#ethically produced

[nenoname]

honestly??? i still dont know what to do with the idea that there might be a bunch of clone fords out there???? it honestly makes me so unhinged??????

[bonefall]

Question: Since the mutation that makes sphynx cats nakey (their hair is fragile and sucks) can just happen at random. How would a Clan treat a nakey cat born among them? Could they make them a coat?

I think, at first, there would be concern that it's some kind of sign. Hairlessness looks like mange, a very serious and contagious condition. This could be a terrible omen-- that mange will be brought down to us.

But it would become apparent the kitten isn't a fader, it isn't a StarClan warrior who came down to deliver the others, or a mere sign. It's pink and wrinkled, like a newborn rodent, but moves as the other kits do. Did StarClan... forget its fur?

There's another feared creature without any fur-- humans. It looks human.

I think the poor thing would have a lot of problems with the other cats its age and maybe the more superstitious members of the Clan, but a warrior of the Clan is a warrior of the Clan. Life would be harder for them, but there would still be love that exists.

They'd be capable of making them a coat, and they WOULD need it, but I can see that cat trying to go without it for fear of being made fun of. That's another thing humans do-- wear pelts all over themselves because they have no fur of their own.

Unfortunately they'd also be prone to a ton of really bad health problems. This poor guy would be in the Cleric's den a lot, and may need to retire early or focus on campbound activities.

Health problems;

Pelt is a LOT weaker; injuries from battle or even training would be a lot more severe, Cleric may recommend them not taking part in fights.

Skin becomes filthy, and needs special cleaning. There is no fur to absorb the oil that the skin naturally makes to keep the coat healthy, causing buildup.

Even with proper cleaning, the skin is super prone to rashes, lesions, and constant irritation. Wash TOO MUCH and the skin will become dry and chapped.

SUNBURN. Especially in WindClan, where the warrior might spend a lot of time on the open moor in daylight, and RiverClan, where light reflecting off the water could cause an intense burn. It would be recommended the warrior take night shifts, but this could be an issue because night is cold. (BB!Cats are crepuscular).

Additionally; such severe, uniquely-placed sunburns are something Clerics wouldn't see very often. Lack of medical experience with these sorts of injuries could prove dangerous.

Ear infections. Cats naturally have hair in their ears, which their earwax production accounts for.

Both heatstroke AND frostbite. Very bad temperature regulation leading to severe ailments. Fur helps stabilize body temperature.

So in conclusion...

Life would be very difficult for this individual. Fur isn't just full-body hair; it's almost as fundamental as a top layer of skin. This would be a serious disability for a Clan cat to have, and it may invoke the image of detested humans leading to social stigmatization.

But because they're clanborn, they are unambiguously a member of the Clan. It's likely that the Clan would make clothing for this warrior out of fur pelts, but in their struggle with internalized ableism, they might have conflicted feelings about wearing it.

The Cleric would recommend campbound activities, night shifts, and WEARING YOUR PELT, DAMN IT. They would need to take full baths every few days, not too much and not too little, plus frequent ear cleanings.

[thebluestbluewords]

Dis-like-Dysentery

I have a lot of very specific headcanons about Auradon Prep, and one of them is the fact that Jay is both a Smart Guy, and also chronically incapable of turning in assignments on time. For. Reasons.

this might be about one of those reasons.

+

Carlos looks up from his plate as Jay wanders over. “Dude, where were you? We started eating without you.” 

“Talking to a teacher. I submitted an assignment wrong, or something.” 

Carlos nods. He’s got a fork dangling from one hand, and there’s a leaf stuck in his hair. Sunlit from behind, Jay’s pretty sure that he’s the prettiest boy on this side of the barrier. “Oh, man. Was it Demorra? She’s super strict about the rules, especially for the online stuff. I could’ve helped you figure it out bro, you don’t have to get through her bureaucratic shit on your own.” 

Jay sets his tray down on the opposite side of the table. “Nah. It was Williams.” 

Carlos frowns. “The international lit teacher? Really?” 

