spreading this around for a longtime Twitter acquaintance, he’s absolutely legit, and his idea for helping people plan medical tourism should get off the ground sooner rather than later. I tried to indent the link box text to make it more readable, but Tungle is being a piece of shit about it.
From the Canadian Museum for Human Rights:
On the night of August 16, 1933, after a softball game at Toronto’s Christie Pits Park, a gang of young men unfurled a white banner. On it was a black swastika, symbolic of Nazi Germany’s persecution of Jews. It was directed at a team of mostly Jewish teens from Toronto’s Harbord Playground. Anti-Semitism had been mounting in Toronto, then an overwhelmingly British, Protestant city. Groups called “swastika clubs” had formed to intimidate Jews. The banner sparked a riot. Youth from Italian and Ukrainian backgrounds rallied to the Jewish side. The six-hour brawl marked a turning point for resistance to anti-Semitism. It led to a Toronto ban on the swastika.
“Did these people [in academia who claim that they are not exposed to disabled people] realize that when they encountered the work of Rosa Luxemburg (who limped), Antonio Gramsci (a crippled, dwarfed hunchback), John Milton (blind), Alexander Pope (dwarfed hunchback), George Gordon Brown (club foot), [Jorge] Luis Borges, James Joyce, and James Thurber (all blind), Harriet Martineau (deaf), Toulouse-Lautrec (spinal deformity), Frida Kahlo (osteomyelitis), Virginia Woolf (lupus), they were meeting people with disabilities? Do filmgoers realize when they watch the films of James Ford, Raoul Walsh, André de Toth, Nicholas Ray, Tay Garnett and William Wyler that these directors were all physically impaired? Why is it when one looks these figures in dictionaries of biography or encyclopedias that their physical disabilities are usually not mentioned – unless the disability is seen as related to creativity, as in the case of the blind bard Milton or the deaf Beethoven? There is an ableist notion at work here that anyone who creates a canonical work must be physically able. Likewise, why do we not know that Helen Keller was a socialist, a member of the Wobblies, the International Workers of the World, and an advocate of free love? We assume that our ‘official’ mascots of disability are nothing else but their disability.”
— Lennard J. Davis, Enforcing Normalcy: Disability, Deafness, and the Body (via irwonder)
It’s so sad in “bug ID groups” how often someone shows a spider they already killed “just to be safe,” like, you couldn’t scoop it into a jar until you knew? And there just AREN’T any spiders dangerous enough that you have to kill them first. There is no spider that just up and kills you with a bite. Even the world’s most venomous is only that dangerous if you have an unusual sensitivity to it or a heart condition. Nobody has died of a black widow in decades. People do the same shit with snakes and I do not get it. What do they think will happen if they fail to chop the head off every “deadly” snake they see chilling outside? It’s gonna teleport into their house and murder them? What about all the ones living in the area that they just didn’t happen to see? What’s the difference? Death penalty for daring to accidentally enter a human’s line of sight? “Wehhhhh I have kids and dogs” well maybe you should monitor them when they’re outside if you live where there might be deadly wildlife, genius
I’ve politely explained the danger level of spiders to probably hundreds of people but never have I just been instablocked for it with no further explanation, that is a new one the hostility in the comments on this is unreal in places and honestly really saddening
i want actual sources
“Almost all brown recluse spider bites heal nicely in two to three months without medical treatment at all. Also the long-term medical outcome is excellent without treatment.”
“Black widow spider bites can be dangerous, especially to young children and elderly people. Hospital treatment is sometimes needed, but fatal bites are rare.”
“Most so-called spider bites are caused by something else.”
“a national study found that nearly 30 percent of people with skin lesions who said they had a spider bite actually had methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections. [other causes included] fleas, bedbugs, and other viral and bacterial infections”
“Only when the spiders were being pinched between two fingers (with the mouthparts already positioned right up against their ‘attackers’) did biting start to become a more common, last-resort tactic”
“ According to the Australian Museum, the number of human deaths from authentic spider bites of any kind in Australia since 1979 has been zero. “ (this was published before 2016) (this was published in 2016:)
“A 22-year-old man has died after being bitten by a poisonous redback spider … in what is believed to be the country’s first fatality from a spider in almost 40 years. “
I read somewhere that the reason recluse bites can be bad is because they’re natural carriers of MRSA, is that true?
