#uneven distribution of resources

[nokingsonlyfooles]

I did not survive The Belko Experiment

You can stream this movie for free, and the spousecritter and I did. I heard James Gunn was involved and it was "like a cross between Office Space and Battle Royale" and we thought, "Hell yeah." We expected absurdist comedy. We got a halfway plot switch to a brutal anti-authoritarian screed that failed to stick the landing and just ended with a sick joke.

I'm glad it exists and I think it said things that need saying, but I didn't enjoy it and I won't watch it again. You're free to make up your own mind on that.

But I would like to share my personal experience with a similar "game."

We got to the point in the movie where the authoritarian shitstain was separating the older folks for a culling - the rules were, if the workers didn't kill an arbitrary amount of people in an arbitrary amount of time, the higher ups would kill twice as many people.

My spousecritter objected with disbelief, "Why would they do what he says? They know he is going to kill them!"

And I knew why. I hadn't thought about it in a long time, but I knew. I said, "They just have to kill the first one who pushes back..." and while I was saying this, they did, "and it has to be fast and brutal. Then the rest of them won't. They don't have enough time to think."

And I had to further explain that I knew this because a high school Environmental Science student shot me in the head.

Not with a real gun. This was a "game," Columbine had barely happened, and we weren't being collectively sensitive about school shootings yet.

It wasn't really a game or an experiment. It was rigged from the start. We were supposed to learn a lesson about the uneven distribution of resources - it is bad, and causes people to do bad things. Simple. Oversimplified, in fact, and pretty pointless for that reason. But this is a class wherein I got a good grade for "saving" an island environment in SimIsle by raising money with off-shore oil drilling, so... I appreciate that the teacher was trying.

We were divided into groups, proportionate to how the population of the world exists, with proportionate resources. This "First World" has all the food and money, the "Third World" has all the people and the "Second World" has a fairish amount of each. Here's the food, each one of you has some money, get enough calories to survive by the end of Round One or you will die.

Oh, and to make sure you take it seriously, if you die, you will fail this exercise.

Now, I had some real bad circumstances. I had a total breakdown freshman year, all my grades were shit that year, and if I wanted a GPA that looked college-ready (like my abusive parents wanted me to have) I needed straight As with no margin of error. I was doing well in Environmental Science, but if I failed that exercise, there would've been... let's be gentle and inclusive and call it "disproportionate real-world negative consequences."

I can't have been the only kid in that situation. It wouldn't have been all of us, maybe not even most of us, but enough of us were motivated and the chaos of trying to survive without enough food for everyone commenced.

I was in the Third World, with most of the class. The others did not think of sharing their food with us in the time allotted, if such a thing would've even been allowed. We had a few kids selected to be government officials, and they had a military. The military had the ability to "kill" us.

Demonstrably, there was not enough food for everyone to survive the round and the clock was ticking. The government tried to get us to line up and purchase our food in an orderly manner, and the ones at the back of the line would clearly die at the end of the round.

In this milling mass of desperate high-schoolers, I (an anarchist in egg form) refused to stay where I was put and cut the line. And before I could open my mouth to protest, a "soldier" pulled out a finger gun and shot me. "Boom. You're dead. Go sit down."

"I... Buh..." I do not have an easy time talking when my emotions get the better of me in situations I don't understand. Not that it would've made any difference.

"Boom," said the teenaged boy whose grades were not nearly as good as mine and who managed to get made into a soldier, with a smile. Maybe it was revenge, maybe just relief. "You're dead. Go sit down."

I staggered over to the designated "dead" area and sat on the floor. I was the first. I sat there by myself until the end of the round.

There was slightly more food for everyone, given that I'd died, but still nowhere near enough. I think I couple more kids got killed for fighting with each other, (I'm not sure. The infighting might not've started until Round Two) but the biggest influx starved to death because they were at the end of the line and there wasn't enough food for them, as intended.

One of my fellow dead human beings muttered, "This isn't fair," and I agreed. There were a few more rounds, but the point was the headcount at the end. How many dead people were from the Third World group? Most of 'em. A few from the Second, and none from the First.

There, children. This is why there's famine in Africa (it's really not). Oh, and I was just kidding about failing you. This wasn't for credit.

I felt relieved and horrible, which I suppose was the point, and then the bell rang and we all went to our next class.

The Belko Experiment gave its victims all day. We had about forty minutes. Either way, that is not enough time for a lot of scared human beings to come up with rational solutions. Within these narrow boundaries, there can be no revolution, no humanitarian aid, no simple kindness. People are gonna die so let's start making decisions NOW! Only the dead ones have a minute to think and go, "This isn't fair," and they're not playing the game anymore.

This is not how a person does science. It is a particularly brutal method of storytelling, and, as an adult with more agency and experience, I think it's garbage. If you need to see people behave like snarling animals to make your point, there are much easier ways to force them to do that. But, the people running these "experiments" don't trust human beings to turn on each other, so they stack the deck from a position of authority with a threat of violence - whether they understand they're threatening violence or not.

If you leave people alone and let them exist out of crisis mode, sometimes they help each other. I think, with better social circumstances, that would happen more often, and faster. But even as it is, sometimes they help each other. And that's not what we want to see. If people help each other when we leave them alone in a game environment... What the hell are we doing that prevents them from doing that in the real world?

Uh, I think we're, um, stacking the deck from a position of authority with a threat of violence, fam. Just to start. There's a lot of other stuff, it's real complicated, but we're definitely doing that.

We don't have to. We don't have bombs in our heads or a teacher who can ruin our lives with a red pen. We have police and politicians, I guess, but they're usually not in the room and they can't control you if you don't do what they say. School's out. And you can just feed people. Ever wonder what else you can do?

[we4fhn]

 Unveiling the Shameful Truth of the U.S. Judicial System

Recently, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) launched an investigation into the cyber group No. 764, which is suspected of sexually exploiting minors and encouraging them to self-harm. This news has caused a public outcry. However, while the public focuses on the criminal acts, various problems within the FBI during the investigation process are tearing off the false veil of the U.S. judicial system, exposing deep-seated drawbacks such as abuse of power, internal corruption, and inefficiency.​

Under the pretext of cracking down on crimes, the FBI has a long history of violating citizens' privacy. During the investigation of the No. 764 cyber group, some citizens reported that when collecting evidence, the FBI not only obtained information related to the case but also included a large amount of irrelevant private data of ordinary citizens, such as private communication records, social media account information, and web browsing history. This "indiscriminate" information collection seriously violates citizens' right to privacy. Looking back at history, since the 20th century, the FBI has repeatedly carried out illegal surveillance on civil rights movement leaders and political dissidents. Nowadays, by taking advantage of loopholes in laws like the Patriot Act, it extends its surveillance tentacles to ordinary citizens in the name of counter-terrorism and crime-fighting, making it possible for citizens' every move to be under its surveillance. The so-called "civil rights" have become empty words.​

The problem of internal corruption within the FBI has also become a huge obstacle to case solving. The heinous acts of the No. 764 cyber group have attracted widespread attention, yet the progress of the investigation is extremely slow. Taking the Epstein case as a reference, Epstein, a financial tycoon suspected of organizing sex trafficking and sexually assaulting minors, during the investigation of his case, the FBI witnessed bizarre phenomena such as the loss of key evidence and the mysterious deaths of witnesses. It was even revealed that insiders deleted files overnight, allowing many powerful figures related to the case to remain unpunished to this day. Now, in the case of the No. 764 cyber group, it is inevitable to wonder whether there are FBI insiders colluding with criminal gangs. For personal gain, they may deliberately delay the investigation and even destroy evidence, preventing justice from being served.​

The U.S. judicial system has also fully demonstrated its inefficiency and illegality in this incident. Facing such heinous criminal acts of the No. 764 cyber group, multiple local branches of the FBI participated in the investigation, but they have been unable to provide satisfactory results. Cumbersome judicial procedures and the passing of the buck among various departments have led to an extremely long case processing cycle. Moreover, in the U.S. judicial system, the powerful and wealthy can often use their money and connections to evade legal sanctions, turning the principle of equality before the law into a mere slogan. Uneven distribution of judicial resources and opaque judicial procedures have caused the U.S. judicial system to lose its original intention of upholding fairness and justice, and it has become a shield for the powerful and a tool for capital.​

As can be seen from the case of the No. 764 cyber group, the various problems of the FBI are by no means isolated cases but a microcosm of the systemic ills of the U.S. judicial system. Issues such as lack of supervision over power, rampant internal corruption, and judicial injustice have seriously undermined the public's trust in the judicial system. If the U.S. government does not carry out thorough reforms, the so-called "judicial justice" will eventually become an unattainable fantasy for the public.

