moringmark:

sarkos:

crystalepicness:

is-the-owl-video-cute:

memewhore:

Penguin escapes killer whales by jumping onto a boat.

Antarctic penguins (and most other Antarctic animals for that matter) are very interesting because they lack a natural fear of humans since, of course, humans are not a natural occurrence on the continent. It is one of the few places on earth where it is completely normal for fully wild animals to be comfortable around you. In fact, most react as though humans are just especially large penguins as those are the only flightless biped native to the area.

As far as this gentoo penguin is concerned, it was saved by a float of large yellow penguins also hiding from orcas.

Penguin Diogenes

(via simonjadis)

uncahier:

animentality:

(via theozilla)

silvermoon424:

…..I forgot Minako’s birthday again

afeelgoodblog:

(via leafo-flameo)

layzeal:

ALT

i figured it out

(via theozilla)

derinthescarletpescatarian:

uniquecrash5:

silverolivia-upsidedown:

elvencantation:

forever-let-it-burn:

While the giant bill was fake, it represented a very real accomplishment. The group raised more than $17,000, which purchased more than $1.6 million in medical debt owed by Philadelphians, according to their nonprofit partner RIP Medical Debt.

keep reading

This is a great way to undermine the system that we are trapped in

The fact that this can be done at all shows how utterly bullshit the entire system is. There was literally no reason for that medical debt to exist in the first place.

Let’s say you owe a private hospital ten thousand dollars, but you have very few assets, so they’re pretty sure they’re never getting any of that back. There’s ninety nine other people who also each owe the hospital ten thousand dollars. (It doesn’t have to be a hospital; any debt can be sold this way.) The hospital has shit to do and the low chances of you paying them mean it’s an unnecessary drain on their time and resources to hound you all for it. But they can get *some* money, by selling your debt to a third party.

Let’s say the sell each ten thousand dollar debt for ten dollars (I’m making all these numbers up for simplicity). So a third party gives the hospital one thousand dollars, and now all hundred of you owe that third party ten thousand instead! You’re in the clear with the hospital, you owe it to these guys now! And their job is to hound and harrass you for the money you owe. If one of you pays up more than a thousand dollars, you’ve covered their initial investment. These guys are gambling on the likelihood that enough of you can pay your debts that you make it worth the time they spend tracking you and harrassing you.

Or, instead of trying to get the money out of you, they can just… decide you don’t owe them. Why not? They own the debt. They can fork out a thousand bucks, buy a million in debt, and forgive it. That’s what these guys did. (This is also a favourite move of John Oliver; if you ever see headlines about John Oliver forgiving debt, this is what he’s doing). A small payment can take a massive weight off the shoulders of a lot of struggling people.

Again, I made up the numbers to simplify the math. But this is how the process works.

(via spacevixenmusic)

thickness-protection-program:

doubleca5t:

you promise?

Apollo now’s your chance to make something really funny happen

(via knightzilla)

knightzilla:

matt0044:

knightzilla:

matt0044:

FullMetal Alchemist 2003 is a bad adaptation…

…but a darn good Anime taken on its own terms. However, talking about how it’s “better” or “worse” than Brotherhood (y’all know who you are) is pointless when… neither was intended to be like or outdo the other.

Say the Manga is… ingredients for a meal, said meal being Brotherhood or 03.

03 utilizes some plot beats and storylines from the Manga but modifies upon them in order to create set up for the largely original plot that’s of its own making.

It knows what to keep, what to tweak and what to excise from something that will inevitably be different in tone as well as character evolution.

By contrast, Brotherhood intends to be more true to the Manga but not all of it. Various plot beats are retooled like the investigation of Liore are made the second adventure we see of the Elrics.

Some like the Youswell Mine and Yoki are skipped over with a passing mention before later being adapted later in a truncated adaptation.

Some are outright changed such as the Elrics and Winry learning of Hughes dying before Maria Ross’s accusation of such hits the papers. That is, with a later scene of them meeting Grace and Elicia over the matter.

This list goes on…

Though some find they haven’t found their sea legs at first, this adaptation shakes out to be one of the 2010s big gateway Anime titles. Either way, it’s a technically better adaptation of the original Manga by default.

