hold on let me google something

what the fuck

happy Boston Molasses Flood to all who celebrate

IN TODAYS FISH NEWS

a breed of goldfish, so rare they were thought to be an urban legend by some, was found by u/heavypickle99 on reddit just a day ago.

a pair, lovingly named "Tater Tot" and "Chicken Nugget" because of their body shape, were found in a pond and initially thought to be a birth defect or healed injury, only to blow the minds of everyone else in the subcommunity

i gotta say folks, as far as lost media goes it'll be hard to top a find like this!

In love with this

hi I love this so much and you have made the world a better place by doing this. more people should follow this example. this should become a thing

[Image ID: tags by thesixthstar reading:

/. End ID]

Someone in my apartment complex also read this post, because I came back one morning and someone else's welcome mat was in front of my door.

Today I found out that yarners think crocheting socks is subversive and controversial and I just…on one hand, why the fuck not, I guess yarners are allowed to have their controversies, but on the other, how much time do you have in your FUCKIN DAY??

My main concern is how they would feel but Maggie u know yarn fandom gotta think about something while knitting five miles of stockingnette for a sweater

Look, you can’t just leave it at that, why is it subversive and controversial? *gets popcorn*

I mean, I’m taking this on good faith, and I’m not saying this is my own personal belief.  I believe in all crafts. 

But…the structure of the stitches and the resulting fabric is pretty different between crochet and knitting.  You get different effects between them, which lends themselves to different crafts.  And none of the effects of (most) crochet stitches lend themselves naturally to socks.  You’re (usually) going to end up with something either stiff and bulky, or full of holes that will Not Feel Good to walk on. Whereas knitted socks will just…BE elastic and comfortable.

Sure you CAN do it.  And there are people and patterns that do it well!!

But MOST crochet socks are a bit like calling this a bicycle

I mean… Okay?  But people are going to Talk.

But this is BABY controversy, this is nothing.  You haven’t even touched on the good shit like RHSS or that time the Olympic Committee dissed us.

Iiiinteresting. So one of those “just because you CAN doesn’t mean you SHOULD” things.

Also I know very little about the yarn fandom except for that bit where a woman had to fake her death and had a nervous breakdown over selling homespun/dyed yarn so like, I already have big expectations.

Was that the one that “died” of leukemia or the one that “died” of lupus, or the one that overdosed?

From what I know of the narrative as it was described to me, I want to say the one that overdosed, but I am intrigued and vaguely concerned that there are multiple distinct individuals the above situation could apply to.

hey umm, what the fuck

the fake deaths thing: indie yarn dyer gets popular, gets overwhelmed by orders, can’t refund money because of shitty bookkeeping, decides faking online death is the only way out.

i’m sure some of them are unintentional rather than premeditated scammers but they’re all still thieving assholes who shouldn’t be running businesses and need to give all the money back.

the olympics commitee: ravelry, well-known knitting (fiber arts in general) site, held a contest they called the ‘ravelympics’ to drum up olympic support then get a cease-and-desist letter for copyright infringement, and the letter said that calling it that ‘denigrates the true nature of the Olympic Games’ and was ‘disrespectful to our country’s finest athletes’

except, you know, ravelry had like 2 million users who all, by nature of ravelry being a website, have basic tech literacy. the social media backlash was so bad that the olympics board had to make 2 official apologies because the first wasn’t good enough.