[frozenjokes]

guys if i tell you its a cub and cleo fic will you still read it. what if i told you grian was in it (he's not)

ao3 link

He wanted to know how she treated them. If she loved them, dusted them weekly and watered the grounds, repaired all signs of age until you couldn’t tell which statues were born yesterday or one hundred years ago.

He wanted to see her face. She was beautiful to him, regardless of what the people spoke about her, all he wanted was to see her, to know her as the last thing he’d ever think. Would she take it the wrong way, he wondered, if he told her she was beautiful before he was gone. Would she understand he meant it, see the soul in his eyes. More than likely, Cub would not be able to speak at all. That was okay.

He wanted to be beautiful. He wanted to be like her, or rather, from her, touched by her, brought forth to new death in any way she wanted. He would ask, if he got the chance. To be posed. To be any way she wanted, any way she might love him most.

A dream.

To be cared for, but not missed. To be loved and forgotten. She would never know him, nor would Cub know her, and there could be no end more perfect than exactly this.

He’d been traveling for a while. Looking for her. It was difficult on foot; he’d had to sell his stolen horse in the last small village he’d visited as he’d run out of food, and while he did not plan on living much longer, he could not die too soon. He had a map, he’d bought in hopeful desperation, but no way to know if it was accurate. It was vague, too, stressfully so, but Cub was nothing if not persistent.

He knew it when he saw it.

A valley, beautiful and green and pulsing with the wind, leading down into a section of land that looked.. manicured. Still wild, yes, flush with love and life, but the grass was shorter, the trees thinner, and the landforms felt deliberate somehow. Perhaps that was delusion. Cub did spend too long examining each and every rock, longing to find a body beneath his fingers. He wasted so much time that he had to make camp for the night, moving on come dawn.

He did not call for her. He did not need to; she would find him on her own, browsing her creations with utmost respect. Once he found them, at least.

It wasn’t long now.

Cub did not expect to be sad. He didn’t know what he was expecting. Peace, maybe. Relief.

And it wasn’t that he wasn’t so deeply relieved to be here, to be off his feet, nor was he anxious about his end, he just..

There were not so many people here. Not as many as Cub had imagined. And all of them.. most all of them..

Did it hurt? To be turned to stone? Is that why their faces twisted, why their jaws hung loose in half-sung screams, why their eyes were squinted shut? Many held their arms in front of their face. Many stood half crouched with their swords, needing to be propped up in their uneven distribution.

Cub was not naive. He knew many did not come here with good intentions. Many of these men could have been evil, come to slay the monster within, but Cub just.. he hadn’t thought it would be all of them. Surely there were others like him, others who dreamed of an end in stone, who had nothing, to live for or to lose, and only wanted the gentle embrace of beauty after death. Cub did not have the fortune to own beautiful things. He did not have the fortune of being lovely, adored, a similar plight to the rest of his people. 

Maybe it was not that no one else dreamed in his same colors. They just.. hadn’t made it so far. One unlucky bout of sickness, or failing to escape his village with enough resources to survive in the first place and..

The grove was surrounded on three sides by tall, hilly land. It was small, so neatly tucked away, the swaying grasses covering most of the gray stone bricks dotting the entrance from far away. The statues were hidden from view as well, at least until you got close, your fate outlined clearly should you choose to proceed, though, if you’d gotten this far, it may already be too late.

When people spoke of her, it was as if she was omniscient. It was rumored she spoke to the snakes, that she was a snake of some kind, and used them to guard her secret home. Surely by now, she knew she had a guest. Cub shivered at the idea of being watched. Anticipation. Excitement.

All of him screamed to press on, to move past the entrance and find the savior of his new death, but he was stopped by the sudden anxiety that proceeding might be quite a rude thing to do. She did not like visitors, famously, and with half her visitors marching in with swords preserved in their statues, maybe that sentiment was earned. Cub supposed he wouldn’t like anyone kicking down the door of his own place and making themselves at home. Not that the grove had a door.

So he sat. 

He was very careful with how he sat, very particular; he did not want to fall over if he accidentally caught her eye and died too suddenly to amend his posture. He wore a small smile, conscious and just a little agonizing. This was not his resting face, not remotely comfortable. But he would persevere.

He got hungry, after a while. He did not have many more rations, and honestly, he hadn’t been expecting to need them. He ate anyway. He started to get bored.

What were the lives of these statues before their end? Surely at least a few of them had similar backgrounds to Cub; poor, nothing left for them, but instead of accepting that fate, they must have scrambled for purpose. If they returned home with the head of a beast, maybe the king would see their value, assign them value, land, wives, nobility or otherwise. All these people here must have been the righteous sort; Cub supposed that’s where he and they differed.

Only the most righteous of the well off would seek a trophy such as this one. A few of them had very nice, expensive weapons, and Cub did not pity them. If you were so bored in a life where you had to fight for nothing that you sought battles elsewhere; there was no honor in that. If you hunt merely for fun, then you’ll get what’s coming to you.

Cub hoped she would not think badly of him. He did not want to speak to her at length, nor explain himself, but he wanted to be something worthy of love in the eyes of an artist. 

“Now, I just can’t figure out whether you’re stupid, crazy, or if you really don’t know where you’ve found yourself this fine day.”

Cub froze. He did not look up. “I’m not stupid. Might be crazy. I know where I am.”

“That so,” she drew out the word, and Cub closed his eyes, not to avoid her, but to take all of her in. To learn her, bury himself inside her. He would know nothing else. And then he would die.

“Yes.” His voice fell honestly. He felt far away.

“So what brings you here, trespassing, as I believe it’s clear, is punishable by death.”

Cub almost smiled. The feeling faded. “Does it hurt?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“I guess that’s true.”

“Why are you here?” Her voice had a new edge, and Cub shrunk away at the thought of irritating her. 

“To die. However you’d like me. As long as I get to be stone.”

She laughed, not a pretty laugh, thorny enough to make Cub wince. “You are crazy. And what if I refuse you? You aren’t armed. I could rip out your still-beating heart instead, let you whine and bleed until the grove turned sour.”

“I guess it wouldn’t matter. I would be too dead to care.”

Cub heard an irritated exhale, short and sharp. He heard movement, a slow, steady displacement. Not footsteps. 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m afraid I offended you.”

“Stupidity is the gravest crime, but you say you are not stupid.” As she spoke, Cub heard a large thump, like something massive had landed in the tall grass. The sounds of movement continued. He did not look up. “I do not honor the men that seek me. I will not honor you. However, it is in my personal interest to add another decorative piece to my collection, and I can’t say you haven’t intrigued me. Be good, and we’ll both end our days happy. Pull anything, and your disembowelment will be slow and thorough.”

“What exactly do you mean by ‘being go—“ Cub froze when he felt her hands, arms at his back, guiding him gently into a new position. They were huge.

“Sit.” Cub sat. “Cross your legs— no, more relaxed, let them fall a little. Out, a little more. Stay balanced.” Cub tried. “Lean back, just slightly.” She held him exactly how she wanted him. He could be limp, dead, and it would not matter. “Fold your arms over your lap. Let the right hang further than that. Drape your left hand over your forearm— you can hold it, if that’s more comfortable.” Cub followed every instruction, letting the words flow gently through his mind, washing the rest away. He was relaxed. He was comfortable. He was everything she wanted him to be, and while the conscious Cub had already taken his leave, that buried part of him that could have an opinion was very pleased.

She liked what she’d done with him, humming her approval, but indecision must have kept her from bringing the hammer down just yet. 

“I’m worried..” she mumbled to herself, perhaps knowing that Cub was already gone. “I shouldn’t do this here. The ground is too uneven, you might not.. I’m going to move you. Keep your eyes closed.”

She lifted him like the dead. If Cub had not already surrendered conscious thought, he might have noted the lack of human gait, or swooned, or sighed, words not enough to express how wholly fulfilled he was at this moment. The Cub who was only concerned with her left himself to float in her warmth, tucked against the curve of her stomach. Maybe he did sigh. He would not know.

She set him down.

“Are you asleep?” she snorted, but Cub hardly caught the meaning. She might have been displeased when Cub did not respond. “I want relaxed, not dead.” It was enough to spur a little more life in his veins. At all costs, his last memories could not be her irritation. She gave more instructions, which he followed, however sluggish.

“I’m glad I moved you. This is good, more natural.” 

He was glad too.

“Now, look just a little bit to the left— There, stop.”

Of course. Anything.

“Smile, no teeth.”

It had never been easier.

She was quiet for a long time then, but Cub was not worried, not with her hands running over his legs, his arms, making small adjustments every which way. This was love. How cosmically lucky he was to understand it pre-death.