Nope! The real truth is that we’re natural carriers of MRSA. The staph bacteria responsible for MRSA already live on basically everybody. There are various reasons they might suddenly cause a rash or a more severe infection, and might do so wherever they get into even the smallest wound. Venom suppresses immune system activity around the bite or sting site, so an envenomated wound is slightly more likely than a normal wound to get infected. The worst proven recluse bites however still only caused maybe a pea-sized scar. People find this super hard to accept, but aaaaaallllll the stories of people losing fingers and arms and huge patches of skin to a recluse spider are completely unconfirmed and probably had nothing to do with a spider at all!
So the other night during D&D, I had the sudden thoughts that:
1) Binary files are 1s and 0s
2) Knitting has knit stitches and purl stitches
You could represent binary data in knitting, as a pattern of knits and purls…
You can knit Doom.
However, after crunching some more numbers:
The compressed Doom installer binary is 2.93 MB. Assuming you are using sock weight yarn, with 7 stitches per inch, results in knitted doom being…
3322 square feet
Factoring it out…302 people, each knitting a relatively reasonable 11 square feet, could knit Doom.
Hi fun fact!!
The idea of a “binary code” was originally developed in the textile industry in pretty much this exact form. Remember punch cards? Probably not! They were a precursor to the floppy disc, and were used to store information in the same sort of binary code that we still use:
Here’s Mary Jackson (c.late 1950s) at a computer. If you look closely in the yellow box, you’ll see a stack of blank punch cards that she will use to store her calculations.
This is what a card might look like once punched. Note that the written numbers on the card are for human reference, and not understood by the computer.
But what does it have to do with textiles? Almost exactly what OP suggested. Now even though machine knitting is old as balls, I feel that there are few people outside of the industry or craft communities who have ever seen a knitting machine.
Here’s a flatbed knitting machine (as opposed to a round or tube machine), which honestly looks pretty damn similar to the ones that were first invented in the sixteenth century, and here’s a nice little diagram explaining how it works:
But what if you don’t just want a plain stocking stitch sweater? What if you want a multi-color design, or lace, or the like? You can quite easily add in another color and integrate it into your design, but for, say, a consistent intarsia (two-color repeating pattern), human error is too likely. Plus, it takes too long for a knitter in an industrial setting. This is where the binary comes in!
Here’s an intarsia swatch I made in my knitwear class last year. As you can see, the front of the swatch is the inverse of the back. When knitting this, I put a punch card in the reader,
and as you can see, the holes (or 0′s) told the machine not to knit the ground color (1′s) and the machine was set up in such a way that the second color would come through when the first color was told not to knit.
Someone port Doom to a blanket
I really love tumblr for this 🙌
It goes beyond this. Every computer out there has memory. The kind of memory you might call RAM. The earliest kind of memory was magnetic core memory. It looked like this:
Wires going through magnets. This is how all of the important early digital computers stored information temporarily. Each magnetic core could store a single bit - a 0 or a 1. Here’s a picture of a variation of this, called rope core memory, from one NASA’s Apollo guidance computers:
You may think this looks incredibly handmade, and that’s because it is. But these are also extreme close-ups. Here’s the scale of the individual cores:
The only people who had the skills necessary to thread all of these cores precisely enough were textile and garment workers. Little old ladies would literally thread the wires by hand.
And thanks to them, we were able to land on the moon. This is also why memory in early computers was so expensive. It had to be hand-crafted, and took a lot of time.
(little old ladies sewed the space suits, too)
Fun fact: one nickname for it was LOL Memory, for “little old lady memory.”
I mean let’s also touch on the Jacquard Loom, if you want to get all Textiles In Sciencey. It was officially created in 1801 or 1804 depending on who you ask (although you can see it in proto-form as early as 1725) and used a literal chain of punch cards to tell the loom which warps to raise on hooks before passing the weft through. It replaced the “weaver yelling at Draw Boy” technique, in which the weaver would call to the kid manning the heddles “raise these and these, lower these!” and hope that he got it right.
With a Jacquard loom instead of painstakingly picking up every little thread by hand to weave in a pattern, which is what folks used to do for brocades in Ye Olde Times, this basically automated that. Essentially all you have to do to weave here is advance the punch cards and throw the shuttle. SO EASY.
ALSO, it’s not just “little old ladies sewed the first spacesuits,” it’s “the women from the Playtex Corp were the only ones who could sew within the tolerances needed.” Yes, THAT Playtex Corp, the one who makes bras. Bra-makers sent us to the moon.
