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sorry the onion has been killing it lately unfollow if you disagree
How dare you put things in chronological order
Everything I know about the assassination of Julius Caesar I learned from the Shakespeare play about it. Which is the historical equivalent of getting all my news updates from memes.
Now would be a good time for everyone to understand how the US dollar hegemony works, and how oil was leveraged to turn the dollar into a weapon. Here, it goes like this:
1. The United States creates dollars, which costs them essentially nothing.
2. Over time, US military power compelled the biggest oil producers (starting with Saudi Arabia in 1974) to trade exclusively in dollars.
3. When a company needs oil, it needs dollars to buy it. You can obtain dollars in a number of ways: you can take a loan or you can sell shoes to the US or teacups to Europe. Notice that the factory has to ship actual shoes to the US or to third markets in order to obtain, basically, a bookkeeping entry that took the US microseconds to create.
4. The oil company receives the shoe factory's dollars in exchange for oil. It invests these dollars into US treasury bonds or securities, which is really the only sensible thing they can do --cash deprecates in value over time, and there are virtually no other risk-free places to park your billions of dollars worth of oil earnings.
5. The US puts part of the investment it received into military use, so that it can keep anyone who would dare to detach from this dollar hegemony in check. The rest goes to enrich the US. Return to step 1.
Note that this mechanism is essentially an obfuscated tax on the rest of the world. An Iranian shoe factory has to obtain dollars if it wants to buy oil, and the oil company is incentivized to store its dollars in the US treasury. This means that part of the value that foreign capitalists would otherwise pocket actually ends up in the United States.
To obtain a million dollars, the US government pushes a button; to obtain the same million a Bangladeshi factory has to sew 500 000 T-shirts.
Because the oil bill comes in dollars and the only deep, liquid, politically safe asset is a US Treasury bond, value flows to Wall Street.
In other words: The US creates money, manufactures a need for everyone to hold some of that money, and then incentivizes them to return that money to the US.
The petrodollar was only ever the beginning. Many things are gated behind the dollar: Shipping, aviation, SWIFT transactions, etc. Everyone needs dollars; if you can't get any you're going to struggle in the global capitalist economy. This is why the US gets to create seemingly endless dollars and have them still hold value, it's why the US can bend anyone reliant on the dollar to their will via sanctions; the dollar itself acts as a weapon. Of course, the status quo is maintained at gunpoint, and the dollar's value is ultimately backed by US military might. The United States exports death.
Because of all of this, the US has an enormous material incentive to keep oil flowing, to keep its military spending high, and to topple any and all projects that would endanger this system. To stop the flow of unequal exchange, to stop the coercive taxation over the rest of the world, would be to destabilize the US empire. Anyone who would provide an alternative must necessarily be seen as an adversary.
Want to nationalize your oil? Want to deal in another currency? Are you another military superpower? No? Too bad, here's one million drone strikes and a new *democratic* government for you.
This is why shifting to renewables has been such a struggle in the west, this is why the planet is warming, this is why the US is engaged in endless wars, this is why most of the world is poor, this is why millions have died. This is imperialism and it must be dismantled.
mythbusters was so good because it wasn't a killjoy show. they didn't just say "see, it doesn't work" and leave it there
whenever they find that the stunt doesn't work as portrayed in the movie, they immediately ask "what would it take to make this happen?"
“we know it takes this amount of explosives to work, but what if we doubled it anyway?”
Some myths I'll always remember:
* Are elephants scared of mice? (They only did that because they were in Africa and had access to elephants.)
* Will a bull run amok in a china shop?
* Is it better to run zig-zag or straight when chased by an alligator?
I love these because NONE of them turned out the way they expected. They went into all three with pre-conceived ideas of how it would go, and each time they "failed." Elephants WILL cower from mice. A bull moves very gingerly through a china shop. It doesn't matter how you run because ALLIGATORS WON'T CHASE YOU.
And each time, they reacted with just... pure glee. "Holy shit, we were wrong! Oh my god! This is great! We were so wrong!"
And that, to me, is what science is. Being excited about being wrong because either way it's information.
🔬This scientist crafts stunning visual art through chemistry.
Forbidden marbles
I honestly think Gen-Z and younger simply does not understand how recent widespread smartphone adoption is.
I am not that old, and I didn't have a smartphone until probably late high school. For most of my life, many if not most people were not walking around with a magic internet machine in their pocket that they pulled out and used constantly for everything.
reblog if you remember having to ration your text messages and accidentally opening the internet on your phone was the end of the world
Tragedy alignment chart. Feel free to use, but please reblog if you do.
And of course the second part of the tragedy, which is: which quadrant did you think you were in vs. which one you were really in
for the most part the epstein files don't demonstrate anything not already demonstrated by the polanski letter or the subsequent elections of donald trump then joe biden then donald trump again. the world is not ruled by a secret organisation of child abusers—the abuse of women and children just isn't a deal-breaker to most people seeking useful social and financial connections in a misogynist society
You have now traveled back to 315 BCE in China, during the Warring States period, and have become the Governor of Shu(Sichuan) Commandery. The King of Qin has ordered you to harness the Min River—a tributary of the Yangtze that poses a flooding threat to the Chengdu Plain. What would you do?(cr 扇子有画)
Dujiangyan is considered one of the greatest hydraulic engineering projects in human history. Constructed during the Warring States period under the direction of Li Bing, the Governor of Shu Commandery, and his son, it has spanned over 2,300 years and remains fully operational today. Water conservancy experts from around the world frequently visit the site. In 2000, UNESCO inscribed Dujiangyan as a World Heritage Site, recognizing it as "a living heritage of water management" and "the oldest and only surviving large-scale hydraulic project in the world that operates without a dam." It stands as an outstanding example of global water conservancy culture. The design of Dujiangyan is remarkably ingenious, adhering to the principle of minimal intervention. It works in complete harmony with nature, causing no ecological disruption. For over 2,300 years, it has had no negative environmental impact, embodying the Daoist philosophy of "harmony between humanity and nature" to the fullest extent.