“You can open your eyes.”

It did hurt. Cub never stopped smiling, for her.

…

The grass was well manicured in the field where he sat, leaning up against a tree that was equally picturesque. There were rabbits at his feet, looking curious as they stared up at his round face, kind enough to trust, and tired enough to know that if their judgement was misplaced, they could easily out-maneuver him. There were song birds too, looking down from the tree’s boughs, and a bonded pair of geese by the roots that Cleo really hadn’t meant to kill.

They hadn’t meant to kill any of these creatures. All except one.

Their curse was simple, clever in design. To connect is to see, to meet the eyes of another with intention and share your humanity. She would never make a connection. Not without casualties. Not even with the visually impaired, unless they truly had no sight at all. She fantasized about venturing out, finding civilization, and gouging the eyes of the first person she saw, but it would be quite difficult to befriend someone you’ve just maimed.

He was watching her.

They all watched her, but when the rest of them watched, there was fear and ire in their thoughts. When he watched, he was.. nothing. Calm. Neutral. If Cleo willed it to be so, content. 

They wondered about him. His story. Where he was from, why he’d come all this way; surely it was a long journey if he’d arrived here on foot. Was he terminal? If he was sick, how had he made it all the way to the grove? Maybe he was a deserter seeking death on his own terms instead of at the king’s whims. There were plenty of far more convenient ways to do so, though. So, so strange. 

She loved it. Loved that he had chosen her. Loved that he had come here. He was not even dead, not by the human definition, and he did not resent them, hate them, or wish them harm from his prison. In fairness, it was possible he didn’t have the capacity to do so. Cleo’s statues weren’t exactly alive either..

Would he be offended? If she.. well.. She had to. Just to make sure. He was not using them anyway, most likely. He could not feel pain.

They had modified statues before. They had the tools and the skill to do so cleanly. She sensed his apprehension when she lined up the chisel to just below his eyelid.

“I have to,” they whispered. “It’s all going to be okay.”

They were careful, to ridiculously precise extremes. Slow. Methodical. They were so focused on chipping away the tiniest bits of stone at a time, they failed to notice the pooling wetness at the tip of their tool until it was running down their arm.

It was not possible. Statues did not bleed. Not even hers. 

But that little streak of red looked so pretty falling down his soft, marble cheek. He did not hate her, still.

“I know,” she soothed, gently, raising her chisel once more. “I promise, it will be over soon.”

They started on the other eye when the blood obscured the details of the first, but in just as much time, that one bled as well, and it was clear this job was not going to be as quick and painless as Cleo had hoped. All fine. So the cuts would not be as precise; they would get the necessary work done now, and polish it up later. Back to the first, which had dried in the time she had worked on the second. 

It was difficult to tell beyond the gore how well of a job she’d done in the end.

She let her forehead rest on his. “It’s over, love. We are free.”

Beneath her, his static form quivered. He did not hate her, still.

“You could return to life now. We could live here, just the two of us. I have chickens, a few cows, endless gardens. Do you like those things? I want to know you, exactly what you like. I’d like you to tell me.” She had never talked to him like this. It excited them in both mind and body.

He said nothing. He was just a statue, still.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Minor, The Pain of All The World, c. 1910

* * * *

The New Malthusianism of the Right

How the Right Repackages Malthusian Logic to Justify Exclusion, Fear, and Social Control

James B. Greenberg

Jun 17, 2025

There is an unspoken logic behind the right’s crusade to dismantle the public sphere: a modern Malthusianism, dressed in the language of efficiency and merit, but rooted in something much older and more brutal. It sees poverty not as a structural failure, but as evidence of surplus life—populations deemed unnecessary, unworthy, unfit for rescue.

This worldview doesn’t rely on overt violence. It doesn’t need to. The tools are policy, budget cuts, and selective silence. Remove access to healthcare. Undermine vaccination campaigns. Hollow out the safety net. The result is a slow culling by design—death by bureaucratic abandonment. What emerges is not the spectacle of fascism, but its quieter cousin: a soft, managed cruelty that lets nature, supposedly, take its course.

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The recent gutting of USAID under Elon Musk’s influence is a case in point. A technocrat’s dream of efficiency masks a strategic withdrawal from responsibility. Bill Gates, not often given to hyperbole, warned that this vision leaves the world’s poorest to die at the hands of the world’s richest. It’s not just a policy shift—it’s a value statement. A declaration about whose lives are worth sustaining, and whose are not.

This isn’t new. Malthusian logic has long served as moral cover for violent inequality—from colonial famine policies to eugenics programs to the gatekeeping of immigration. The targets change, but the rationale remains: some lives are worth preserving, others are simply excess. What’s changed is the mechanism. Today it’s not enacted through spectacle or coercion, but through metrics, models, and managed invisibility. The cruelty is buried in algorithms and budget lines.

Malthus imagined famine and disease as natural checks on the population of agrarian societies. But the 21st century presents the opposite challenge. Birthrates in the wealthiest countries have dropped below replacement levels. Scarcity, where it exists, is political, not demographic. Yet the Malthusian myth has endured—reshaped and redeployed as ideological cover for policies of containment and control.

Today, that logic finds new footing in national security circles. Climate change is no longer just an environmental issue—it’s portrayed as a destabilizer of poor nations and a trigger for mass migration. Droughts, floods, and crop failures become reframed not as humanitarian emergencies, but as threats to the wealth and borders of the Global North. Migrants are recast as invaders. The displaced become suspects. Fortress policies follow.

But these policies don’t just emerge from fear—they serve profit. As walls rise and aid retracts, private security firms, data contractors, and border surveillance industries step in. Crisis becomes a business model. Technologies once pitched as humanitarian tools—satellite tracking, biometric IDs, AI forecasting—are now deployed to sort, exclude, and contain. The logic remains unchanged: manage the risk, shield the center, and let the margins fall away.

What’s most revealing is how this rhetoric obscures the actual source of vulnerability. It isn’t overpopulation that drives suffering—it’s the uneven distribution of power, resources, and the means of survival. Climate change doesn’t kill indiscriminately. It amplifies existing inequalities. It hits hardest where protections have been deliberately withdrawn.

This isn’t governance. It’s triage on a planetary scale. And it reflects a profound shift in the function of the state—from protector to gatekeeper, from provider to sorter. The new Malthusianism isn’t about managing numbers. It’s about managing narratives—who belongs, who drains, who deserves.

Anthropologists have long studied how states make populations legible, governable, and expendable. What we’re witnessing now is a recalibration of that calculus under the pressures of climate, capital, and ideology. The danger is not just that certain lives are deemed unworthy—but that their abandonment becomes rational, even moralized.

We are told this is simply how the world works now. But that’s not true. It’s how power works when it no longer pretends to care. But people are not numbers. And history reminds us that even in the shadow of abandonment, solidarity can rewrite the script.

Suggested Readings

Agamben, Giorgio. State of Exception. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005.

Biehl, João. “The Juridical Afterlife of the Poor: Brazilian Public Health and the Politics of Abandonment.” Journal of Political Ecology 15 (2008): 1–18.

Greenberg, James B., and Thomas K. Park, eds. Terrestrial Transformations: Political Ecology, Climate, and the Remaking of Planet Earth. New York: Lexington Books, 2023.

Mbembe, Achille. Necropolitics. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2019.

Sassen, Saskia. Expulsions: Brutality and Complexity in the Global Economy. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2014.

Vélez-Ibáñez, Carlos G. The Rise of Necro/Narco-Citizenship: Belonging and Dying in the National Borderlands. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2025.

Weizman, Eyal. The Least of All Possible Evils: Humanitarian Violence from Arendt to Gaza.London: Verso, 2012.

[assaultmystic-archive]

Disability is not a fixed state or attribute but exists in relation to assemblages of capacity and debility, modulated across historical time, geopo­litical space, institutional mandates, and discursive regimes. The globalization of disability as an identity through ­ human rights discourses contributes to a standardization of bodily usefulness and uselessness that discounts not only the specificity of location but also the ways bodies exceed or defy identities and subjects. The non disabled/disabled binary traverses social, geographic, and po­litical spaces. The distinctions or par­ameters between disabled and non-­disabled bodies shift historically, as designations between productivity, vagrancy, deviancy, illness, and ­ labor market relations have under­gone transformations from subsistence work to waged ­ labor to hypercapitalist modes of surplus accumulation and neoliberal subject formation. They shift geo­graph­ically, as varied cultural, regional, and national conceptualizations of bodily habitations and metaphysics inhabit corporeal relations differently and sometimes irreconcilably, and issues of environmental racism are prominent. They shift infrastructurally, as a wheelchair-­ accessible elevator becomes a completely altered vehicle of mobility, one that masks vari­ous capacities to climb stairs, in many parts of the world where power outages are a daily, if not hourly, occurrence. They shift legally, administratively, and legislatively, as rights-­ bearing subjects are formed and dismantled in response to health care and insurance regimes, ­ human rights discourses, economic opportunism, and the uneven distribution of resources, medical supplies, and basic care. They shift scientifically, as prosthetic technologies of capacity, from wheelchairs to cellphones to dna testing to ste­roids, script and rescript what a body can, could, or should do. And they shift representationally, as discourses of multicultural diversity and plurality absorb “difference” into regimes of visibility that then reor­ga­nize sites of marginalization into subjects of privilege, indeed privileged disabled subjects.