And the cool thing with them was that they did it all WITHOUT PINS, WITHOUT SEAM RIPPING and in ONE TRY. You couldn’t use pins or re-sew seams because the spacesuits had to be airtight, so any additional holes in them were NO GOOD. They were also sewing to some STUPID tight tolerances-in our costume shop if you’re within an eighth of an inch of being on the line, you’re usually good. The Playtex ladies were working on tolerances of 1/32nd of an inch. 1/32nd. AND IN 21 LAYERS OF FABRIC.
The women who made the spacesuits were BADASSES. (and yes, I’ve tried to get Space-X to hire me more than once. They don’t seem interested these days)
Holy shit I want to know more about these women
Oh, Tumblr, I’ve missed you.
Always reblog.
this is the best most concise takedown of safe space critics I’ve ever seen
Congrats anon for being the second anonymous I have blocked from this blog. :)
Canada brings in 300,000+ immigrants every year. We’re doing fine.
Also this:
But don’t let facts get in the way of your racism and xenophobia.
Interestingly, there are many people that think that Canada should be larger. Like, at least 100 million people. At our present size, we lack the scale to do things like implement great transit systems, and really build our cities.
Canada has always been a nation of immigrants. As a percentage of our population, we’ve always accepted more immigrants than the USA.
CBC ideas podcast on how many people Canada should really have:
The Atlantic’s article on how Canada is and always has been an immigrant nation:
Beautiful big almond eye, realistic and full of expression as she gazes gently at you. Elbowed antennae and delicately segmented legs and body. Gorgeous pearlescent sheen like she is glowing. This ant moisturizes. This ant is round and huggable. This ant is a star. 11/10.
Beautifully detailed, lifelike pose but with an unexpected neck and odd antennae, perhaps scared straight. Her eyes suggest she has seen things. Her expression confirms she has seen too much. She is haunted and I want to know more. 7/10.
Floppy antenna, pointy muppet face, oddly posed legs. What is she? She has no waist. May be she is some kind of bee in disguise? I find her unsettling. 3/10.
This ant has an unexplained, double-jointed thorax, and no evidence of a waist. Her four-footed pose suggests that she a centaur rather than an ant. Centaur ants would be cool. I’m not sure what was intended here. 2/10.
Good first impression, kind of bland in the details. This ant has no particular waist to speak of, floppy rather than elbowed antennae, and an inexpressive face. Her color scheme is soft and hazy. I like the sharp angles of her stylishly sophisticated legs. This ant may not know quite were she is going, but she knows how she is getting there. 6/10.
Were you even trying. 0/10
Gasp! This ant is elegant. This ant has a beautiful tapered thorax, a segmented abdomen, alert, elbowed antennae, and a light-footed pose. This ant’s face suggests curiosity and a desire to explore the world. This ant inspires me. I want to be like her. 10/10
3-legged, waistless centaur-ant with strange, limp antennae and a beak. I don’t know what this is? It kind of reminds me of a Hork-Bajir. 1/10, not an ant.
This ant… makes me sad. All of her legs are broken. The MS Paint art style and gradient abuse convey distress. She has a duck beak. Despite this, her expression suggests perseverance and determined cheerfulness. I want this ant to have a better life. I am rooting for her. 3/10
This ant is a bold and challenging mixture of photorealism and caricature. She is broad and low-built and seems very sturdy. She looks like she would help you move. This ant is a dependable friend. 9/10
A picture of an ant from a children’s book. She is wearing little boots. This ant is wrong in every way, and yet I can’t stay mad at her. 7/10
An interesting, top-down view of an ant; her legs are positioned with slightly jarring symmetry. Nevertheless, her overall impression is that of a graceful, stylized design, like a pictograph. She is suitable for adorning fine garments and jewelry or perhaps gracing the walls of a tiny ant church. I like this minimalist ant. 8/10.
This is a termite. -10/10
“they” (1 word) is shorter than “he or she” (3 words)
“they” is more inclusive than “he/she”
“themself” flows more naturally than “him or herself”
“they” is less clunky than “(s)he”
it’s time to replace the awkward “she or he”
“hey can you go ask they what does they want for dinner, and when is they coming over to watch movies with they?”
“Hey, can you go ask them what they want for dinner, and when they’re coming over to watch movies?”
Step one is learning how to talk like a human person.
