15
Knife-TotingRat 15 points ago +15 / -0

That's the same year Brian Mulroney opened up Canadian immigration from an adjustable 80K per year, to 260K per year and ratcheting only upward.

After he took away Baby Bonus and said we were a mature country that didn't need to pay people to have babies to grow any more.

5
Knife-TotingRat 5 points ago +6 / -1

Individualism .... is "white supremacy" ... and therefore must be crushed out of existence ....

Even though the "let your freak flag fly" movement is supposed to be the end-all, be-all of individualism ...

Sense the trap yet, mousies?

9
Knife-TotingRat 9 points ago +9 / -0

Yup, I saw an article earlier today accusing Musk of letting Yemeni arms dealers do their thing openly on X.

2
Knife-TotingRat 2 points ago +2 / -0

Aye, Canada has - or used to have - film-maker tax credits that amounted to the same thing. So it was more profitable to make a movie that failed, rather than try to compete in the theatres against Hollywood films. So that's why Canadian movies/media of the second half of the 20th century really, really sucks outside of maybe the NFB's short animations.

2
Knife-TotingRat 2 points ago +2 / -0

It's been a while, but yeah, I did do a binge read of a bunch of mostly TNG books, especially Diane Duane (at least she tended to remember the cat folk existed). But that was years and years ago now.

1
Knife-TotingRat 1 point ago +1 / -0

It's kind of a reminder that for every Wesley who passes with a 90+ average, there are also the Barclays who just fumble through and pass with one mark over the pass-fail threshold ...

6
Knife-TotingRat 6 points ago +6 / -0

Yep, I figured the "let your freak flag fly" movement was exactly that - get everyone to "out" themselves for weeding out later.

2
Knife-TotingRat 2 points ago +2 / -0

It's not just "public education", it's been the perception since forever. It's the flip side of the coin to deaf people who can't speak being considered automatically "stupid" (hence the shift in meaning that the word "dumb" originally meant. Medieval writers knew the difference.)

The best example in popular culture is probably the goddamn Professor from Gilligan's Island. The castaways expect him to know everything - but he's a goddamn botanist. No wonder his glue didn't hold - he's not a chemist. He might know THAT a certain sap or plant is used for something, but not how to use or extract what you need from it.

Or Hermione from HP. Great at book learning, but she couldn't get it though her thick skull that House Elves are not slaves and don't want to be "freed". Ron and Hagrid tried to tell her that Dobby was an exception ("There's oddballs in every bunch, Hermione")

10
Knife-TotingRat 10 points ago +10 / -0

If you read well, and pass tests, people think you're "smart". Unfortunately, they also think "smart" = "knows everything", so they will fail to explain things to you, or train you properly, and you wind up having to figure shit out for yourself, at which point you have to pray you do have the smarts you've been gaslit into thinking you have.

-1
Knife-TotingRat -1 points ago +2 / -3

Lower Decks has been the most Trek thing going at the moment. That's where all the writers who cared went, I think.

The first episode did irk me, though. Redoing the whole "Officer and its Kid" dynamic is tired enough, but anyone who doesn't understand that whether something is "farm equipment" or "weaponry" is entirely in how it's being used at the moment and declares how much they "hate authority" should never have graduated Starfleet Academy in the first place. Show gets better from there, though, esp. from the second season on.

6
Knife-TotingRat 6 points ago +6 / -0

Well, the faggots who "sought a better way" followed Surak. The ones who were happy with the way they were became Romulans. I think the peaceful faggots started a war and chased the proto-Romulans away, iirc ...

3
Knife-TotingRat 3 points ago +4 / -1

Accused witches and lycanthropes were also accused of using potions or salves for to shapeshift ... the alleged recipes for which are all nothing but psychoactive and somewhat toxic plants.

First robots, now witchcraft. Might as well be a different IP.

2
Knife-TotingRat 2 points ago +2 / -0

Ran that through google translate, just for funsies.

Taka is Swahili for "garbage" ...

10
Knife-TotingRat 10 points ago +10 / -0

Meanwhile, nignogs and pakijeets can run around stabbing people with impunity

1
Knife-TotingRat 1 point ago +1 / -0

Well, the version of the Ramayana I read was a "down to earth" retelling of it that replaced the monkeys with a bunch of hermits, but the gist of it was there ...

Read a similar version of Gilgamesh, in which Innana was simply a spiteful priestess, and the bull belonged to the temple, etc.

I think one or the other of them was written by one of the "cyberpunk" guys.

Library books, 30 or 40 years ago.

Never actually took Hamlet, or MacBeth. Wound up getting "Romeo and Juliet" three fucking times, though.

4
Knife-TotingRat 4 points ago +4 / -0

The Lion King (og) also strongly resembles the Ramayana, the story of Rama from Hindu lore.

Rama is a prince whose jealous uncle murders his dad, the King, and takes over, banishing Rama (though in this story, the girlfriend opts to be exiled with him, which becomes a plot point); after some filler adventure, the girlfriend is kidnapped by the Demon King, and Rama stumbles onto the og Monkey King, Hanuman and his people (Timon and Pumbaa). The monkeys agree to help Rama get his girlfriend back, and then they all go reclaim Rama's kingdom.