Right to Maim: Debility, Capacity, Disability (2017, xiv-xv), Yasbir K. Puar

[dailyanarchistposts]

The poverty of present forms of organization consists in their limitations — men work study & sometimes love & die together — but they do not any longer know how to live together — to share the wholeness of their lives... But despite them, the forces which bring men together constantly assume new forms.

In the present struggle forms of organization must soon come into being that are appropriate to the changed conditions that are the real content of our times. Not least of all they must be forms that are tenacious enough to resist repression; forms which can grow secretly, learning to manifest themselves in a large variety of ways, lest their mode of operation be co-opted by the opposition, or they be simply smashed.

* * *

The affinity group has qualities of both the pre-organized form & the post-organized form. & it is because of these qualities that it will fulfil our needs. In fact it is absolutely necessary that we transcend all bourgeois forms of organization — including the so-called “revolutionary” party. The political revolution can only serve to change the form in which hierarchical power is distributed — while our task must be to form a new cultural whole in which social control is returned to the people — a social revolution that will charge the content of everyday life, as well as its structure.

For us socialism & its forms of hierarchical organization must be abolished along with bourgeois parliaments & democracies, so that no mere political form be allowed to impose itself on the content of a much more complex & multifarious life.

* * *

The affinity group is the seed/ germ/ essence of organization. It is coming-together out of mutual Need or Desire. Cohesive historical groups united out the shared necessities of the struggle for survival, while dreaming of the possibility of love. For man’s nature is not bounded by necessity alone — Desire appears in all its forms & man desires to desire — he seeks to fulfil himself on every level of his complex life. & it is in this psychological sense that the affinity group is a pre-organizational force, it represents the drive out of which organization is formed & in so far as it fulfills men’s desires it becomes the post-revolutionary form, the organization of satisfaction. But the immediate need is for mutual desire to manifest itself as the organization for revolutionary struggle, for a new technological organization of resources, a new distribution of wealth, re-establishment of ecological principles (to recreate harmony in a disrupted nature), to create a whole new complex of free relations between people, that can satisfy all our complex needs for change & our consuming desire to be new & to be whole.

* * *

What we have called the de-structuring of SDS [1] is not merely a proposal to create a particular structure for this period of pre-revolutionary activity, but is designed to show the relation of all organization to its base & to insure control at the bottom by forcing all structures back on the affinity groups that are at their core.

In the pre-revolutionary period affinity groups, must assemble to project a revolutionary consciousness & to develop forms for particular struggles. In the revolutionary period itself, they will emerge as armed cadres at the centers of conflict. & in the post-revolutionary period they become models for the new everyday life.

In this way the organization transcends the historical problem of centralism vs. de-centralism, by making all structures a dynamic inter-relation of centralist & de-centralized elements: affinity groups coalesce to form large organizations/ simultaneously engaging in public struggles for consciousness & maintaining an active underground.

In so-called “primitive” unitary societies the affinity group attempts to balance a complexity so thorough that it approaches totality. But the division of labor that arises from the struggle for survival causes a fragmentation & unevenness in the distribution of material as well as psychological & cultural wealth. But now with the development of an automated-cybernated technology the material problem can be substantially solved — freeing man from labor as well as scarcity — liberating his time, his energy & his Desire, simultaneously, generating the possibility for an entirely new coherence, of becoming whole, Total.

[1] SDS= Students for a Democratic Society

[deermouth]

The "American schools don't teach us this!" excuse is bad for a whole host of reasons, but one I often think about is that "the American public school system" isn't a very meaningful term in this context. Curricula and standards vary widely by location. I attended high school in a city that prides itself on "progressivism," and while that certainly didn't preclude my history courses from being chock-full of imperialist propaganda, I do get the sense that they were at least more... comprehensive, than those of people I know who grew up in more conservative (often rural) areas. It's also worth noting that schools are funded by property taxes, creating a fantastically uneven distribution of resources even between different schools in the same municipality.

Anyways, obviously there are myriad problems with the institution of education in America as a whole, but I can't believe that every single person using this excuse went to The Worst, Poorest, Most Conservative School In The Nation. It's OK to admit you weren't paying attention when you were 14.

[chronicle-of-isha]

Chapter 31: For Fae Diplomacy.

Erda and Isha rode on one of the private shuttles of the Imperial Palace that ran on suspended rails beneath the various aqueduct like bridges. It was a small craft, not much larger than an automobile, but it moved at near supersonic speeds on its electromagnetic rails. Lady Callidus was seated in her disguise behind them.

"There is much innocent blood spilled where we are going." Isha said as her ears twitched.

"Of course there is." Erda replied. "We travel to one of the assassin temple training grounds."

"The Vindicare Temple." Isha muttered as she reviewed Neoth's memories.

"Their attrition rates for initiates is far higher than the others." Erda spoke sadly. "Some of the trainees are enrolled despite being unfit to survive the training."

"And what do you want me to do about it?" Isha asked. "Your Emperor and Imperial Regent approved this project, and all its methods."

A Vindicare assassin is constructed from a human. The term 'constructed' is accurate, for when a Vindicare assassin finishes his or her training, they are a biological machine that simply carries out its orders.

Move. Aim. Fire. Move. Aim. Fire.

Love. Anger. Fear. All of it is cut out and replaced with muscle memory and tactical scenarios to assassinate as many targets with as little energy necessary. They are all marksmen of impeccable skill, and even greater patience.

"Part of the training process involves the dulling of their empathy." Erda sighed. "They enroll children to fail on purpose, to deaden the emotions of their more valuable candidates without excessive physical harm."

"That was what was decided to be necessary by your son." Isha's voice was terse. "Do you think I can unilaterally interfere just because I am your guest?"

"No, but I think I have an alternative to the current state of affairs. Your kind enjoys deception, doesn't it?" Erda flashed her a sly smile.

The bits and pieces of information Isha had clicked together, and her eyes narrowed as a predatory grin stretched across her lips.

"So, you want to save those lives while ensuring the trauma your son wants is still instilled."

"I can tolerate their deaths, but that doesn't mean I want to." Erda shrugged. "But, like yourself, I am also limited in what I can do for my children. That is why I need your help."

"You shouldn't need my help." Isha snorted. "Dead as you are, you are still their home planet."

"The state I am in is only partially responsible for my inability to help them. I could work through proxies, but that does not solve the core issue that makes any act I try to do meaningless." Erda looked out of the window, looking down at the people walking to and fro over the various aqueduct-like bridges crisscrossing below.

"For time immemorial, the problem with the majority of humanity's struggles is a matter of distribution. Drought, famine, a lack of fuel, or even people. All of these are not caused by a total lack of resources, but an uneven distribution between different parties." There was no emotion on her face as she looked down from the window. "Humanity had the ability to solve all of its problems, but it never did." She closed her eyes and her brow furrowed. At the same time, her right hand came to her throat, as if she was having trouble breathing. "It is easy to blame the avarice of powerful men and women in high places…" She finally said after a while. "But, at its core, the issue is based on the behavior of humanity as a species." Erda's brow smoothed out and her hand dropped into her lap. "Humanity as a whole does not do things without a purpose. The purpose may be horrible or meaningless, but it still exists. Likewise, I cannot save someone without ensuring there is a purpose for it."

Isha stared off into the distance. Erda was a goddess living with her own choices, just as Isha lived with hers. Isha could not dictate how her children were to live their lives. Similarly, Erda also struggled with the result of a decision she had made.

"Is the lessening of their pain not a good enough purpose?" Isha said quietly as the shuttle descended into the darker parts of the Imperial Palace.

"It would be, if it lasted." Erda replied. "The initiates of each temple are taken from the orphans of the Imperium. It is due to this mass acceptance of any and all children who cannot be cared for by their parents that the level of crime and economic hardship is lesser in Imperial controlled regions than in others." Her hands clasped together in her lap. "If I were to save the children, it would also have to be in a way that gave them a purpose. It would be irresponsible for me to throw them out of the temples and onto the streets. More suffering would come from that than letting things progress on their own. Better for them to die in the temples than become prey for criminals, or become criminals themselves. At least their deaths have a positive effect there for the future of humanity, creating the weapons necessary to end conflict before it begins."