Friendly reminder:
“I shouldn’t like to punish anyone, even if they’d done me wrong.” —George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss (1860)
“A person can’t help their birth.” —William Thackeray, Vanity Fair (1848)
“But to expose the former faults of any person, without knowing what their present feelings were, seemed unjustifiable.” —Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (1813)
“Every Fool can do as they’re bid.” —Jonathan Swift, Polite Conversation (1738)
“So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses.” —King James Bible, Matthew 18:35 (transl. 1611)
“God send every one their heart’s desire!” —William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing (~1600)
“Now this king did keepe a great house, that euerie body might come and take their meat freely.” —Sir Philip Sidney, the Arcadia (1580)
“If … a psalme scape any person, or a lesson, or els yt they omyt one verse or twayne…” —William Bonde, The Pylgrimage of Perfection (1526)
“And whoso fyndeth hym out of swich blame, / They wol come up and offre a Goddés name” —Geoffrey Chaucer, The Pardoner’s Tale (~1380)
“þan hastely hiȝed eche wiȝt on hors & on fote, / huntyng wiȝt houndes alle heie wodes, / til þei neyȝþed so neiȝh to nymphe þe soþe [Then hastily hied each person on horse and on foot / hunting with hounds all the high woods / ‘til they came so near, to tell the truth]” —William and the Werwolf (transl. ~1350-1375)
“Bath ware made sun and mon, / Aiþer wit þer ouen light [Both were made sun and moon / Either with their own light]” —Cursor Mundi (~1325)
We’ve been using they/them/their pronouns to indicate a person with unspecified gender for a long ass fucking time. The only reason it’s become a big issue lately is because it can be used as a semi-respectful term for trans and non-binary folks and we can’t have that can we
These fucks are literally trying to change our language to hurt trans/nb folks, and claiming that’s just the way its always been
how did that person forget the word ‘them’
Books by: Cherie Dimaline Stephen Graham Jones Daniel Wilson Hope Nicholson, editor Elizabeth Lapensée and Weshoyot Alvitre, editors
[Tweet by @medievalpoc reads: People of color are not an anachronism. Art history can be a mirror for everyone, you just have to keep looking.
the face of a bird who fully understands what he did and will do it again.
WHAT DID HE ORDER???
OMFG HE ORDERED A WHOLE BUNCH OF STRAWBERRIES
berries.
berries.
berries.
I legitimately haven’t cried laughing like this in fucking forever omg I’m dying. This bird is so pure and just wants a million orders of berries
A user interaction with the Visual Chatbot, a thing made by researchers looking into “meaningful dialog with humans in natural, conversational language about visual content.” I’m trying to figure out what is natural about the above conversation.
The Octavia Project:
The Octavia Project uses the creative power of science fiction to imagine new futures and greater possibilities for our world. We create spaces of imagination for Brooklyn teens, blending creative writing, art, science, and technology to create rich, interdisciplinary workshops that encourage critical thinking, build confidence, and develop skills in a myriad of subjects.
We use the lens of science fiction and fantasy to examine our current world and see the social and legal contracts that shape our city, schools, streets, and neighborhoods. Our teens gain the understanding that the world around them was created by a series of choices, and those choices can be modified, remade, or replaced by something new. Our inspiration and namesake is Octavia E. Butler, who broke barriers in writing and science fiction to become an award-winning and internationally recognized author (Kindred, Lilith’s Brood). We are inspired by her visions of alternate futures and commitment to social justice.
octaviaproject.org
Dr. Michelle Martin is a researcher and professor at California State University, Fullerton. She has a Masters of Social Work, Masters in Global Policy, and a Ph.D. in Peace Studies (Political Science). She teaches Social Welfare Policy in the Master of Social Work program.
The following is her write-up on the separation of families at the border. She dispells a lot of common myths going around and provides sources which are linked. This might be helpful in your personal debates and discussions.
———————————————-
There is so much misinformation out there about the Trump administration’s new “zero tolerance” policy that requires criminal prosecution, which then warrants the separating of parents and children at the southern border. Before responding to a post defending this policy, please do your research…As a professor at a local Cal State, I research and write about these issues, so here, I wrote the following to make it easier for you:
FALSE. The policy to separate parents and children is new and was instituted on 4/6/2018. It was the “brainchild” of John Kelly and Stephen Miller to serve as a deterrent for undocumented immigration, and some allege to be used as a bargaining chip. The policy was approved by Trump, and adopted by Sessions. Prior administrations detained migrant families, but didn’t have a practice of forcibly separating parents from their children unless the adults were deemed unfit.
[ source ]
FALSE. Annual trends show that arrests for undocumented entry are at a 46 year low, and undocumented crossings dropped in 2007, with a net loss (more people leaving than arriving). Deportations have increased steadily though (spiking in 1996 and more recently), because several laws that were passed since 1996 have made it more difficult to gain legal status for people already here, and thus increased their deportations (I address this later under the myth that it’s the Democrats’ fault). What we mostly have now are people crossing the border illegally because they’ve already been hired by a US company, or because they are seeking political asylum. Economic migrants come to this country because our country has kept the demand going. But again, many of these people impacted by Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy appear to be political asylum-seekers.