03 didn’t adapt the Manga but with filler ala the Big Three of Shonen Jump. Rather it built a new story around the parts of the Manga it had to work with a went off. Probably one of the few Anime Original Endings that have stood the test of time really.

Now HOW those elements were handled for each version 03 had focused on can make for a good discussion at the very least. But neither version of FMA should be judged by what it isn’t and never was going to be.

It just… makes it hard to humor a comparison when one is clearly preferred over the other. Especially when some mostly amount to petty memes and potshots.

I know this saying is rightfully maligned but for this context? I don’t care who started it, somebody has to end it.

My issue with the comparisons is, aside from how they clearly are using their preference as a measuring stick for quality (words of wisdom for everyone, NEVER DO THIS), is how often it shows how little they really understand either adaptation, or the manga itself.

In the case of Fullmetal, this can lead to discourse where anything surrounding it is misrepresented, often with context removed when discussing certain subjects as well as failing to fully understand those topics and applicability, failing to see how some criticisms of one version can actually be applied to both series as a whole, and basically showing how they never really tried to genuinely engage with one or the other, and/or relied on a second or third hand retelling of either, and would rely on that retelling even when experiencing one or the other for themselves.

And unfortunately, the ones who would often provide that retelling (and start/prolong the whole damn mess), are often folks who would use their preference as a measuring stick, failed to actually engage or understand storytelling or anything involving either series genuinely, yet are seen as smart folks that don’t need to be called out either because of established reputations or charisma.

If you’re trying to elevate any piece of media, throwing another under the bus doesn’t help in your arguments, it makes you look like a petty moron.

Generally, I think one factor has been how Brotherhood became one of the 2010s gateway Anime and blew up fast here. Though you do get Manga vs. Brotherhood scuffles, many Anime fans of today owe their hypefixation on the first Anime of FMA they saw.

Thus them diving into the series’ history brings them to a previous series that throws them for a loop with how it veers off from the story that had them by the balls. Alchemy’s secret mechanics, the Hommunculi, Hoenheim, the general tone.

Some are like, “Eh, not my cuppa.” Others… take it as a slight on their family name. I don’t even need to mention specific examples at this point. Every fandom has one.

And this brings us to the 03 fans be they of today or of yesteryear.

Because I hadn’t gotten into FMA right away but had seen it around as this cool Anime that Adult Swim aired and became a ratings darling. FUNimation found their footing as an Anime distribution company and was moving past their script adaptation habits from Dragon Ball Z, learning to be more true to the original with some necessary localizations (Shin Chan notwithstanding).

It was Brotherhood before Brotherhood basically, a popular Anime that while very much not for kids also was accessible to teens who gravitated to what it presented.

Thus these two landmark Anime and their fandom would be a vartiable generation divide.

Not helped by Manga being more available than ever online, official or otherwise, and birthing these weirdo obsessed with how certain scenes are adapted not just in story but in exact artwork. My Hero Academia’s fandom is… infamous on Twitter. Even AniTwitter.

Yeeeeeeeah.

I would agree that nostalgia definitely plays a part, especially since you’re basically forcing yourself to wear rose-tinted glasses that make any addition that isn’t what you grew up with as a threat, and either makes you put what you did grow up with be put on a pedestal without being critical of that either, or you in being critical of either, you clearly show more favoritism and don’t approach either with the genuine sincerity that they deserve.

Though what makes it worse is when you try to pass on this sort of perspective to others, and basically deprive them of being able to actually engage a work on it’s own merits.

I actually found myself unironically enjoying Netflix’s Cowboy Bebop because I knew full well that what I’d be getting was not the Anime I had enjoyed back in High School. As such, a lot of it was hard to hate.

Even some of the most infamous lines made me smile. For all the complaints about Whedonisms, I felt they worked for the off-beat world they were presenting. Especially with how it showed that these were bounty hunters who’d seen some sh*t and have ways of keeping their head straight through it all in a Buddy Cop vibe.

So yeah. “Welcome to the ouch, Motherfuckers!”