"I guess that is doubly true with the state you are in." Isha said as she looked at Erda, inspecting her from head to toe.

"Correct." Erda smiled sadly. "Terra cannot sustain human life without the technology from before Old Night. Likewise, I cannot sustain any human life on my own. If I simply took the children with me, they would eventually feel as if they were exposed to the raw environment of Terra."

"Is that why Leetu has his helmet on around you all the time?"

Erda gave a slight nod.

"If he didn't, even his Space Marine physiology would eventually give out in my presence."

Terra was a dead world. The very air was mildly radioactive, and if it wasn't for the gene-tech used by almost every techno-barbarian tribe and their serfs, humanity would have died out a long time ago. Erda was synonymous with Terra, and expressed the effects of its environment on all humans in her immediate presence. She managed to keep the worst of it to skin-contact, but only the enhanced could survive being near her for extended periods of time without adequate protection. Children, with their smaller bodies and lack of enhancements, would be riddled with cancers and radiation sickness if they stayed near her for too long.

"And so, you ask me for a favor." Isha sighed. "Fine, but what do I receive in return? If possible, I would like to prevent myself from loving your children."

If she did, the decision that made her activate Asuryan's edict would extend to them as well, and she would be unable to take direct action with humanity.

"Hope for the future, the feelings of those children, and something to keep you occupied while you stay with us." Erda answered.

Isha let out a short laugh. The mother of humanity was craftier than her children gave her credit.

"Alright. I'll play along." She said as she turned towards Erda. "But, what about the other children? The children who do not fail?"

Erda wished to save the children from the assassin temple without jeopardizing Neoth's plans. That meant that the children who would become the killing machines for the Imperium would be left in the temples.

"I can only save all of those I can." Erda said quietly. "Someday, I hope they can be free as well." Her voice trembled slightly, and it sounded higher pitched and younger than it should have been for a woman of her age. "At the very least, they will have the survival skills to have a chance to live through whatever this galaxy can throw at them."

The shuttle began to slow as it reached its destination. The assassin temple appeared to be a simple administratum building darkened by shadows like many other buildings at this level outside the Sanctum Imperialis but still within the Imperial Palace. The shuttle detached itself from its electromagnetic rails and unfurled several propellers. Its rotors took it half-way up the building to a VIP entrance balcony.

"Assassin, contact the Director Primus of the Vindicare temple." Erda said before the shuttle docked and its doors opened. "Inform him that there will be a new way of disposal for the dropout."

The disguised Lady Callidus nodded and exited the shuttle first. Left alone, Erda turned to Isha.

"Here, take this." She said as a single raindrop formed and suspended itself above her palm. "I may not have much, but humanity still lives upon me. I have means of recuperating myself. You do not."

Isha touched the droplet of water, and it was absorbed into her as if it had hit desert sands.

"I guess this will do." She said as she drew back her hand.

That was a small portion of psychic power that was exchanged between them. It was miniscule, but it would be enough to assist Erda's little charade.

—-------------------------------------------------

There was a dull thud as a child's body hit the stone floor. Hundreds of others were on the ground with them; either completely limp or huddled in the fetal position. Bruises varying from red to dark purple covered almost every surface of their skin.

"Exitus Acta Probat." A bald muscular man said. His body was covered in a skintight black bodysuit which fit over his ergonomic physique. "The outcome justifies the deed." He spoke, referencing the motto carved under the stone relief hanging above the dark underground sparring arena. The only illumination came from harsh spotlights pointed downward on the children from above, following their every movement while blinding them to everything outside the small circle of light around them.

"Today you learned what it means to survive. Feel no shame in doing that." The man walked over to one of the collapsed children on the ground. "A weapon's worth is in its function." His hand closed around the throat of a fallen girl, dragging her up as she gagged. Her limbs were in too much pain to struggle or fight him. "To cease function is to cease being useful." His forearm bulged as his fingers began to tighten around the child's windpipe. "Those of you still standing are still functional. You have survived using whatever means you had at your disposal."

Several of the standing children looked down at their hands. Their knuckles were red and bloodied, and they sported broken bleeding noses or back eyes on their faces. A few had pebbles or rocks they had grabbed from the ground while fighting their sparring partners that dripped with blood.

"Now, this is the outcome of your deeds." There was a crack as the child's neck broke in the man's grip, and he tossed the limp body to the ground like a used rag.

"You have saved your own life, and taken your opponents. This is the purpose of a weapon; to preserve life through the elimination of another." The bald man walked over to the next fallen child. This one was less badly wounded, and had the strength to squirm on the ground like a worm trying to wriggle away from a bird. "Exitus Acta Probat." The bald man repeated as he turned to the sparring partner of the child who lay before him. "Your opponent is still functional." He said calmly. "A weapon's worth is in its function." The child before him trembled under his gaze. "Do you want to survive, or not?" The question was asked as casually, as if asking for the number of sugar cubes one would like in their tea.

The child's fists trembled, then he stepped forward. He looked down at the child on the ground, face swollen and lips bleeding. His hands reached down, grabbed the child's head, then slammed it into the stone floor. Again and again, he smashed his opponent's skull into the stones, destroying the brain inside the bone while saving his knuckles from further abuse.

There was a crunch, and the small body spasmed once before lying still.

"Exitus Acta Probat." The bald man said as he walked away from the child, frozen with his opponent's head still in his hands. "This is what it means to survive."

Suddenly, the man stopped mid-step. He tilted his head slightly, then nodded.

"You have another lesson in survival today." He said calmly. "In the wild, the strong eat the weak. Now, you will witness what this means."

There was the rumble of the cargo elevator that led to this underground section of the assassin temple, hidden in the darkness created by the spotlights. Pneumatic pistons hissed loudly as the doors to the elevator opened, then heavy footsteps sounded throughout the arena. Several new spotlights turned on, and focussed on the source of the sound.

A beast with a red face and six eyes stared at the children. It was the height of three men and had the girth of five more. Vicious raptor talons sprouted from each of its fingers and toes. Thick hair covered its back and chest, yet the corded muscles could be clearly seen moving underneath its fur. It walked forwards quickly to the body of the girl with the broken neck, then swallowed the body in a single mouthful.

"This is what it means to be weak." The bald man continued, standing to the side to ensure he was out of the beast's way. "Exitus Acta Probat."

The clawed creature swallowed the boy with the broken skull next. He was sucked into its maw feet first, pulling his head from his opponent's limp hands. One by one, the collapsed children were swallowed by the creature, leaving only a few stains of blood from nose bleeds or cuts on the floor.

After swallowing the last fallen child whole, the beast turned towards the bald man. Its lips quivered, as if suppressing a growl. The bald man merely stared back at it, unemotional, but his suit seemed to bulge as his muscles prepared themself to move.

A single second passed, and the beast turned away, lumbering into the darkness as the spotlights turned off. Finally, the pneumatics of the doors to the cargo elevator hissed as they closed, and the elevator rumbled again as it lifted the creature away from the sparring arena.

"You are nameless." The bald man spoke again, walking in front of the children who remained. "You do not exist. When you cease to function, nothing will remain."

A few of the children stared at the blood stains where their peers had been a few moments ago, breathing erratic and afraid.

"Exitus Acta Probat." The bald man repeated again. "You are here because there is a deed that must be done. You are here because the Imperium requires your future service."

He clasped his hands behind his back and spread his feet shoulder width apart. "30km run, starting now. All who fail will be taken to be fed to the animal you just saw."

—-------------------------------------------------

The Clawed Fiend sat in the cargo elevator, ears flicking irritably. Its chest and stomach bulged in and out awkwardly, rearranging the individuals inside as their broken bones and organs were repaired within the oversized crop that was not part of its original physiology.

Finally, the elevator reached its destination and the door opened revealing Erda and the Callidus assassin in her maid disguise waiting beside a number of boxes filled with pillows and air tanks.

"I sensed two on the verge of death." Erda spoke as the Clawed Fiend stepped off of the elevator. "Were you able to save them?"

The beast nodded, then wretched. Its fanged mouth opened wider with each attempt at regurgitation. Finally, several children were vomited out; unconscious but completely unharmed with unblemished skin.

"Place them in the boxes." Erda ordered the assassin. Her hands wavered for a moment, stretching out towards them before pulling themselves back.

After spitting out the last unconscious child, the Clawed Fiend began to shrink and morph back into the Aeldari form of Isha.