[ source ]
FALSE. Most of the parents who have been impacted by Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy have presented themselves as political asylum-seekers at a U.S. port-of-entry, from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. Rather than processing their claims, according to witness accounts, it appears as though they have been taken into custody on the spot and had their children ripped from their arms. The ACLU alleges that this practice violates the US Asylum Act, and the UN asserts that it violates the UN Treaty on the State of Refugees, one of the few treaties the US has ratified. The ACLU asserts that this policy is an illegal act on the part of the United States government, not to mention morally and ethically reprehensible.
[ source ]
FALSE. We are a country that has an above-ground system of immigration and an underground system. Our government (under both parties) has always been aware that US companies recruit workers in the poorest parts of Mexico for cheap labor, and ICE (and its predecessor INS) has looked the other way because this underground economy benefits our country to the tune of billions of dollars annually. Thus, even though many of the people crossing the border now are asylum-seekers, those who are economic migrants (migrant workers) likely have been recruited here to do jobs Americans will not do.
[ source ]
FALSE. First, in the case of economic migrants crossing the border illegally, criminal prosecution has not been the legal norm, and families have historically been kept together at all cost. Also, crossing the border without documentation is typically a misdemeanor not requiring arrest, but rather has been handled in a civil proceeding. Additionally, parents who have been detained have historically been detained with their children in ICE “family residential centers,” again, for civil processing. The Trump administration’s shift in policy is for political purposes only, not legal ones.
See page 18: [ source ]
FALSE. The increase in asylum seekers is a direct result of the increase in civil conflict and violence across the globe. While some people may believe that we shouldn’t allow any refugees into our country because “it’s not our problem,” neither our current asylum law, nor our ideological foundation as a country support such an isolationist approach. There is very little evidence to support Sessions’ claim that abuse of our asylum-seeking policies is rampant. Also, what Sessions failed to mention is that the majority of asylum seekers are from China, not South of the border.
Here is a very fair and balanced assessment of his statements: [ source ]
FALSE. Neither the Republicans nor the Democrats caused this, the Trump administration did (although the Republicans could fix this today, and have refused). I believe what this myth refers to is the passage of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, which were both passed under Clinton in 1996. These laws essentially made unauthorized entry into the US a crime (typically a misdemeanor for first-time offenders), but under both Republicans and Democrats, these cases were handled through civil deportation proceedings, not a criminal proceeding, which did not require separation. And again, even in cases where detainment was required, families were always kept together in family residential centers, unless the parents were deemed unfit (as mentioned above). Thus, Trump’s assertion that he hates this policy but has no choice but to separate the parents from their children, because the Democrats “gave us this law” is false and nothing more than propaganda designed to compel negotiation on bad policy.
[ source ]
FALSE. Criminal court is a vastly different beast than civil court proceedings. Also, the children are being processed as unaccompanied minors (“unaccompanied alien children”), which typically means they are in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR), which is part of the Department of Health and Human Services (DHS). Under normal circumstances when a child enters the country without his or her parent, ORR attempts to locate a family member within a few weeks, and the child is then released to a family member, or if a family member cannot be located, the child is placed in a residential center (anywhere in the country), or in some cases, foster care. Prior to Trump’s new policy, ORR was operating at 95% capacity, and they simply cannot effectively manage the influx of 2000+ children, some as young as 4 months old. Also, keep in mind, these are not unaccompanied minor children, they have parents. There is great legal ambiguity on how and even whether the parents will get their children back because we are in uncharted territory right now. According to the ACLU lawsuit (see below), there is currently no easy vehicle for reuniting parents with their children. Additionally, according to a May 2018 report, numerous cases of verbal, physical and sexual abuse were found to have occurred in these residential centers.
[ source ]
LIKELY FALSE. The ACLU filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on 5/6/18, and a recent court ruling denied the government’s motion to dismiss the suit. The judge deciding the case stated that the Trump Administration’s policy is “brutal, offensive, and fails to comport with traditional notions of fair play and decency.” The case is moving forward because it was deemed to have legal merit.
[ source ]
FYI for your next conversation with a Republican
But if you lived with your best friend who was at minimum 12 times your size (I did the calculations) and did everything together wouldn’t you try and climb on top of them sometimes? I’m just, saying cats do make sense.