They’ve been reading through Jay’s lit assignments together. Auradon expects them to type up all of their homework, so he’s been getting by with the hacked dictation program on his laptop and locking himself in the bathroom to read his essays out loud into the program with the minimum of background noise. 

There’s a peer writing tutor who does proofreading two nights a week for free, but Jay’s not gonna take his shitty essays in to her when he’s pretty sure he’ll just get laughed right back out of the student study room for the giant default font Carlos set on his computer. 

It doesn’t exactly make reading his own assignments easier, but it doesn’t make it worse either, so they’re calling it functional for now. Auradon Prep is all about “helping students embrace their unique academic talents”, so Carlos and Evie are both being pulled for more advanced classes, which is great for them, and terrible for Jay’s essays because it’s seriously starting to cut into their free time. 

That, and the trouble they’ve been getting up to after hours. 

The assistant gym teacher still hasn’t figured out who to blame for French braiding all the climbing ropes together. 

“She couldn’t read my handwriting.” 

“Fuck.” 

That’s about the shape of it. Handwritten assignments are few and far between, but Jay can’t bullshit his way through all of them. “Haha, yeah.” 

Carlos thunks his head down onto the table. “Ugh. Fuck. I can make you a handwriting font on the computer, but that’ll make in-class assignments worse if you can’t keep it up.” 

“Yup.” 

He sits up. There’s a dent on his forehead from pressing it into the table. “Eat.” 

“Not hungry,” Jay says as cheerfully as he can manage. It’s not gonna fool Carlos, but he’s not gonna show weakness in front of the royal rabble. “Anyway, we’re not going to the honor board. She’s willing to settle it with some sorta evaluation. Have you heard of dyslexia before?” 

Carlos blinks. “Dyslexia? No. I mean. It’s gotta be dis from like, disinterested, disintegrating, some sort of anti? Or else it’s dys from like, dysentery. Some sort of illness, maybe. Lex has gotta be from lexicon, lexicography. Something to do with either anti-words or a words illness? Does she think you’re sick of words?” 

Jay shrugs. “She said it’s why I’m bad at reading. Wants me to do an assessment so she can know what’s going on.” 

Carlos already has his phone out. He’s typing with one hand, the other one curled around his plate in a defensive hunch that’s almost casual. “Huh. How’s that going for her so far?” 

Jay snorts. “Fab. Nah, she didn’t do it yet. It’s a whole special test that she’s gotta send me down to the psych for.” 

“Can you reject it?” 

“If I wanna meet with the honor board and explain why I apparently have great handwriting, but only when they can’t see me do the assignments.” 

“Fuck.” 

“Yeah. At least she was cool about it.” 

Carlos groans. “Your handwriting sucks, dude. You’re not sick of writing, you’re just— your handwriting sucks.” 

“Yeah, and my fucking reading comprehension. I—“ Jay cuts himself off abruptly as the shadow of more people falls across their lunch table. “Hey, guys.” 

Mal sets her lunch tray down on Jay’s left side, leaving Ben the spot on his right. Evie’s not eating with them today. They have other friends in theory, but between Doug’s science club buddies and Carlos’s general disinterest in socializing with other humans, they didn’t bother picking a table large enough for anyone else.  

“Sorry,” Ben apologizes, even as he’s nudging his shoulder against Jay’s. It’s nice not being the only tall one sometimes. “I couldn’t help overhearing.” 

Jay leans back into the contact. “We were talking out loud, dude. It happens. You got any hot tips for the stupid assessment I’ve gotta do later?” 

“Have you tried being better?” Mal suggests. “I find that cheating works great. I could find you a spell to let one of us borrow your hands for a few hours, and so long as you can tell us what you want to write, we can control the muscles and get better handwriting than your usual chicken scratch special.” 

“Hey.”

“Would that work if you can’t see the paper?” Ben asks curiously. 

Mal frowns. “No. Not unless I modify the spell to possess your eyes too.” 

Jay represses a shudder. “Thanks, but no thanks, M. I like my eyes in one piece.” 

Carlos is scrolling rapidly on his phone, hanging half-over the table in an attempt to get closer to the three of them. “Dude, dyslexia is a brain thing that affects how you process visual input of words— aw, shit.” 