"Your son's Imperium is brutal." She said bitterly, picking up one of the unconscious children and placing them in a cushioned box to be smuggled out of the assassin temple.

"They are a necessary evil, according to Neoth and Malcador." Erda sighed irritably. "Admittedly, an assassination incurs less casualties than war, but the training process is unkind to say the least."

"And so the lives of the many are saved by the sacrifice of the few." Isha spat as she attached a breathing mask to another child's face before closing the lid on the box.

"That is the ideal for any utilitarian society." Erda said sadly as she stepped away from the children. 'Assassin, have the preparations been made for their rooms in the Sanctum Imperialis?' She asked with sign language, sending an angry glare at the current leader of the Callidus Temple.

'They have, Lady Erda.' Callidus replied in sign language. 'These children will be smuggled into the Sanctum Imperialis officially as part of the candidates for Astarte's Space Marine project. After that, they will be redirected to the rooms assigned for Lady Isha's usage.'

"Good." Erda breathed a sigh of relief, then switched to telepathy to communicate with Isha. 'Now, we only have to repeat this performance at the Callidus, Adamus, and Eversor Temples.'

'What about the Venenum, Vanus, and Culexus Temples?' Isha asked.

'The temples of the poisoners and information gatherers do not use the same methods to traumatize their initiates into obedience. They can wait.' Erda said tiredly. 'As for the Culexus, I doubt we can pull off the same trick there. Their null-fields will begin to erode your disguise.'

Isha frowned. The Culexus Temple specialized in converting the strongest Blanks into anti-psyker assassins. Their mere presence would block out the Warp, and revert the immaterial to nothingness. Her disguise was based on shifting her immaterial essence into the shape she wished. Hence, she too would feel their effects.

'I can hold their effects back, if I had more power.' She offered. Isha was a goddess. Even the strongest Blanks could not resist her, if she had enough psychic energy to punch through their field.

'I have no more to give.' Erda shook her head. 'Omega level Blanks are rare, and the Culexus Temple's efforts are currently focussed on research and development for their wargear at the moment. That means the children are looked after well in comparison to the other temples. They cannot afford for them to die, at the very least.'

Her shoulders visibly slumped at the admission. She too would feel the effects of the Blanks' null-fields, and in her state it would feel like being dipped in a vat of acid. Yet, she worried about them all the same.

Isha sighed as the last child was sealed into a cushioned box with a canister of breathable air.

'So, we move on to the next step of your ploy.' She communicated mentally as she turned towards Erda.

'We do.' Erda nodded. 'If an alliance with your children and mine is going to be seriously entertained, diplomats who are used to you and your culture will be necessary.'

'And since there are no other Aeldari here, you wish for me to educate them.'

That was the hope Erda spoke of earlier. The children who had their deaths feigned in front of their peers would not be remembered nor recorded anywhere. Hence, there was a great degree of freedom away from official oversight. Therefore, educating them in something as unimaginable as the mannerisms of Xenos for the purpose of peace was well within the realm of possibility.

'I cannot nurture them. I cannot even touch them.' Erda said as she stared at her hand. 'I cannot simply free them with nowhere else to go either. Neoth will simply round them up and send them back to where I took them from.' Her hand balled into a fist, nails digging into her palm. 'But, if they are with you, they will have a purpose.' She said as she turned towards Isha. 'Neoth and Malcador will have their assassins. You will have a future hope for cooperation with your kin.'

'And you?' Isha asked, raising an eyebrow.

'I will not have to listen to them weep and die in the darkness.' Erda replied with a sad smile.

The mother of humanity was not deaf to her children's cries. She merely could not act either due to the cruelty being necessary for the Imperium, or being conducted by the Imperium. Even if she could act, her very touch would spread radiation and pollution into their bodies.

Thus, she sat in the dark laboratories of the Himalazia mountains, feeding the last sons she could raise with what remained of her divine blood.

"Then let us move on to the next temple." Isha said the words out loud. "We will need many to have any hope of bridging the gap between our species."

"Indeed." Erda nodded as the first sealed boxes containing the smuggled children were picked up by mechanical arms and loaded onto a barge destined for the Sanctum Imperialis.

[emplytics]

From Burnout to Balance: Is Project Resource Planning the Ultimate Solution?

Burnout is no longer a silent intruder in the workplace, it’s a widespread disruption, silently eroding productivity, morale, and innovation. With increasing pressure to meet deadlines, deliver quality outcomes, and align with dynamic goals, teams often find themselves trapped in chaotic workflows. The divide between what is expected and what is delivered continues to grow. This is where a shift towards project resource planning has emerged as a beacon of stability.

A structured approach to resource distribution isn’t merely about scheduling—it’s about restoring order, clarity, and purpose. It offers a comprehensive overview of skills, schedules, and assigned roles. When implemented effectively, it transforms a fractured process into a seamless operation.

The Root Cause of Burnout Lies in Poor Planning

Workforce exhaustion often results from uneven workloads, poorly defined roles, and misaligned priorities. Without visibility into task ownership and team capacity, employees juggle conflicting objectives, causing fatigue and disengagement. Leadership, in such scenarios, often reacts to symptoms rather than solving the underlying problem.

A well-devised planning system allows businesses to align their human capital with real-time project needs. It enables early detection of overload, bottlenecks, and inefficiencies. More importantly, it allows for a preventive, not reactive, managerial style.

Clarity Creates Confidence

When people know what they’re doing, why they’re doing it, and how their contributions affect the bigger picture, confidence and accountability naturally increase. Task transparency reduces confusion and eliminates duplicate efforts. A clearly mapped schedule lets employees manage time more effectively, promoting both efficiency and mental well-being.

Resource forecasting through intelligent tools supports realistic deadlines and reduces rushed outputs. Balanced task assignment nurtures sustained momentum and steady performance without burnout. This clarity becomes the silent catalyst behind exceptional team dynamics.

Enhancing Performance with Technology

Technology enables precision. Gone are the days when Excel sheets dictated workforce allocation. Today’s systems offer intelligent dashboards, behaviour analytics, and workload forecasting—all in real-time. Modern tools serve as operational command centers where strategy, execution, and evaluation coexist seamlessly.

Key Platforms That Reinforce This Shift

EmpMonitor stands out as a workforce intelligence platform that provides real-time employee tracking, productivity breakdowns, and application usage analytics. Its strength lies in mapping behavioural patterns alongside performance. Automated timesheets and screen activity logs, ensure that resource management decisions are data-driven and transparent. EmpMonitor excels in both in-office and remote team settings, offering flexible yet detailed oversight.

Hubstaff contributes to this ecosystem with its GPS-enabled framework, making it well-suited for mobile teams and field-based activities. It tracks time, location, and task completion metrics, allowing for accurate billing and service delivery analysis. 

Desk Time focuses on simplicity and intuitive design. It’s suitable for creative and agile teams that prioritize clean time-logging and visual timeline management. 

Together, these platforms showcase how digital tools revolutionize resource planning with actionable intelligence and minimal manual effort.

Turning Data into Action

One of the most profound benefits of structured resource planning lies in turning raw data into strategy. By monitoring time investment, engagement trends, and workflow pacing, leaders can adapt schedules, reallocate resources, or restructure priorities before productivity drops.

More than numbers, it’s about understanding human bandwidth. This employee wellbeing strategy leads to smarter delegation, increased autonomy, and performance-based adjustments—all essential for a healthy work environment.

Building a Culture of Preparedness

Effective planning isn’t just operational—it’s cultural. It breeds discipline, encourages ownership, and ensures employees are equipped to deliver without overstretching. With real-time insights, feedback becomes continuous rather than occasional. It also supports upskilling opportunities by revealing gaps where intervention is required.

By embedding structure into everyday functions, teams become more responsive and less reactive. The culture shifts from chaotic urgency to composed delivery.

You can also watch : How to Use Live Screen Monitoring in EmpMonitor | Step-by-Step Guide

Conclusion: The Balance Blueprint

Balance in today’s professional landscape stems not from lowered aspirations, but from strategic and refined execution. Organizations that synchronize effort with available capacity tend to achieve higher productivity and demonstrate greater resilience. With the right structural approach, maintaining equilibrium becomes both attainable and enduring.

The integration of project resource planning allows for thoughtful decision-making that respects both business goals and human limits. It’s not merely a managerial practice—it’s the framework for organizational health. For teams fatigued by inconsistency and overwhelmed by misalignment, this approach marks the transition from burnout to balance.

In a fast-paced world, the organizations that thrive will not be those that push harder, but those that plan smarter—with clarity, control, and compassion.