RHSS: Red Heart Super Saver is cheap Walmart-level yarn. some people hate it because it used to be just really fucking awful and they haven’t bothered updating their opinions. some people hate it because they hate non-natural yarns. some people hate it because they’re yarn snobs(which, btw, comes in two flavors: the disdainful assholes and the people who just don’t see the point if you have the money and don’t indulge yourself). a lot of people defend it because it’s cheap and widely locally available and honestly not that bad after a wash and some fabric softener.

crocheted socks: exactly what kaitoukitty said. people who crochet socks tend to either be new crocheters who are not aware crochet is not the best medium for socks or experienced crocheters who are pushing the boundaries of the medium.

babies on fire: i can’t believe we’re talking about yarncraft controversies and no one mentioned babies on fire. that’s my favorite controversy.

so when deciding what material to make baby blankets out of, in addition to considerations like softness, ease of washing, and allergy concerns quite a lot of people like to consider what would happen to the baby if the blanket was set on fire. yes, really.

wool has the problem of hand-wash only blankets for a new mother (superwash wool exists but that’s a whole ‘nother paragraph), allergy concerns, and also real fucking expensive if you want quality not-itchy-on-baby-skin wool. but pro-wool-blanket people insist that because wool actually resists being set on fire pretty well and also can self-extinguish, it’s the only sensible choice.

acrylic on the other hand is cheap and you can throw it in the washing machine, and while bad quality acrylics might be stiff and plastic-y they’re not itchy, but if it gets set on fire it will melt onto the baby’s skin. pro-acrylic people insist that if your blanket is on fire, you probably have bigger problems than what the blanket is made of.

wow I didn’t expect such a detailed response. thank you!

Fiber Arts Just Be Fucking Like That.

what hte FUCK

A couple more from Ravelry:

If I ask my mother she could probably give me more. These are just what I remember off the top of my head. I don’t knit or crochet (I do cross-stitch and don’t really interact with the wider community) but my mother runs a small yarn dyeing business and has been part of the community on the Internet for a LONG time before that so I get all the juicy details on the drama.

It’s worth noting that the founders of Ravelry, Cassidy and Jessica Forbes (both women) are married to each other; and Cassidy is trans.

I had no idea this was the drama I needed on my dash today

It’s nearly Cozy Things Knitted By My Mother season!!!!

(via @scoutdoesstuff)

1) Yeah I’m not necessarily the biggest fan of the change but the timing and number of TERFs make it either the TERFs co-opted an existing complaint made by people who liked ravelry but had physical issues with the new site, or it was entirely FABRICATED by TERFs to try to make the founders problematic bc one of them is trans.

2) oooo now I want to try making a slipper in Tunisian crochet because you’re right, it makes a much flatter, knit-like fabric that might be actually quite pleasant!

3) I assume it’s a collective word for both knitters and crotcheters, since both work with yarn but their crafts are quite different. It’s the easiest most intuitive word to refer to both groups at once.

I don’t understand… I grew up in crocheted socks… I mean, they were more like house slippers because we didn’t really wear them inside shoes, but still. What’s wrong with 덧 버선?

I love that this looped back after all that to absolve the crocheted socks.

well it took me about 2 seconds to reblog this

HOLY FUCK

????????????

-person who forgot to take their not-feeling-terrible medication

So this post is the single reason I took my meds today. Reblogging out of duty.

WELL SHIT this post just helped me not skip my anti anxiety meds for a second day in a row 🤦‍♀️ Boosting for obvious reasons in that spirit

This is why I love the “Covid is faked” conspiracies. Like really?? You think the WHOLE WORLD is working together THAT EFFICIENTLY?? Even the countries that hate each other? Wow cheers for the optimism

Look up the manhattan project you dipshits

You mean the project where the only reason there was any secrecy was that none of the people had any part of the wide reaching project (Oppenheimer, Einstein, and all the others were pretty much kept way away from eachother) and was almost brought down as a secret in the group by one of the guys being an amateur safe cracker? That Manhattan Project?

The one where everybody near Los Alamos knew that something big was happening, because they were actively hiring during the War?

The one that had so many close calls to they’re working on some kind of bomb that by the time the war was over you had people involved blabbing, to the point the Rosenbergs happened?

THAT Manhattan Project?

The Manhattan project, the one that the editor of a science fiction magazine (I think it was Astounding) figured out was happening because all the physicists who subscribed suddenly changed their addresses to Los Alamos?

That Manhattan project?