Bad. That’s the bad-news tone. Jay’s heart drops traitorously into his stomach, which suddenly isn’t feeling the tater tots on his lunch tray. “What?” 

Carlos shakes his head. “Nothing too bad. Just, I think Williams is right. You’ve said you’re shit at reading fast cause the words all look the same, right? Like, you can’t scan to identify them, you’ve gotta sound each one out.” 

Jay smashes a tater tot with the side of his fork. The destruction doesn’t make his gut feel any better. It’s not that he’s mad, it’s just— he doesn’t want to do this. Analyzing his brain sucks. He did the whole week of required therapy that the student disciplinary council required after the stuff with Mal’s mom, and he’s so fucking done with Auradon grown-ups pretending to understand why his head’s fucked up. “Yeah, so?” 

Carlos waves the phone at him. “So that’s what this is. You’ve got a brain disorder.” 

“We can fix it, right?” 

He wiggles a hand back and forth. “Ehh. Kinda. There’s techniques to make it easier, but it’s sorta like— your brain is wired for AC power input, and words are DC. It’s a misalignment. We can make an adaptor, but we can’t rip out your brain wiring.” 

“I could,” Mal offers. “I love doing illegal magic.”

[some-murmurings]

somewhere along the way, a whole lot of people concluded that "metaphor" meant "false" and "illusion" meant "lie"

furries are not animals. they are humans. you can tell because, first of all, they are made of the same people meat everyone else is. not a flawlessly deductive argument, no, but a very robust induction nonetheless.

furries are not humans. they are animals. you can tell because, first of all, they will tell you that. at great length. repeatedly. bc we are all autistic. not a flawlessly deductive argument, no, but a very robust induction nonetheless.

being a furry is, as the eminent philosopher Patricia Taxxon (@patricia-taxxon) defined it, a concession to the symbolic and the sensory. humans are already mammals, that some of us find more of ourselves in fur than skin is not news.

Traumagenic, Endogenic, & whatever-a-tulpa-is-genic systems both are and are not multiple people in one body. We are a body experiencing consciousness in a non-singular way. We are reality viewing itself through a kaleidoscopic fractal fraction of the infinitely fractal kaleidoscope that is human experience. That we see more of ourselves in a group than an individual is not news either.

God is not real. God is also real. God is a metaphor. Maybe. God tends to elude definition, a defining tendency itself, if you wanna try & wrap your already aching brain around THAT.

That furrydom, systemhood, and theology are all metaphorical and illusory is not a reduction of their truth but instead are their nature. Life is metaphorical and illusory. Motion is a logical inconsistency. Plato, the stupidest man to ever live (other than every other person), said that time itself was "the motion of eternity." He was talking about clouds passing in front of the sun. He was also right. For once. The metaphor and the illusion ARE the truth of it. Samsara take us all, Brahman ur Atman, man, no one else can do it for you.

Every paradox I've mentioned is solved by shutting the fuck up and being kinder. Listen. Speak. Agree. Disagree. Love. Hate. they're all the same and completely different.

In my experience, hope is just despair after a shower, death just rot becoming regrowth. calling my metaphor a metaphor derogatorily does nothing but make you look like a dumb asshole. calling your own metaphor not a metaphor has the exact same effect.

[officialbruciewayne]

Thoughts on crime that was validated?

Not everything that is right is legal, and not everything that is illegal is wrong.

[spitblaze]

hey does anyone have any good songs about unethical experiments or genetics or profound regret. im making a playlist for a new masks character

[hussyknee]

Kind of insane how much y'all hate queer, disabled, mentally ill adults. Especially Black and brown ones.

All this "adults who like X are creepy/ gross/disgusting" is just an excuse to hurt the most systemically vulnerable people and shame them into compliance. Shaming doesn't work on comfortable white people with stable jobs and social lives and the money to buy luxury items– they can just log off and go to a fondue party. So you just go for the people with the least socio-economic protection who depend on online communities and congratulate yourselves on your "activism" and social conscience. Even when your collateral includes people from the same minorities you're "defending".