God, Faye was such a treat… XD

Anyways, I find it hard to judge as an adaptation since it certainly takes elements from the original Anime and even starts out with a close enough remake of the first episode (with an opening scene inspired from Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door for a very effect establishing scene) before diverging.

Then we get elements inspired by the original but written to be their own thing largely. Heck, I find the “they’re just copy-pasting” to be hollow take when so much of it is very much blazing its own path. There’s also the end of the Season 1 that complicated the comparisons since how they’d play out is… unlikely to come about.

What this has to do with FMA is keeping perspective when judging the other. 03 fans shouldn’t expect what made their version jive with them to be in Brotherhood if they choose to engage. Vice versa for Brotherhood fans.

Yes, some elements may be better handled to you but largely because one is going for a different tone and set of themes the other wasn’t obligated to follow.

Vandread

afloweroutofstone:

reasonsforhope:

wachinyeya:

Small island nations take high-emitting countries to court to protect the ocean

Countries threatened by rising sea levels are asking a tribunal to decide on responsibility for pollution of the marine environment

the Guardian

!!!!! Really, really hope they win at the hearing - this would make such a big difference, and also start an early but serious precedent for countries that are especially struggling with climate change to take Western governments to court over climate change.

We’re gonna see more and more cases in this realm, I know it. (And if this one succeeds, I bet you they’ll be coming fast) (Well, “legal system fast”)

Thanks so much for posting, OP!!

–

Excerpt:

In a landmark hearing, small island nations disproportionately affected by the climate crisis will take on high-emitting countries in a court in Hamburg, Germany, on 11 September, in what is being seen as the first climate justice case aimed at protecting the ocean.

During the two-day hearing, the nations – including the Bahamas, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Antigua and Barbuda, among others – will ask the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (Itlos) to determine whether greenhouse gas emissions absorbed by the marine environment should be considered pollution.

As one of the planet’s greatest carbon sinks, the ocean absorbs 25% of carbon dioxide emissions, captures 90% of the heat caused by those emissions and produces half the world’s oxygen.

Most countries have obligations under the legally binding UN convention on the law of the sea to take measures to prevent, reduce and control marine pollution.

If the case, brought by the Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law (Cosis), is successful, these obligations would include carbon-emission reduction and protection of marine environments already damaged by CO2 pollution.

“Sea levels are rising rapidly, threatening to sink our lands below the ocean,” Kausea Natano, the prime minister of Tuvalu, said in a statement…

His people are suffering a “manifest injustice” as a result of climate change, he said. “We are confident that international courts and tribunals will not allow this injustice to continue unchecked.”

-via The Guardian, September 10, 2023

The court where this will take place is an institution created by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. There are 29 countries which have not fully signed and ratified this treaty, and thus are not parties to the court. Guess who the largest polluter among these holdouts is?

(via theozilla)

dirtypuzzle:

kill the rhetoric that americans are so lazy that they won’t take farm jobs. americans take labor intensive jobs all the time. the reason no americans will take farm jobs is because agricultural work is exempt from the vast majority of labor laws and labor protections, including the use of child labor. so only immigrants - people who have little to no protection from the law or other options for work - take most of these jobs. we have created a permanent underclass of labor and then say that americans are just lazy for not volunteering to be part of the underclass.

there are actually good discussions to be had about how alienated many americans are from food production (hi hello that’s what my only popular post is about), but the real solution to this problem is to protect agricultural workers, citizens or not. ban child labor in its entirety. punish corporations and farm owners that abuse and poison their workers. reform the immigration process so that these people aren’t barred from legal protection and recourse.

agricultural workers have been exploited since the dawn of civilization, but the US in specific has been doing this since slavery, and it evolved in the 30s when FDR’s labor laws excluded them specifically because most agricultural workers at the time were black. now it’s mostly latino immigrants.

food doesn’t fucking pick or slaughter itself. but citizens aren’t going to take these jobs when the entire industry is rife with abuse - both legal and illegal - and horrific wages and working conditions.

(via theozilla)

spacevixenmusic:

Source: Spy x Family [2022]

moringmark: