Scientology, most Megachurches)

[charlesoberonn]

To anybody asking if the Amish are a cult, the answer is yes, very much so.

They’re a high control group that isolate you from society. The cult decides how you dress, how you behave, who you marry and how. They control what you know, blocking all information from the outside world. They control how you feel and what you’re allowed to think with threats of both social and supernatural harm. They’re a cult.

[charlesoberonn]

The best method to determine if a group is a cult, in my opinion, is Steven Hassan’s (cult expert and former cult member himself) BITE model.

BITE stands for Behavior Control, Information Control, Thought Control, and Emotional Control.

The more points a group “scores” on the model, the more of a cult it is.

I think this model is the best one for several reasons:

It’s more nuanced than “cult” or “not cult” and doesn’t make false equivalences between groups

It’s versatile, applying to groups big and small, and cults of all kinds, religious, political, financial, etc.

It focuses on what’s important, which is what the cult does to its members, and those members’ experiences, and not on irrelevant details like how uncommon their doctrines are or whether they have a charismatic leader

[charlesoberonn]

This is a great example of Thought Control used by cults whenever they’re confronted with criticism.

[saxifraga-x-urbium]

#you might notice that there are a lot of similarities between cult techniques and those of abusive partners#and that is an important thing to be aware of

yah that goes in the post

[charlesoberonn]

The creator of the BITE Model considers abusive relationships to be two-person cults.

[forgotn1]

It’s important to note that almost every sect of evangelical christianity in the US today fails the BITE Model.

[alp-crispy]

This was the post that lead to breaking my JW mindset. Been a while since I seen it.

[charlesoberonn]

I’m glad I could help in your deconstruction, if only a little bit. I wish you all the luck in your journey moving forward.

[charlesoberonn]

It’s tricky with parenting, because parents have to control their children’s lives to start with, since newborns are incapable of taking care of themselves.

A healthy parent will gradually relinquish control as their child grows and becomes more capable. And even while they’re in charge, they will treat their child with honesty and transparency and respect. They’ll prepare their child for independence, giving them the tools they need to live their own life.

A culty, abusive parent will go far beyond the level of control that their role requires. They will use manipulation and undue influence, taking advantage of their child’s naivete and malleable mind for the parent’s own benefit and agenda. They will continue to exercise this control well into their child’s adulthood, possibly their whole life.

[redstonedust]

some people like to get mad at disability benefits because they think its unfair people who dont work get a payout from the government while they have to work 50 hours at the human suffering factory every week. but if you tell them "yeah that sucks i think you should also get a universal allowance and not have to work 50 hours at the human suffering factory every week" thats apparently the wrong answer.

[hope-for-the-planet]

New Solar Tech Makes Desalinating Seawater Cheaper Than Producing Bottled Water

Engineering teams around the world have been attempting to develop new methods of seawater desalination.

Scientists in China have developed a more efficient form of solar desalination that uses 47.4% less energy than alternatives. After the first year of testing, the scientists believe that at scale it would be able to desalinate water more cheaply than producing bottled water.

The goal is now to scale the technology for use in coastal areas and islands experiencing water insecurity.

[midnightssea]

what if the US adopted the UK tradition of the head of government resigning in disgrace as soon as people start getting mad at them. let’s try it just once and see what happens.

[ip2lb]

x

[thehappysnail-deactivated202210]

Holy fuck

[musingsofaraven]

This works best if you keep windows closed.

Another design is using 2 20x25x1 filters, taping them to the sides of the box fan and then to each other so they sort of make a triangle, then cutting cardboard to make a top and bottom to the triangle.

This was discovered as a more effective design during the 2020 US west coast fires.

https://tombuildsstuff.blogspot.com/2013/06/better-box-fan-air-purifier.html

Better Box Fan Air Purifier

A better more efficient and odor eliminating homemade air purifier than just taping a 20x20x1 filter to a box fan. Sometimes you need to

[runcibility]

If you live on the west coast of the United States, fire season is coming and this is vital.

[turtlesandfrogs]

We’ve been using one, and they’re great. Might try to make the double filter version this year.

[objectconstancy]

theyve been doing a bunch of studies on this during the pandemic and this design is best! 4 filters and a shroud to optimize flow rate.

Corsi-Rosenthal Cube

Corsi-Rosenthal Cube

https://encycla.com/Corsi-Rosenthal_Cube

[ryanthedemiguy]

Something is better than nothing, one is enough if it’s that or nothing!

