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One qualm I’m having with Dexter original sin is the rewriting of Brian. They’re making him out to always be “evil” to juxtapose Dexter starting out “good”. In the original show, Brian was Dexter’s protector, Dexter even called him Biney. They were close and played together. They didn’t fight. But in original sin, Brian is mean to Dex, he’s killing lizards, creeping out adults, etc. And I guess they’re trying to give a real reason as to why Harry only took Dex out of the shipping container and not Brian, but the og gave us the reason. Brian was old enough to remember and have it change him, they didn’t know yet that Dex was also old enough for it to affect him. Idk the rewriting of Brian is kinda bothering me because the entire point of the first season was because Brian wanted a relationship with his brother in whatever form that had evolved to, and they’re taking that away.

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"It is what it is" I say as I almost vomit from anxiety

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mutuals do this

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Crazy to hear - I had always wondered why Danneel has pretty much just left the acting world...

But also, the "I don't like that we were all used in this episode to pile on Danneel" (and basically just objectify her repeatedly, by the sounds of it) bit...

Well, if they really cared about their friend so much they could've refused to say those things in the episode. It's not like they were imprisoned...

Like, yes, they shouldn't have to choose between the right thing to do or keeping their jobs/careers, but also, crappy situations sometimes put people in that position and people with integrity should choose to do what is right, not what is easy.

(x)

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Doctor Who The Unicorn and The Wasp | 4.07

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Problems with Trump’s new proposal to make insurance companies/the government pay for IVF:

1. IVF is immoral. Human life begins at conception. Human embryos are human beings. IVF commodifies, destroys, and endangers human embryos. An embryo created in IVF is statistically more likely to die before birth than to make it to term. Even in “ethical IVF” where only one embryo is created and implanted at a time, for a woman under 35 that child has a 49% chance of dying before birth. There is no other circumstance in which we would tolerate putting a child in a situation where they had a 49% chance of dying. For women over 35 the survival rate goes down dramatically. Since older women are more likely to be candidates for IVF (you have to have been trying for a while before it’s even recommended, and many women today don’t start trying until their 30s or later), the chance of death for many embryos created in IVF is between 75-95%.

It is impossible to know the success rate for natural implantation, because a woman cannot know if she has conceived until after implantation has already occurred. However, it would be reasonable to assume that the natural method of conception would be less risky for the embryo than creating an embryo in a lab and trying to perfectly time the implantation attempt, often by using drugs that artificially manipulate the mother’s hormonal cycle.

Note: in the article linked above, a 60-65% success rate is referenced before they get to the age breakdown. However, it should be noted that that rate is for “genetically normal” embryos, implying that you only get that rate if you’ve already destroyed any embryos that are not genetically perfect. But even if you decide to be a eugenecist and not consider generally “inferior” embryos to be people, that’s still a 35-40% risk of death, which again we would not tolerate for any other situation involving a child.

2. Religious freedom. For the same reason we have the Hyde Amendment to prohibit federal funding of abortion, and for the same reason that Hobby Lobby won their Supreme Court case, forcing either taxpayers or employers to fund IVF is forcing people to participate in something they consider to be morally indefensible. Both the Catholic Church and the Southern Baptists have condemned IVF, along with many smaller denominations and individual churches/religious groups.

3. It is not the best solution to our birth rate issues. IVF will not get us to replacement rates. We need cultural shifts that encourage women to start having children in their 20s (many fertility issues stem from waiting too long) and better overall health for women (healthy food, less environmental toxins). Let’s instead focus on letting RFK Jr. step in as part of Trump’s cabinet and work on getting the toxins out of our food and fixing nutritional recommendations to reflect the actual science, not lobbyist agendas.

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things that should be free:

water

food

electricity

healthcare

internet connection

period products

transportation

contraceptives

all medications

every level of school (prek-university)

and these shouldnt even be controversial

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Well, if you took it out of that pot and planted in the ground or a massive pot, it'd grow much stronger. Of course, it'd also no longer be a bonsai, but that's kinda the point: A bonsai is a tree that's been forced to grow in such a fashion that it's really weak.

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They're fragile because they've already *been* maltreated in the way they've been forced to grow in such a tiny pot.

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Children certainly aren't "pure" or "untouched by sin", but they are largely defenceless...

That is why it is is important to protect them from abusive people - because they can't do it themselves: They aren't "pure" (anyone who's ever seen a child throw a tantrum knows they'll still use manipulative tactics to get what they want), but they don't know about all the kinds of tactics adults know of, thus they're more easily tricked...

Children don't matter because they are "pure" and "innocent" and "untouched by sin."

Children matter because they are human beings. We should not be associating children with purity because it is dehumanizing rhetoric. It isn't about saying that children are not pure, but that we should be treating them as equals because we recognize they are people, not because they are "purer." Children should never have to be "pure" to be treated as people.

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They go to all the trouble of cross writing and then put such a massive amount of space between the lines that they could've gotten the same amount of text on the page by just writing the lines with less spacing...

Here are two 19th Century “cross written” letters. Cross writing was a technique to save paper when paper was scarce.  Every scrap mattered at one time (one of these is dated 1823) so the writer, upon reaching the end of the page, would turn the paper 90 degrees and add a second layer of text.  Once it becomes familiar, the mind adapts easily and cross written letters are surprisingly legible.  Charles Darwin famously used the technique.   ��

(Fact Source) Follow Ultrafacts for more facts

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A good lesson for today's culture in here... People need to forgive those who've hurt them, instead of always blaming others, wanting more "reperations" to be done, when it'll never actually be enough for them.

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Not exactly. Sure, capitalism isn't perfect, and we'd like to improve how we run it, but the vast majority of people live a fairly comfortable life in capitalist countries. Especially compared to the vast majority of people in countries like North Korea.

You can't tell me you'd prefer to live in North Korea right now than the US?

And if you're talking about workers in other countries being exploited for US companies' gain, you do realise that many of those workers are in communist countries, whose own governments should be protecting them, but aren't?

s10e05, oxygen // s11e07, kerblam!

lol. lmao even

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Except for that thus far, communism has become like China & Russia *every single time* whereas while capitalism as seen in countries now isn't perfect, it's still a whole lot better.

Pro-communists keep saying "*this time* we'll get it right" instead of accepting that communism in real life just won't work out the way you hope it will in an ideal world.

Better to improve the capitalist system. For example, human punishment for human harm - eg if a company takes shortcuts that get people killed, you don't fine them as the system currently is. The people who made that deadly decision should get prison time.

That way, when a CEO is considering putting people's lives at risk, he isn't going "will I be fined more or less than the profit I'll make from it if I get caught". He'll know he's risking going to prison.

s10e05, oxygen // s11e07, kerblam!

lol. lmao even