We’re talking about the Manhattan project that Kodak had clearance to know about (and even got advanced warnings about tests) because they figured it out when radioactive fallout from the tests contaminated their x-ray film? That one?

And that was still just one government using the fullest extent of their power to try and keep just one secret in a time before cellular phone cameras or the internet. Imagine thinking multiple, rival governments agreed to fake a virus to fool just some of their citizens into staying home from work, while also agreeing to pay billions of dollars to compensate them for it.

The birth of Snake Venus

snenus

First off, this is hilarious, but secondly, the artist’s name is Bill Flowers and he literally goes by The Snake Artist because he just does a bunch of paintings like this.

He’s also apparently a “venomous snake wrangler.” He’s Australian, which I feel explains a lot.

@home-of-little-giants

hey artists just in case you feel despair at the rise of ai art please remember that the talking points of pro-ai people are as genuinely “ai art bad? but what if there was a PUCK girl who had Steampunk Tube Arm Prosthetic No Hand Syndrome that couldn’t draw because of no hands and you poured a biiiig vat of pencils in front of her really big and made her look at it sadddd style and she can’t just Pick Up Pencil and draw because No Hand ? what if that happened? then ai art… goood😃😄?”

the most ironic thing about pro ai people being like “BUT IMAGINE IF THERE WAS A DISABLED PERSON WHO COULDNT DRAW?! AI ART WOULD BE SUCH A USEFUL TOOL TO DISABLED PEOPLE WHO ARE PHYSICALLY UNABLE TO DRAW!” is that by virtue of saying that they have outed themselves as knowing jack shit about the online art world because a huge majority of artists have carpal tunnel or some other pain condition in their hands like tremors that makes drawing Painful. like ohhh wow yeah ….it would be such a huge innovation if there was …. a tool that would make drawing easier….it’s not like every art program on earth comes with ….. oh i don’t know… a stabilizer that would completely alleviate this problem..??? yeah it would be really nice if that would happen. but yeah it’s such a miracle of technology that we disabled people FINALLY have a method of creating art! by creating something completely artificial and inauthentic !!! it’s SUCH a gift from god THANK you random person on the internet! do you want all the disabled people in the world to come to your house and throw a party? do you want a cake? do y

Not to mention that it's also Incredibly ignorant that disabled people can't draw.

Because there are people without limbs who can do amazing art with only their mouths as a guiding tool, such as Mariam Paré and Grant Sharman.

Pro AI art people just refuse to do the work

Polish artist Mariusz Kędziersk, who is also self-taught and paints without hands.

Simon Ushakov painted this without hands in 1658

Natalie paints with her lips.

Artist Martin Sodoms from Capetown.

Chinese artist Guofu paints with mouth and feet.

All this in 5 minutes of googling. There are so many artists without hands creating art, all sorts of art, that AI "saving" disabled people is a horrible take.

And seriously speaking, does art need to be super awesome to be art? No. Draw a line. Great, you made art! Draw many lines with different colors. You made more art!

My house is chockfull of self-taught disabled artist. And I teach art to disabled people, among many others. Fuck AI.

I think the idea very idea that AI is an acceptable “art” form for disabled people is insulting. “You could never ACTUALLY make something so here’s a computer program so you can pretend.” Instead of ACTUALLY making accommodations so they can experience ACTUALLY creating something of their own.

These people don’t understand that “making art” is not just the final piece existing. That is the end result of a whole experience.

And its an experience literally anyone can have. Like the last person said, drawing a line makes you more of an artist than AI. Which I know, because I have personally taught multiple physically and mentally disabled people art across the whole spectrum of severity.

yknow it's a real shame that romans didn't have access to australia specifically for augury reasons. i really wish i could have seen a roman augur have to deal with australian birds. like imagine trying to properly interpret an omen from a fuckin. cassowary

loving that the general consensus here is that "the omen when you see a cassowary is that you are about to die of cassowary"

The cassowary evaluates your innards, not the other way around

These two are amazing!