[statisticalcats2]

There are gonna be people who won't like hearing this but if you want to live in a world where mixed marriages, families, and adoptions (particularly POC adopting outside their "race") aren't maligned and discriminated against, then you have got to get more chill about seeing someone partaking in something cultural that you don't think fits the "race" you perceive them as.

[statisticalcats2]

It's a vague memory now, it was a vague memory even at the time I made this post, but I think what sparked this was remembering stupid comments I saw about a Chinese-American cookbook that were complaining about it being written by a white woman and then I looked the white woman up and the briefest research showed she was adopted as a child into a Chinese-American family and just....

*pinches nose*

Fellas, is it cultural appropriation to inherit your family's culture but you don't pass the blood quantum test?

All of you are literally just racist. You've come full-circle. You're working under the belief that people are supposed to "keep to their own kind" and that means the socially invented concept of "race", and "race mixing" of any sort is unnatural.

[roscolux]

need to beam this tweet directly into everyone's minds right now

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

a thing that was so interesting about the vampires in Sinners is genuinely what huge losers they are. get bit and immediately start talking like the most annoying youth pastor you know.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

which is a really cool choice because it emphasizes how deeply Off they are. there are obviously the big tells in their behavior, like Bo not reacting to a man getting mauled five feet away or Cornbread getting weird at the door, but the way they speak is also really off with the cadence of the movie the audience has gotten accustomed to. the characters are friends, family, they know each other enough to make jokes, trade barbs, argue, swear. they talk in an informal, natural way with each other. one bite later and it's "excuse me my brothers and sisters in the one race, the human race, won't you pretty please let me come inside to rejoice in your company 🥺"

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

the kkkouple that remmick turns first are a really effective storytelling shorthand. we know basically nothing about them pre-vampening except that they're trigger happy racists, so when you see them turn up all smiles at a Black juke joint parroting everything remmick says you immediately get a pretty solid grasp of what getting bit does to a motherfucker

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

obviously I'm arriving to this party really late and I've already seen almost every bit of this movie dissected down to the minutia, but I've not seen anyone talk about klanwife's line about how the vampires are "starting a new klan, built on love." crazy good line, made me figuratively need to take a seat. really cuts right to the heart of the dissonance between what mr. o'vampire says he believes and the nightmare bullshit that he's actually doing.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

I keep thinking about the big vampire group song because it's like. god this scene is good. it circles back to my point about remmick being a loser, because getting a couple dozen new vampire thralls and using them to do an elaborately choreographed song and dance is peak loser shit.

but it's also horrifying, absolutely horrifying, for the living characters who are looking on because a.) they're watching their dead family and friends and neighbors, most of whom are covered in blood and visibly injured, get danced around like puppets and b.) it's the first time the characters are really getting a taste of the hivemind bullshit the audience has already been clued in on and c.) sure, they're just dancing for now, but they're realizing just how many hungry vampires are waiting outside to kill them at the first opportunity and take Sammie. so that's a nightmare for them.

so you could read that as a deliberate intimidation tactic on remmick's part, trying to overwhelm the survivors into giving up, but then you're like, okay, maybe in his mind this is a display of how good it is to be a vampire. isn't it good? doesn't it look fun? look how much fun we're having! you could come have fun too if you want! just let me in :3 I don't think that's impossible, that he'd be totally oblivious to how he comes across. the newly-turned vampires seem pretty bad at faking their interpersonal skills; all memory of how to act human beyond the most superficial level seems to really go out the window pretty immediately. remmick seems a little cannier than that, since we see him try to play on people's emotions more than once--appealing to the kkkouple's fear of the Choctaw to gain their shelter when he realizes they're klan, trying to lower Mary's guard by sympathizing with her over her dead mother, pressuring Grace by threatening her daughter. obviously some of those efforts are more successful than others, but he at least seems to have an ability to read the room that other vampires lack.

but it's also not a stretch at all to think he might sincerely be that clueless, because that whole song and dance number is remmick's whole thesis statement, which is that when he says he believes in "equality" he means that he'll kill anyone and turn them into one of his tools regardless of who they are. like sure, whatever, I'm willing to believe that he does sincerely find the klan objectionable, but he's also just packed full of shit. his version of equality is one where everyone's equal under him, acting out his own culture and history for his pleasure. thinks he's not racist because he doesn't care that Sammie's Black but still wants to take away everything that makes Sammie an individual and just keep the musical talent to perform a crude facsimile of being Irish.

and this is getting so long but that scene of all the vampires dancing in step in the dark, cold and washed out, is contrasted so well with the earlier scene inside the juke where everyone is warmly lit, revolving around Sammie but not beholden to him, dancing in their own styles side by side with spirits of the past and future blending different styles and cultures. that scene is such a gorgeous visualization of musical traditions persisting through time and place, connecting people across generations, growing and changing fluidly as people take inspiration from the past, while all of remmick's songs show people being very forcibly trapped in the past, unable to grow or move on. when he encounters something beautiful in the present all he can think to do is own it, destroy it, bend it into the shape of history. pathetic!