And because Rama was an avatar of Vishnu, Hanuman was rewarded by being Ascended into godhood.

But hey, backstabbing royalty/"elites" have been pretty much the norm throughout human history. It's only recently they started backstabbing the commoners more than each other, it seems ...

7
Knife-TotingRat 7 points ago +7 / -0

See, that's where it's fuzzy.

I've heard it used the same way as subspecies, but also as simply to refer to variants within a population, that haven't split off into their own populations, like, say, black wolves amongst grey/timber wolf populations, or redheads within northern teutonic/saxon/celtic populations.

Two races can hybridize into their own populations as well, such as Metis or Mexicans, amongst humans, or like I remember seeing Red Wolves might be (a self-sustaining group of coyoteXwolf descendants), or the European Wisent (genetically discovered to be a cross between an extinct relative of the North American bison and the Aurochs.)

Real speciation can only really happen if there's a long enough break in geneflow for genetic drift/adaptations to take enough effect to hinder the two populations from producing offspring that are both viable and fully fertile. (viable meaning they don't tend to die before being able to breed, fully fertile means they can breed with either parent species, or each other. Horses and donkeys are two different species because while mules and hinnies are viable, they're not fertile. There's a species of European crayfish that split off from another species about 25-30 years ago, but the new species is completely parthenogenic; they produce clones of themselves and do not/cannot mate with the males of the parent species.)

Strain or variety could also refer to what humans think of as bloodlines, or breeding lines.

19
Knife-TotingRat 19 points ago +19 / -0

If tall Dutchmen and Pygmies were judged by another species using the EXACT SAME FUZZY RULES humans use when classifying other animals, they would totally be two different subspecies (races) AT BEST. If they were only known from fossils, they would TOTALLY be two different species, maybe even different genera.

The problem is thinking "race" is on the same level as "species", when it's more like "sub-species".

There are technically only one species of rabbit, and one species of hare. All rabbits can breed with any other rabbit (including domesticates), and all hares can breed with any hare. But hares and rabbits can't crossbreed.

1
Knife-TotingRat 1 point ago +1 / -0

Reality is Unrealistic X Prefers the Illusion.

The farther away from nature/reality humans get, the more they think their impressions of How Things Should Be seem more real than reality itself.

1
Knife-TotingRat 1 point ago +1 / -0

https://tomsmith.bandcamp.com/track/rocket-ride

Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, Nothing worth doing that I haven't tried. There ain't no living on planet-side, Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.

How many cities crumble into dust At the first atomic attack? How many self-aware, wise, and just Computers will we have to hack?

How many supercars will turn to rust 'Cause we don't have a spare or a jack? Give me technology we can trust, And give it fins like a Cadillac.

I want a shining tower of glass and steel, A rubber jumpsuit and a freeze-dried meal, The will to survive, the need to explore, The love of adventure, who could ask for more?

I want you, baby, right by my side, Help me get out before my brain is fried. The stars are waiting, so big and wide, Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride. Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.

How many demons out in cyberspace Will possess every hacker's will? How many members of a master race Will come closing in for the kill?

How many xenomorphs will change their face, And then hunt us down for a thrill? Give me a villain with style and grace, And a little bit of fencing skill.

They used to be angular, sneering and bald, If someone got killed even they were appalled, They tried to marry the heroine, no thought of rape, And they sure as hell knew how to wear a cape.

They never tortured, they never lied, They'd honor a promise if it meant they died. Let's find a villain with professional pride, Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride. Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.

Terminators, Life Force, Robot Jox, Predators, Lots of things that know how to flense, Defenestrate 'em out the doors, gimme gimme Star Wars, Bring back the Children of the Lens.

Puppet Master, Child's Play, Fright Night, Judgment Day, Jason, Freddy, Michael, and Stripe, Let Frankenstein, Ardeth Bey, and Kong chase them all away, The Movie Snatchers' pods are overripe.

I want more than action and special effects, To think about what might happen next, A hero, not a weapons shop with pecs, A heroine, not an excuse for sex.

I want a bubble helmet matting down my hair, The ground giving way to the open air, The joy and wonder as I head out there, And I know I can have it, if I only dare.

How many bodybuilding macho jerks Will blow everything full of holes? How many imitation Captain Kirks Will spill beer on the ship's controls?

How many stupid personality quirks Will we see instead of souls? Give me my baby and a ship that works, And give us the starring roles.

I want to cruise the galaxy at FTL, Pursuing Heaven and defying Hell, I want to do everything that a man can do, And I want to do it all out there with you.

Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, Nothing worth doing that I haven't tried. There ain't no living on planet-side, Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.

Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, Nothing worth doing that I haven't tried. There ain't no living on planet-side, Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride. Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride. Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride. Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.

2
Knife-TotingRat 2 points ago +2 / -0

That was part of an attempted attack on Jehovah's Witnesses that the media staged in the 1990s.

It kinda backfired, because people hate JWs, and don't give a shit what happens to their fucking kids, if they don't grow up to knock on doors, great. So they dropped it.

3
Knife-TotingRat 3 points ago +3 / -0

Isn't this the law that was meant to stop wizards from turning mundane objects into (potentially dangerous) magical ones, that then might find their way into unsuspecting Muggle hands?

The law that Arthur broke the hell out of himself by making himself a nifty flying car?

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