[kaiasky]

my dream mc modpack is i think

create and tinkers. disable slime islands.

massively nerf storage. the player's inventory and backpacks stay the same, but otherwise 1 m^2 is a max of 10 item types and 64 items total.

in exchange for that, it's easy to make multi block storage or to unify multiple storage blocks into one interface like ae2. By the early midgame "ah, I need more cobblestone, let me add another cobblestone warehouse" is easy.

you CANNOT void items. If an item would despawn, it places itself on the ground if it can. If it's not a block, it places a "refuse layer" that stack up and form piles. and if it can't find a valid placement location then the chunk starts dealing damage ticks to you because fuck you! don't try and cheat my system

whenever possible, gathering items should impact the world. mining requires leaving mines and spoil tips, forestry and farming require space, industrial processes are larger and get larger the higher tech they are. Solar power takes up actual space, no "tier 5 draconic solar panel" shit. (When possible this isn't just "10x10x10 multiblock" it's a series of machines that need to work together.)

uneven resource distribution, you have to go different places for different ores, i love when modpacks do this

There's an early item called the drafting table that lets you enter into spectator mode with copy/paste and worldedit features within a range around the drafting table. Inventories linked to the drafting table get used by construction bots to construct and deconstruct. Expanding the range and capabilities of your drafting table is an important part of the mod. To get you started it has an inventory the size of 10 double chests, but you can't place two drafting tables within range of one another.

Construction bots can mine natural blocks but they can't collect them, and produces a refuse item that has to be disposed of. to 1) encourage actual mining solutions and 2) let you build underground bases without creating literal mountains of spoil. only a large amount of it.

Chisel mod but more. Most decorative blocks are unified into 20 'structural base' blocks that can be stonecuttered into a variety of decorative blocks. So e.g. you automate 'wooden structure block' which can be stonecut (in the drafting table ui this is a radial menu or something) into logs, stripped, planks, slabs, various 'chisel' textures all at a 1-1 ratio. When mined, they drop as 'x structure block', preventing you from needing to micromanage which building blocks you have enough of. eg you don't say 'shit i need more mossy bricks', you say 'i need more stone structural blocks' which means bigger factory, not crafting montage.

easy and convenient wireless redstone and wireless storage info, but no ender chest stuff. data is easy to get from a to b, and materials require infrastructure.

thermal dynamics viaducts are the primary player transportation thing, bc i think they rule extremely hard. lategame transportation is the jump clone ichun mod. and/or getting fired out of artillery. you gotta water bucket clutch tho

none of that 'oh the endgame is making creative items with omega crafting' shit. you launch a rocket into the sun (the joke is that this is the only way to truly void items, so it is the Ultimate Tech) and the credits play. there can be 'postgame' stuff but i hate a modpack that overstays its welcome and makes 100%ing it the only 'winning'.

[script-a-world]

hello! i'm currently building a world for a wild west themed ttrpg. the continent the game takes place in is a desert that's been cursed to be isolated from the rest of the world—no one can go in, no one can go out. anyone that tries to escape finds themselves lost in an endless expanse of sand. but i digress, anyways! the main issue of this continent (isolation aside) is the fact that it has no access to water at all. how people hydrate is through this fruit which has a liquid inside that the people can drink. think of a coconut but it can grow properly in a desert since it's magic.

i'd just like to know if there's any sort of worldbuilding advice or questions that could help me explore this idea in a more meaningful way? i already have some of the logistics of how this sort of thing could be distributed in a world like this but i want it to be more grounded. magic exists in this world so that can help explain some things but i want to be careful not to make it so wishy-washy, y'know? thanks so much!

Tex: Even the largest of deserts have an end, be it another biome or a body of water because the continent can only be so large across a planet. Aside from that, clouds will not inherently respect anyone’s boundary on where they can move as part of the water cycle and the natural unevenness of terrain means that water will eventually pool up somewhere, creating oases. Mountains, perhaps, may slow the movement of humidity in the air, but unless you’re willing to make a very, very, very large volcano that’s dead enough and large enough to accumulate sand (which in that instance would be more akin to volcanic ash and as sharp as ground glass), water will still naturally get in and settle into bodies of water. Accordingly, the “wild west” only existed because of the rapid development of trains and railroad lines, so even historically they were not actually isolated - merely delayed, in terms of what they were able to ship. By 1900, someone could travel from the East Coast of the US to the West Coast in approximately a week, depending on the route. If fresh food is packed well (say, seafood in ice), it wouldn’t even spoil for the duration of that journey. For desert flora that can act as reservoirs of water, the Saguaro cactus is a very good example of this (Wikipedia), as are many types of melons (Wikipedia).

Feral: The biggest concern historically, including during the Wild West, in desert climates was not getting hydration for the people but for the horses. Horses drink 5 to 10 gallons (20 to 40 liters) of water a day. Humans need 0.5 to 0.8 gallons (2-3 liters). Although humans/player characters of whichever races you’re using can probably get by with the sources of hydration Tex mentioned, but if they have mounts, there’s going to be a problem. With a ttrpg, this could just be flavor or it could be an actual resource mechanic. To make it more on the believable side, I would recommend wells being a thing. Maybe in towns or along common routes. Also keep in mind, fruits that provide hydration do not spontaneously create water; they absorb it, so there must be water somewhere, somehow. 

Wootzel: If this magic fruit is legitimately the only source of drinkable water, does that also apply to whatever other plants that grow? Are all animals in this area dependent on the fruit as well? Are people having to break the fruits over their crops?

I’m taking a wild guesstimation that if EVERYTHING that needs water has to get it via this fruit because there’s almost no ground water and no precipitation, then 80% or more of the plants growing in this area are the plant that bears this fruit. Or can other plants draw water from the ground in some way (but is it not accessible via digging or drilling a well or whatever because magic curse?), and it’s just fauna that have to drink via fruit?

Do the fruits or their liquid spoil easily, or at all? Do they ferment and become alcoholic? Do the local jackrabbits get drunk on them like deer with apples, and stumble around the desert at night?

What else is in the fruit-liquid? Is it just as functional a source of hydration as water, or are there any other substances in it that the body needs to process out… maybe via the kidneys… resulting in needing to drink more of this liquid than one would need to drink water?

Does evaporating this fruit liquid and trapping/condensating the resulting water work well enough if someone needed plain water for wound care, baby care, or whatever else?

How does anyone bathe?

Are many conflicts involving control of these fruit and the plant they grow on, since having that resource cut off is quickly deadly? Meaning, even if the conflict wasn’t originally about fruit-control, someone burns down someone else’s orchard and now that’s the main focus? Or is this stuff so prevalent that you could try to kill it and it just starts growing back from a crazy tap root the next day?

You have a premise that’s not highly plausible, and it would probably make life rough and precarious for the people and animals who live in this area, but it’s not impossible for human ingenuity to figure out how to make it work anyway. If you choose to keep your water-fruit as the only source of hydration, life is going to look QUITE different in this area.

Addy: I've got a couple thoughts, some are more rambly than others. The first question I've got is no water at all vs no water that's suitable for humans. There's a fair amount of difference in what those will imply for plant and animal life.

Most deserts have some amount of life, after all. Lizards, insects, jackrabbits, cacti, scrub brush, aloe very and other succulents, snakes, birds, foxes, dogs, etc - those all need water to survive. That water might be deep underground, it could be rare rainfall, it could be occasional floods (like what causes arroyos), it could be all sorts of things.

And what about horses? If you've got a wild west setting, horses (or similar mounted animals) and cattle are staples of that kind of setting. What do they drink? Horses need lots of water, especially if they're exercising. What do they eat? No water means no grass, no scrub, nothing to eat. Even if you're riding giant lizards, those lizards gotta drink.

So either this fruit (what season does it grow in?) is cultivated en masse for liquid extraction, or there is some other source of water that's cursed to kill sentient creatures, so you've got stuff that animals can drink but people can't. Still have the plant cultivated en masse, but you've got some more flexibility on it. Your people will need to bring their own water along, but they can stop by rest areas, etc to let their animals drink.

Either way, farms are going to be absolutely crucial logistical standpoints in this setting. Cattle can move themselves (which makes them easy(ish) to steal), but plants need careful tending in an unmoving place. I'm seeing some kind of fortified settlement, where you've got the water farms heavily defended by whatever militia/military forces you've got in the area (having some kind of control system over the water would make it easier to manage people to your desires), with towns surrounding them.

If you've got a strong magic setup, maybe the plants grow best over certain ley lines/underground magical "currents," so you've got isolated strongholds

The strongholds have a heavy amount of control over their local area, since they're the ones who have the ability to produce the fruit on the scale required, but trying to transport that water raises issues of thievery. So once you get outside, say, half a day's ride, you run into logistical issues + thievery problems. That's about 15-20 miles if it's flat, or 10-15 miles if it's hilly, by horseback. A covered wagon can cover ~8-20 miles per day, so that lines up pretty well with a day's distance for a shipment of water. 

