A bit of earth

Focus 2024: Just chaos at this point, honestly

[depsidase]

[crabussy]

wow I love to sit crosslegged without moving for several hours straight!

[crabussy]

okay time to straighten my legs man I'm so excited

[crabussy]

I f eel like a suit of armour that was attacked by a welder

[crabussy]

I am nineteen years old

[crabussy]

I am so sorry I just turned 20 I hope you can forgive me

[crabussy]

. yeah okay true I did do that

[marzipanandminutiae]

Wait how is Artemis propaganda? I thought it's just space nerds doing something really really cool (I say this as a space nerd myself)!

It is – but it's also part of an undeniable pattern where the US as a political entity does cool and flashy and impressive things while the government is committing horrible acts they would prefer people not pay attention to. This is pretty much true regardless of timing because they are almost always committing horrible acts they would prefer people not pay attention to 

I wouldn't go as far as to say that that is the singular or even main purpose of our space program, by any means. It IS about scientific exploration and discovery. However, the degree of publicity around it is partially fueled by a desire to make the country look better on the international stage, and has been pretty much since the Cold War.

Very much one of the situations where you have to be able to hold two things in your mind at the same time, and I am very cognizant of the fact that people in other countries have every right to say "I'm not super excited about your astronauts orbiting the moon when your government is blowing up children in other countries and they would very much rather we focus on the astronauts orbiting the moon." Because like… That's absolutely a logical and rational way to feel! Our government is doing horrible things! Our government is usually doing horrible things, and that absolutely disgusts me and I try to use my voice and power as a citizen of a republic to stop it! And they're not wrong about the role that media promotion of the space program has played and continues to play in US government propaganda!

(it's also not uniquely a US thing to do that with one's space program, but you know. We're the ones who just did a big space thing at the moment, and one of the ones committing atrocities)

I'm not sure I would phrase it as "Artemis is propaganda" myself, because that implies propaganda being the primary purpose of an entire space mission, which of course it isn't. But to say "there is a propagandistic element to the promotion of the Artemis mission through official US government channels like social media and press releases" is absolutely true IMO

... and so is "the Artemis mission is amazing and in many aspects captures the best nature of humanity, as well as involving innovative science and technology and leading us to greater understanding of the universe we live in"

[ssfoc]

Artemis II captures a full view of the Oriental Basin (06.04.2026) via NASA

[intellectually-voluptuous]

x

i'm so. emotional at the thought of this very professional, highly trained crew delaying their first meal (in a day scheduled down to the minute!) in sheer awe at the view of earth receding. and then getting the windows grubby in their excitement ;-;

[the-big-mood]

[wizardshark]

How do I explain Plato's allegory of the cave to my cat?

[sexshopshenanigans]

gato’s allegory of the fishtank

[vibraph0ny]

Everyone's all "ohhh 2026 bring back physical media" until I start talking illuminated manuscripts and then suddenly we're not on the same page anymore

[somewhere-south-of-neutral]

Actually we are on the same page. We've been on the same page for a week because these things take forever to make

[ihavedonenothingright]

Actually we are on the same page. We've been on the same page for a week because this sentence deviates from the standard version of the text and the lettering is just a little too smudged to distinguish between the minims with any certainty. We're currently trying to figure out if this says omnem or omnium (the abbreviation is just omm). We're probably going to be here for some time.

[theshitpostcalligrapher]

listen i'm fucking working on it

[wizard-council-bureaucrat]

the king has abruptly fired 60% of his wizard staff, so he’s about to be abruptly surprised at who floated 100% of his formerly floating sky castle

[hyper-lynx]

I heard they're planning to maintain their levitation rites with autonomous constructs from now on, saying wizards are going to be totally obsolete within the season... so, ah, I'd invest in falling island insurance.

[scilas]

Preserving not-prev-but-someone-elses funny tags in this chain as well because I love both these additions actually,

[bitowhump]

GOD I need to write an essay about what fucking fearmongering pieces of shit the Non-GMO Project is. FUCK. GAH.

[bitowhump]

Listen. Listen. You don't understand how much they piss me off. Fucking "non-GMO tomatoes" at a time when there's no goddamn GMO tomatoes on the market bastards. Fucking "Non-GMO salt" there's no goddamn genes to modify in salt you jackasses. Fucking "GMOs create superbugs" knowing jack shit about refuge farming irresponsible shitbags. Fucking "citing a republished redacted study with no apparent changes to the content of the goddamn study" shit-stirring know-exactly-what-they're-doing cowards. FuCking "think of the children" targeting parents and particularly mothers so more people buy their purposefully fucking misleadingly labelled products greedy pieces of SHIT. GODDAMN FUCKING "GMOS CAUSE CANCER" NO CONTROL STRAIN OF LAB RAT THATS WHOLE FUCKING THING IS GETTING CANCER CALLING-THEM-RAT-BASTARDS-WOULD-BE-AN-INSULT-TO-RATS ROTTEN PUDDLES OF SLIME.

[bitowhump]

I'm incredibly normal about this topic, I promise.

[bitowhump]

The thing is there are real issues with GMOs and the Real Problem is not that the Non-GMO Project is anti-GMO, but that they're exactly the same as Monsanto, they're just placing themselves in strategic faux-opposition to them so they can seem morally upright while Also profiting off of GMOs in a deeply predatory manner

[bitowhump]

But don't quote me on that. Because, unlike SOME PROJECTS, I believe in scientific integrity, and that extends to integrity in citing your sources.

Which is why I need to write a proper essay about these fuckers.

[celebrinienjoyer]

i need to show you all something that made me crylaugh last night. just fucking look at them.

[thesylverlining]

It's fine they just went a little nuts with the character creation face sliders

[sjerose]

No. Middle. Sliders.

[ch4nn3l4st4tic]

[therisingking]

[h2ocolors-blog]

Eva Funderburgh

love her work

[s-olipsism]

she still makes these and they’ve only grown more wonderful over the years. The wood-fired surfaces really give them life.

love these lil guys

[kaijudove]

happy make a terrible comic day!!! i haven't stopped thinking about this post since i saw it. in 2018 a common merganser was spotted with 76 (SEVENTY SIX!!!) chicks!! that's SOOOO many baby. so much success.

[xenthosss]

Heres a picture btw

[icebear4president]

The Artemis II crew filmed an 80s sitcom style video on their way to the Moon

[aspaceinthecosmos]

lunar flyby photos just dropped! here’s my favorites!

you can see all the mission photos, plus nasa’s explanations of them on their website!

[i-post-hilarious-shit]

[eknippp]

Some of my favorite quotes from Artemis ii so far:

"Copy. Moon joy."

"I have two Microsoft Outlooks, and neither one of those are working."

"Houston, if you could give me about 20 new superlatives in the mission summary for tomorrow that will help out my vocabulary a little bit, that would be great. Thank you."

“If you’ve ever seen the top of the spotlight of the top of the Luxor at night in Vegas, this looks like what it wants to be when it grows up.”

"To all of you down there on Earth... we love you, from the moon."

"We just went sci fi."

"It is so great to see Earth again. To Asia, Africa, and Oceania: we are looking back at you. We hear you can look up and see the moon right now. We see you too."

"We will always choose Earth. We will always choose each other."

“It’s a bright spot on the moon, and we would like to call it Carroll.”

[tevruden]

People always wonder why we need to risk sending humans out to do this when we can just send a robot. I think this is a good explanation.