The water of Dujiangyan is very clear, appearing green when sediment levels are low. The surrounding ecology is also thriving, with people often spotting otters—an indicator species highly sensitive to water quality—frequenting the area. A netizen from northern China visited Dujiangyan and was deeply moved by its grandeur. She later posted a question online: "I love Dujiangyan so much—would the people of Dujiangyan mind if I had my ashes scattered here after I die?" This sparked lively discussions, with the top-voted comment as follows:
Jokes aside, Cnetizens genuinely love Dujiangyan. Mount Qingcheng, where Dujiangyan is located, is one of the important birthplaces of Daoism. During the Eastern Han Dynasty(25–220 CE), Zhang Daoling cultivated his practice and founded a Daoist sect here. Mount Qingcheng is renowned for its "ethereal seclusion under heaven." Especially on overcast days, the mountain brims with a profound spiritual energy—a presence that photos cannot convey. One must experience it in person to feel as if stumbling into a realm of cultivation, akin to the world of an xianxia novel.
OP: When exploring outdoors, don't act recklessly — not every body of water you see is meant for swimming. (cr 神秘园)
OP: When exploring outdoors, don't act recklessly — not every body of water you see is meant for swimming. (cr 神秘园)
Stuck on the idea of vampires as a kind of reverse fae, or like someone's twisted, perverse attempt at moulding humans into fae.
They're repelled by liminal spaces.
A vampire could never enter fairyland, not just because they'd never be welcomed, but because most of the usual entry-ways are naturally barred to them.
They can't cross running water. They can't be seen in mirrors. They will wait forever at a crossroads, unable to pick a direction to go in. They can't even step over a thresh-hold unless there is absolutely no ambiguity about whether they are welcome inside.
They crave human blood, iron and salt, but are repelled by herbs and plants. They are supernaturally prevented from harming you unless the rules of hospitality have been invoked.
A fairy may replace your newborn child with something unnatural and ever-hungry. A vampire will do the same, but with your grandmother's corpse.
The fae are typically associated, even in stories where they're the bad guys, with flourishing and purity. Vampires, even in stories where they're the good guys, are typically associated with decay and corruption.
The fae turn ancient human burial mounds into fancy halls for their courts. Vampires take ancient human castles and let them grow mildewed and cobwebbed, exchanging the beds for coffins, turning them into burial places.
Fae don't tend to live among humans, but can generally pass for them with relative ease if they so choose. Vampires nearly always live among humans, but tend to find not revealing themselves a huge struggle.
I can't think of many stories I've read where fae and vampires even exist in the same universe, let alone ones where they actively interact. I feel like their enmity is almost more inevitable than that between vampires and werewolves, however.
The rivalry between vampires and werewolves is, essentially, the rivalry between two apex predator species who share a territory. (Even in stories where the werewolves aren't actually hunting humans.)
The vampires hate the werewolves because the werewolves interfere with their access to prey. The werewolves hate the vampires either because they consider themselves aligned with humans (the prey species), or because they are also predators and the vampires are competing with them.
By comparison, I think there's some story potential in the fae finding something genuinely creepy and uncanny valley about vampires.
They're immortal, like them, but also dead. They can be beautiful, like them, but that beauty is something they actively require humans to sustain. They like to inhabit beautiful and ancient ex-human dwellings, like them, but they actively work to make those places dark, damp and empty.
Fairies who are unflappable in the face of all sorts of Otherworldly monsters, can look an eldritch horror in the eye(s) without blinking, and have never been phased yet by any human, but will recoil from even the weakest vampire.
Vampires who hate fairies just as much, but in a more envious way. The way that the creature for whom immortality is a curse is bound to hate the creatures for whom immortality is an eternity of sunlight and laughter.
Maybe their touches burn each other. Maybe vampires can't stand physical contact with anything so alive and vital. Maybe immortal fairies become ill from too much exposure to the undead.
Maybe they fight over the human population when their territories overlap. The fairy need for servants and people to make deals with, competing with the vampire need for thralls and blood to drink.
Just… fairies and vampires. We need more stories about them interacting.
the most elegant dismissal of “why are there pyramids all over the world” that I’ve heard was “what’s the easiest structure to build? A pile of stuff. What if you wanted to make the pile stable? You’d turn it into a pyramid shape” and I forgot where I heard this but it reminds me of “notice how there’s flood myths all over the world” feels a lot less interesting if you ask “notice how civilizations that leave written records are often located next to rivers or other bodies of water and what’s a catastrophic natural disaster that can happen to cities next to bodies of water”
i'm not an expert, but thru the years of tension surrounding gender/sex and participation in sports, i have always wondered why it isn't as strong a talking point in leftist circles to push for. no gender/sex division in sports. and where weight or stature matters, to classify players by weight/stature, like in boxing. and i understand arguments that gendered upbringing means some people's baseline capacity dwindles compared to others, but especially if it's children we're talking about, just. train them all with the same diligence, same basic skill set. and go from there. and again, i clearly understand why a right winger's philosophy is against this, but i don't understand why, in my real life conversations with leftists who care about either trans/intersex/marginalized children's well-being, sports in general, or both, that isn't even more common a talking point