[tgatbc]

[thebotanicalarcade]

Beatrix Potter

Writer, illustrator, conservationist, natural scientist

For the inaugural Arcade Feature, I'm excited to tell you about Beatrix Potter. Most people (including me) know her best for her picture books-

-which have sold over 250 million copies since they were published in the early 1900s.

Fun fact: In 1903, Peter Rabbit was the first fictional character to be made into a patented stuffed toy, making him the oldest licensed character.

But what really caught my attention is the work she was doing before Peter Rabbit came along.

Beatrix Potter had a scientific eye for detail, and was able to faithfully depict the world around her. In particular, she was interested in mycology.

In 1897, she put forward a paper to the Linnean Society in London... but as a woman was not allowed to be a member of the society nor attend the meeting when her paper was read. When the society's members did not pay much attention to her work, and fearing her samples to be contaminated, Potter withdrew her paper, which became lost. Only after Potter left hundreds of mycological artworks to a museum in the Lake District, UK, on her death in 1943, were her scientific talents recognized... Potter's precise and beautiful paintings and drawings of fungi are now helping modern mycologists in their efforts to identify species.*

Potter eventually moved away from books in favor of land management and farming. She was a prize-winning sheep breeder and a prosperous farmer, and bought several farms surrounding her own to preserve the unique hill country landscape. Much of that land now constitutes the Lake District National Park.

Keep an eye out for more Beatrix Potter throughout the month of February.

* Fry, C., & Wayland, E. (2024). Introduction. In The Botanists’ Library, The Most Important Botanical Books in History (1st ed., pp. 9–10). introduction, Ivy Press.

More

[kittycatdraws29]

Let’s just say, episode 9 changed my perspective of episode 5 and 6. It explains Ragatha’s behaviors towards Jax getting close with Pomni and she said “Jax is corrupting her”. I thought corrupting meant Pomni changing for bad, not literally

So she has been trying to protect her, to not let the history repeat

After all, she lost her friends because of JAX

[saturn-leia]

doomed yuri

[ohwhatagloomyshow]

do you remember why you followed prev

yes :)

no :)

Remaining time: 4 days 13 hours

[junkratsadstuck]

here at the sandwich shop, we’ve started to notice some people who are new to sandwiches aren’t used to meat and cheese between two slices of bread. they find this practice strange and confusing. that’s why we’ve decided to cut the bread out all together. from now on, we’ll just serve slices of meat and cheese on a plate.

[junkratsadstuck]

we know that many of our loyal sandwich shop customers have been coming here for years to buy our delicious sandwiches. but some people don’t “get” sandwiches, and we need to try and appeal to them with an easier-to-understand meal format. we will no longer be serving sandwiches. all of our food will just be cold cuts on a paper plate. we love our customers and appreciate your understanding <3

[derinthescarletpescatarian]

Yes we know Craig's Cold Cuts down the street does cold cuts better than we do and has millions of customers. That's why we need to switch to cold cuts, to get their customers. We hope that our long-time sandwich loving customer base will be patient in this transition to cold cuts and welcome the certain influx of Craig's Cold Cut customers who will surely come here to enjoy our worse cold cuts with you, our sandwich-deprived customer base, whom we value so much.

[isawken]

hey man. nice regional dialect. mind if i apply some baseless assumptions about your personhood to it? i was also gonna prescribe morality to it as well. if that’s cool with you

[roseredfingers]

“You think that you can judge what’s good or evil from whether you enjoy doing it or not. You think that evil is what always appears in the form of a temptation, while good is what you never spontaneously want to do. I think this is all total rubbish, if you don’t mind me saying so. Brecht is always showing the temptation towards good as something that you have to withstand. If you go back into political theory, you can read the same thing in Machiavelli, and even in a certain sense in Kant. So Eichmann and many other people were very often tempted to do what we call good. They withstood it precisely because it was a temptation.”

— Hannah Arendt, The Last Interview and Other Conversations