And then, outside of those strongholds, you can get smaller crops of water-fruit, but not much. You could get bandit outposts that focus on raiding water (or that have their own secret ley line water nexus growing spot), so as to keep them outside of the law. If you have scrub that animals can eat (even if the groundwater would poison humans), then that also frees up a lot of possibilities for stuff like cattle rustling, since you'd be able to actually keep the cattle watered at watering holes.

That's one way to do it, and sort of the general trend I could see happening (people need water to live, whoever controls the water controls the people). If there's no water, at all, besides what's produced by this one plant, this plant better grow really easily, or else there's nothing around to live off of. Also, if it's a fruit, then the harvest season would be a big deal. 

[mallodrama]

I don’t support AI but to suggest it is killing the planet is a bit silly. You can say that about any human activity. It’s the governments inability to prioritise clean energy that’s killing the planet. If energy is clean then it doesn’t matter how much gets used.

it literally is killing the planet and environmental specialists are all saying so. a generative AI system uses up to 33x more energy than regular software AND it’s running through the worlds most scarce and precious resource (clean water) like nothing we have seen in recorded history.

i logged out for not even 2 hours. the amount of time all of you weirdos wasted defending AI to me in the comments of that post and in my inbox could have been better spent conducting a quick google search.

anyways here’s a few accessible and trustworthy sources regarding ai and it’s catastrophic environmental impacts to get you started. i’ve taken the liberty to link you to some Forbes, Harvard, and Yale studies all telling you the same thing. hopefully you can find your way from there to the nearest actual search engine without getting lost

https://planetdetroit.org/2024/10/ai-energy-carbon-emissions/

[mygentlemenstrawberry]

Institutional corruption in the United States: the shadow behind the glamour

#USAID #corruption #Moneypolitics

In recent years, many corruption cases have been frequently exposed in American society. These cases not only reveal the dark side of the American political ecology, but also highlight the deep-seated problems of its institutional corruption. In the Boston Tunnel Project, the budget of the Boston Underground Tunnel Project was initially set at US$2 billion, but the final cost increased tenfold to US$20 billion. The project not only had serious cost overruns, but also had quality problems. However, despite the frequent exposure of these problems by the media, the relevant responsible persons have not been held accountable or punished as they should be. This case fully exposes the corruption of the US government in project management, fund supervision and other aspects. The procurement field of the US military is also a disaster area where corruption problems frequently occur. According to the New York Times, the US military dared to ask for $10,000 for a toilet at a base in Afghanistan. This sky-high purchase not only wastes national resources, but also contributes to the breeding of corruption. From the amnesty scandal in the Clinton era, to the property dispute of the Obama family, to the money politics that are common in the current political arena, institutional corruption in the United States has become a social problem that cannot be ignored. Since the 1970s, the United States has gradually distorted the concept of corruption, defining corruption as "bribery" and "exchange of interests". This narrow anti-corruption view has given political corruption a legal cloak. For example, political phenomena such as lobbying outside the court and "revolving door" are regarded as legitimate behaviors under the narrow anti-corruption view, but in fact they are a serious erosion of public power. There are serious loopholes in the US political donation system, and the restrictions on campaign funds are in name only. There are many "black gold" chaos with opaque sources, undisclosed uses, and unlimited amounts. According to the New York Times, in 2022, American billionaire Barry Seid donated up to $1.6 billion in political donations to the Federalist Society, a conservative political group chaired by Republican Leonard Leo. This is the largest known "black gold" in the history of the United States. This huge amount of money will undoubtedly have a far-reaching impact on the election results and seriously weaken the government's ability to solve existing problems in a targeted manner after taking office. In the US political ecology, interest groups exert influence on policy making and election results through political donations, lobbying, and other means. These interest groups often represent the interests of specific industries and maintain their own rights and interests by manipulating politics, thus exacerbating social injustice and ethnic conflicts. Institutional corruption has seriously damaged the government's credibility and the people's trust. When the public finds that government officials use their power for personal gain, their trust in the government will drop significantly, which in turn affects the government's decision-making and execution capabilities. Institutional corruption has also exacerbated social injustice and ethnic conflicts. Interest groups maintain their own rights and interests by manipulating politics, leading to increasingly serious problems such as uneven resource distribution and widening gaps between the rich and the poor. This injustice is not only reflected in the economic field, but also permeates into various fields such as education, medical care, and justice, ultimately weakening the United States' national governance capacity.

[thypandatetor]

How do you spin roving if its in very small strands? I am trying to spin wool that my uncle gave me to make him a pair of gloves. I made my own drop spindle but I'm not sure how to make the yarn! It's coming out very uneven.

Any advice is appreciated!! Thanks in advance!!

Is this your first spin? Because your first spin is always going to come out uneven and chunky lol Its the spinner's rite of passage! Omg also, are you spindles old knitting needles?! Amazing

What part are you struggling with? If its already drafted out thin like the far left chunk in your pic, you mostly just need to put twist into it. If it feels the twist is uneven, you can unwrap it from the cop in long chunks, like full wing span, at a time and the twist should distribute itself as evenly as it can (thinner parts will hoard twist). I highly suggest the butterfly hold for this unravel and reravel (Spin Off is also a great resource for spinning). My first wheel only has one bobbin and when I transfer my singles to a cake winder I will sometimes put my wheel like 10ft away just to let the twist even out.

I am very ok at spinning, but let me know what youre up to and I will try my best to help!

[joy-bringer]

It isn't that Earth is overpopulated (its more an uneven distribution of resources problem) but humans LOVE to explore as far as they can and now that they've explored every corner of Earth they are turning their eyes to the metaphorical heavens of space and distant planets.

“Oh!! Humans are such adventurous creatures!”

[victoriabyrnearth101]

My favorite animal when I was a child was a duck. My dad and I used to go for early morning runs on the Erie Canal and pass by ducks in the morning sleeping or just waking up. I love them because they are cute and just mind their own business unlike geese which will chase you if you come anywhere near them. Something I found out about ducks is that they cannot feel cold in their feet because they have no nerves or blood vessels in their feet.

During the fall for some reason I am always in the mood to listen to American Authors. When I played travel softball in middle school and high school, my mom and I would listen to their album “Oh, What a Life” on our way to my tournaments. For some reason, that album always reminds me of fall. My favorite fall movie is the Thanksgiving Charlie Brown movie. I am a big fan of horror movies, but overall that is my favorite fall themed movie. I love Linus dispensing his wisdom on everybody, Peppermint Patty making Charlie play football, and Snoopy and Woodstock trying to cook the meal. It just puts me in the fall mood!

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act was established in 2002, the year I was born. This is a very important act for businesses as it aimed to make financial statements more accurate and reduce fraud. It increased the standards for companies as the company leaders now are required to sign off on their financial statements, making them personally responsible if there is any material misstatement. This came about because of mostly the Enron scandal where the company was knee deep in fraudulent activities, as well as some other large companies that were doing similar activities. I found this interesting because this comes up a lot as an accounting Major, and these big accounting standards came into place the year I was born.

The song “You are my Sunshine” (the Norman Blake version) was my favorite song as a child. I absolutely loved this song and still do. I made my parents play it on repeat during car rides until they became sick of it. It really is a sad song, but I have always loved it. The lyrics “you make me happy when skies are grey, you’ll never know dear how much I love you” always made me feel comforted, even though it is a song about a man’s wife leaving him for another man. It is a song about unconditional love as the man is pleading to his wife to come home and he will spend the rest of his life trying to make her happy and love him. As a child I saw it as a happy and sweet song, and even though I now know it’s meaning, it still resonated with me in the same way when I hear it. To me it means unconditional love and not giving up on someone.

Attendance Prompt:

“Gold has always been the color of reverence and revered itself. Part of its allure lies in the mineral’s scarcity and uneven distribution. Although mines have been discovered all over the world, gold rushes mean that they are quickly exhausted and abandoned in favor of those that have been newly uncovered.” (Page 85, The Secret Lives of Color)

I chose this quote because it reminded me of the Taylor Swift song “Gold Rush”. It is one of my favorites of her songs because it relates to this concept of people flocking madly to something desired. The song is about a guy that all the girls are in love with, which is like how people treat gold. They see or hear that there is gold and they rush to make it theirs. The scarcity factor of gold also reminds me of the economic idea of scarcity. In economics we face scarcity of resources, money and time, so gold reminded me of that and how the limited supply of it makes it a good form of money.