Western leftism operates on conditional humanity and respectability politics. "We'll give a fuck about you...as long as you behave only in ways we find palatable." When we point out that punitive forms of social control always take us out first and in larger numbers, we're given to understand in no uncertain terms that we are in fact acceptable collateral in your personal social justice hero quests to "punch Nazis", "fuck the US government" and "eat the rich". All just a bunch of hyperindividualistic neoliberals resentful of being robbed of white privilege rooting around the social justice closet for cudgels that suit you.

[trans-yllz]

"wearing leather/fur or eating animal products is unethical" SHUT UP SHUT UP WE ARE PART OF THE ECOSYSTEM!!!!

[kissycat]

Using AI in medicine predates chatgpt/LLM popularity by years. I know this because I worked on a related project in 2020 but it was a thing already long before that and it has nothing to do with LLM 👎

[justashadetalkative]

Writing flails: Empathy

(Obligatory disclaimer: Defining empathy is a challenge and often contradictory. But this post is about affective empathy / emotional contagion, not definitions of empathy that are synonymous with compassion.)

.

My most empathetic character is also by far the one who causes the most harm; a character who can often barely tolerate other people unless he’s in control of both their pains and their joys, but who delights in seizing that control.

My second most empathetic character means well, but is so eager to help and comfort others that he often charges in half-cocked without any kind of true understanding of the situation, and can get hurt and defensive if that ends up making it worse.

My third most empathetic character means well, and has self restraint, but despite knowing better is frequently tempted to quietly and unilaterally fix situations without any input from – or feelings experienced by – the other people involved.

My least empathetic character is, admittedly, perfectly happy to kill and eat a person if it seems like the practical option at the time, but is also constantly listening to and trying to understand the perspectives of those around it. (Even if it’s also often judging those perspectives because they seem nonsensical to it. 😂)

My second least empathetic character is completely and utterly committed to the idea of autonomy and informed consent; detests bullies of all sorts; and often gets a bit carried away, but is pretty much always willing to listen when she discovers that she’s fucked up.

My third least empathetic character has literally devoted his entire life to helping, healing, and teaching others, and has tied himself up into a dysfunctional knot from sheer scrupulosity around his determination not to cause harm.

…And then off to the side somewhere we have Linast, who is either hyperempathetic or just very observant and very prone to projection and I can never quite decide which, and Phosa, who is so disconnected from her own more complex emotions that she doesn’t really have a chance in hell of actually telling when other people’s emotions are having an effect on her, even when they do. :’D

[thewhizzyhead]

being a busy ass student with student journalism gigs on one hand and comm academic shit on the other is very interesting because with the jam-packed life I live I only really get to breathe at like late lAAATE night when no one can bother me about my responsibilities other than myself. that being said that's also when creative brain goes into overdrive and now misfits finally has the final draft of its opening number woo

[gay-ppl-real]

People who make formalwear out of natural fibres I love you. People who make fancy clothes out of natural fibres I love you. People who make unique and interesting styles out of natural fibres I love you. People who find a way to make creative shapes and textures and looks out of natural fibres I love you. Natural fibres I love you.

[anglerflsh]

have you ever thought of writing a story or comic?

I am (supposedly, allegedly, technically) writing a play. Though it will never be published or presented for the purpose of gathering fans or the likes, I'm only writing it for my own enjoyment

[wandering-wolf23]

I will say that I think ethical breeding as veered from "we should produce healthy, sound, stable animals from parents who are healthy, sound, and stable" to "anything not a purebred is inherently unethical and should not exist". I'm not sure how much of it is online virtue signaling, but enough of it is to make me roll my eyes.

Come on, y'all. I'm sure my health testing working mix is sooo much more unethical than your byb purebred Frenchie.

[trans-leek-cookie]

sittimg at the Wikipedia article. Comptemplating

[shybreadgarden]

You know “don’t like, don’t read”?

New philosophy:

Don’t like? Don’t eat.

If you don’t like something, it literally affects you nothing at all to shut up about it. “Ewwwww why do you eat xyz I would nevveeerrrr.” Shut up. Let people eat. Same actually goes for “Whaaaat? How do you not like [extremely common food]????” I don’t care. Shut the fuck up.