@x-heesy 💃🏻🕺🏻 Friday vibes!

I want whatever it is that these two have

im honestly convinced trans girls have a natural advantage with everything at this point

im sorry your kid just can't do a wee jig

Conservatives in 2014: I don’t know, it’s kinda faggy for a man to dance.

Conservatives in 2024: women have a biological disadvantage at dancing due to the lack of the “dancer’s cock” that helps you balance and stay on beat.

Ok, so I use Em Carroll's His Face All Red to begin the horror unit in my graphic narrative course and today I had a student provide my ABSOLUTE FAVORITE TAKE on the comic.

They were like, "This isn't scary at all. It's a perfectly logical set of events."

And the class was like...what?

And they were like, "Clearly, the weaker younger brother didn't actually kill the stronger older brother. He bashed him in the head with a rock and, head wounds bleed a ton, so he thought he'd killed him, but he'd only stunned him. Older brother wakes up, climbs out of the hole, notices his coat is missing a giant chunk, and has a pretty good idea of what younger brother is going to do. SO he orders himself a new coat, has it delivered to a nearby village, waits two days for Amazon prime to show up with it, and then walks back to his home village on day 3 having decided to drive his brother absolutely insane in revenge. And then for the next several days he plays along with his brother's story and digs a hole next to his brother's house, except he doesn't stop there, he digs a tunnel that reaches back to the hole in the woods connecting the two. Because he knows that his brother is going to freak out at some point and go back to check if the body is still here. And when he sees his brother heading off into the woods one night, he hops into the farmhouse-hole and takes the short-cut tunnel to the forest-hole and puts on his old coat and rubs some sheep's blood on his face so that when his brother shows up he can roll over and be like 'whattup' so he'll lose his damn mind."

And then multiple other people in the class were like, "actually, yeah, if my sibling tried to kill me that's exactly how I'd handle it."

In honor of Halloween, I'd like to bring back my favorite day of teaching Em Carrol's His Face All Red.

"In one of Africa’s last great wildernesses, a remarkable thing has happened—the scimitar-horned oryx, once declared extinct in the wild, is now classified only as endangered.

It’s the first time the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the world’s largest conservation organization, has ever moved a species on its Red List from ‘Extinct in the Wild’ to ‘Endangered.’

The recovery was down to the conservation work of zoos around the world, but also from game breeders in the Texas hill country, who kept the oryx alive while the governments of Abu Dhabi and Chad worked together on a reintroduction program.

Chad... ranks second-lowest on the UN Development Index. Nevertheless, it is within this North African country that can be found the Ouadi Rimé-Ouadi Achim Faunal Reserve, a piece of protected desert and savannah the size of Scotland—around 30,000 square miles, or 10 times the size of Yellowstone.

At a workshop in Chad’s capital of N’Djamena, in 2012, Environment Abu Dhabi, the government of Chad, the Sahara Conservation Fund, and the Zoological Society of London, all secured the support of local landowners and nomadic herders for the reintroduction of the scimitar-horned oryx to the reserve.

Environment Abu Dhabi started the project, assembling captive animals from zoos and private collections the world over to ensure genetic diversity. In March 2016, the first 21 animals from this “world herd” were released over time into a fenced-off part of the reserve where they could acclimatize. Ranging over 30 miles, one female gave birth—the first oryx born into its once-native habitat in over three decades.

In late January 2017, 14 more animals were flown to the reserve in Chad from Abu Dhabi.

In 2022, the rewilded species was officially assessed by the IUCN’s Red List, and determined them to be just ‘Endangered,’ and not ‘Critically Endangered,’ with a population of between 140 and 160 individuals that was increasing, not decreasing.

It’s a tremendous achievement of international scientific and governmental collaboration and a sign that zoological efforts to breed endangered and even extinct animals in captivity can truly work if suitable habitat remains for them to return to."

-via Good News Network, December 13, 2023

Putting powdered sugar on the post below