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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 27th, 2023

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  • If they can guarantee that they’ll finish the story, I’m on board with the shows. But most of the time, the story is either cut short or it’s extended indefinitely. In film, you can usually bet that by the end, the major plot points will be resolved. You can’t say the same about television (at least when it comes to series that explore a single storyline throughout as opposed to sitcoms that have more self-contained episodes).

    There are obviously exceptions in both cases, but I’ve been bit enough times by good shows that raised a bunch of questions right before being canceled.


  • Thomas Jefferson, 1787

    And what country can preserve it’s liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is it’s natural manure.

    I think this quote puts it aptly. It obviously comes from a more tumultuous time, but the United States was borne out of the idea that violence is a valid response to injustice. Law and order are preferable to anarchy, but that doesn’t mean that all law is valid. When the laws are used to insulate the powerful few against the many, what reason is there for the many to follow the law?

    This often-cited quote from Jefferson urges regular rebellion against the law so that the powerful will never lose sight of how tenuous their position is. If you let the powerful manipulate the laws for their own benefit against the interests of the rest of society, you’ll be left with a population that has no interest in upholding the law.

    That is ultimately why people are happy to let this man face no consequences. People are angry at the billionaires, especially those in the health insurance industry. And this action is being picked up as a warning shot across the bow. Society is saying that we are sick of the status quo, and if things keep going as they have been, this is not going to be an isolated event.





  • Yeah, reading the article, it sounds like they’ve decided to park at the space station because the parts that malfunctioned during the journey to the space station were not designed to survive re-entry, meaning that they won’t have the opportunity to understand what went wrong with them after they return to Earth. So they’re delaying the departure in order to collect as much information as possible about what went wrong in the first part of the mission. They’re still confident that a safe return is going to happen.







  • The executive branch is a bureaucracy that has to follow procedures. The president can direct the agency to start these processes, and that’s what he done. The HHS has done the necessary work to show that cannabis is deserving of a lower schedule according to the Controlled Substances Act. It is now up to the DEA to review that data and reschedule it accordingly. This is the process stipulated by the law, and the executive branch must adhere to it. If they don’t, it will be undone in the courts.

    The alternative route would be for Congress to pass a new law to specifically legalize cannabis, but they do not have the numbers, so the Biden administration has to follow the process outlined in the existing laws. He’s done what he is legally able to do, and it’s more than any of his predecessors have. It may be slow, but it’s pretty much a fast as the law allows.




  • Red Dye #3 is not commonly used in the United States anymore. Instead, Red Dye #40 is used and works just fine as a safe replacement.

    Brominated Vegetable Oil is used to emulsify flavor oils into water and is commonly used in citrus soft drinks. Sucrose Acetate Isobutyrate and Glycerol Ester of Wood Rosin are both be used for the same purpose.

    Potassium Bromide is added to flour to strengthen dough, allowing for a greater rise during baking. It appears that Ascorbic Acid (vitamin C) can replace much of its use.

    Propylparaben is an antifungal preservative that is used in packaged baked goods to prevent mold. There are other preservatives that can be used, but it sounds like parabens are the most effective for preserving non-acidic foods. I assume that propylparaben will be replaced by some other paraben.





  • So you’re saying that movies shouldn’t push a message and should instead be purely about enjoyment. Then you bring up an example of a movie that you found to be really shitty and unenjoyable as an example of a movie without a message (but didn’t watch enough of it to be able to say whether it pushes any message). Are there any movies that don’t push a message that you did enjoy?



  • Historically, women did not feel welcome at open chess tournaments. Chess talent was seen as synonymous with intellectual brilliance, so some men would not take it well when they were beat by a woman. I like to think that this has changed, but there’s probably still an element of this. Regardless, women’s tournaments were set up so that women who wanted to play chess competitively would have an opportunity to do so safely and without the fear of harassment. They still exist because people still compete in them and enjoy them, so why stop?