Mike Kudrna on X - "I had a former employee get into financial trouble Sued us on a verifiable lie that he cut his thumb on the job and 8 years later could no longer use it Workers comp attorney said she knows it's a lie but his attorney knows the exact dollar amount to ask for that is just below the threshold for court So they'll settle instead This is one reason everyone's insurance is so high. We allow these scams with no repercussion. No harm in trying to sue is their belief"
Chef Andrew Gruel on X - "Employee got drunk on the first day of the job. Harassed employees, broke a glass and walked out. Asked for his job back. We said no. He filed a PAGA claim with a trial attorney - form lawsuit, claiming we didn’t pay overtime, vacation pay, breaks, etc. he only worked around 4 hours and when we gave him his final check I added $200 because he was clearly hurting. Trial attorney asked for $250k. I’m in over $50k fighting it and the state won’t drop it as PAGA never gets dismissed. All fake and proven false yet we will most likely be out over $100k.
Every attorney I’ve spoken to says we need to settle for well over 50k."
Thread by @seconds_0 on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - " We think of the Aztecs and Incas as so old, but the Aztec civilization is younger than Oxford. Incans didnt exist until the 1200s. There is extensive archeological remains of Peruvian civilizations (the Caral) existing in 3000 BC, predating the Incans by 4000 years That's contemporaneous with 4th Dynasty Egypt, the pyramid builders. They were a lowland river society with satellite villages on the coast. They lacked ceramics entirely, but had sophisticated cotton farming for production of fishing nets and were dependent on seafood. In 3000 BC, they had extensive trade networks - fancy shells from ecuador, dyes from andean highlands, hallucinogenic snuff from the amazon. They worshiped the Staff God. This was found carved on a gourd in Caral, and imagery repeated throughout south american culture There is no record of any kind of warfare at Caral for a thousand years. No multilated bodies, burned buildings, or other tell tale signs of violence. All settlement patterns are completely non-defensive. No walls or forts. A thriving civilization without warfare is odd. They were massive builders with an enormous density of large sites. It was likely the most densely populated area in the entire world in the third millennium. Small scale terracing, large scale platform mound masonry. Were talking dozens of massive step pyramids on 100s of acres This is main pyramid at Caral-Supe. 520'x490', rising 59' tall. It was occupied from 2600bc to ~2000bc when the Caral civilization collapsed. It was briefly occupied around 1000bc and from 900-1440ad, but with very few people on the outskirts. It was rediscovered in 1977. Technological differences from Eurasian ancient civs are vast. Total lack of ceramics is unique and accompanies lack of archeological visible art. They do no sculpture, no carving, no bas relief, and very little painting / drawing. Interiors are completely bare. What they do have is huge structures and enormous amounts of textiles. Quipu - string recording devices - suggest proto-writing existed. Large numbers of instruments - in particular 32 pelican bone flutes. Textile art would be less likely to survive 5000 years and is unsurprising. Unlike 4th Century egyptian pyramid construction, theres no question or controversy around Carals pyramid construction method. Quarried stone small enough to transport and gathered field stone were moved in reed bags, of which extensive evidence is preserved. These 'shicra bags' made of a long, very durable grass from the highlands, were filled with rocks and packed into retaining wall trenches in the step pyramids, hauled by hand. There is some evidence that dried anchovies were used as currency and paid to hauling workers."
Scott Piper on X - "Google Cloud accidentally deleted a company's entire cloud environment (Unisuper, an investment company, which manages $80B). The company had backups in another region, but GCP deleted those too. Luckily, they had yet more backups on another provider."
Thread by @thinkingwest on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "Kenneth Clark lamented that civilization was a fragile thing. He observed three “enemies” that could topple even the mightiest cultures—what are they?π§΅
The first enemy is fear: “fear of war, fear of invasion, fear of plague and famine, that make it simply not worthwhile constructing things, or planting trees or even planning next year’s crops. And fear of the supernatural, which means that you daren’t question anything.”
Fear paralyzes a people and stifles adventure, invention, and grand building projects. Fear leads to stagnation.
The second enemy is a lack of self confidence. Clark saw the late Roman empire as a prime example of a culture that didn’t believe in itself anymore: “The late antique world was full of meaningless rituals, mystery religions, that destroyed self-confidence.”
When traditions and rituals lose their connection to what inspired them in the first place, they become the performance art of a dying civilization. Cultures need to believe in something.
Finally, a civilization dies with exhaustion—the “feeling of hopelessness which can overtake people even with a high degree of material prosperity.”
Decadence, moral degradation, and lack of belief in something greater leave a society questioning the point of it all. An aimlessness pervades society that is often only quenched by civilizational suicide. Clark tells a story by Greek poet Cavafy, in which he imagines an antique town that waits for barbarians to come and sack the city. After a while, the barbarians move on and the city is spared. But the people are disappointed—destruction would have at least been interesting.
Enough doom and gloom—what’s the solution? Clark draws a distinction between the “amenities” of civilization and the factors that caused it to prosper in the first place. A society can be “dead and rigid” even while enjoying great wealth: “People sometimes think that civilisation consists in fine sensibilities and good conversations and all that. These can be among the agreeable results of civilisation, but they are not what make a civilisation”
Ultimately Clark says that flourishing civilizations have two things beyond a base-level of material prosperity: confidence and belief. “confidence in the society in which one lives, belief in its philosophy, belief in its laws, and confidence in one’s own mental powers.” For example, the way in which the stones of the Pont du Gard Aqueduct are laid shows not only a triumph of technical skill, but a vigorous belief in law and discipline, as well as a confidence in the ability to accomplish great tasks.
But there’s something else great civilizations share: “Vigour, energy, vitality: all the civilisations—or civilising epochs—have had a weight of energy behind them,” Clark says.
Clark’s thoughts on civilization should inspire reflection about our own. Does the West believe in its foundational principles, laws, or philosophy? Is the West confident in itself? Or, is it fearful, timid, and exhausted?"
The West has lost confidence in and hates itself, so good luck
Thread by @thinkingwest on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "“Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder,” according to 20th-century historian Arnold Toynbee. He claimed every great culture collapses internally due to a divergence in values between the ruling class and the common people…π§΅
Toynbee was an English historian and expert on international affairs who published the 12 volume work “A Study of History,” which traced the life cycle of about two dozen world civilizations. Through his work he developed a model of how cultures develop and finally die… Toynbee argued that civilizations are born primitive societies as a response to unique challenges—pressures from other cultures, difficult terrain or “hard country,” or warfare.
Toynbee writes: “Civilizations, I believe, come to birth and proceed to grow by successfully responding to successive challenges.” But each challenge must be a “golden mean” between excessive difficulty, which will crush a culture, and ease, which will allow it to stagnate. He believed civilizations continued to grow so long as they meet and solve new challenges, one after the other, in a cycle he calls “Challenge and Response.” Thus, each civilization develops differently because each confronts and overcomes different challenges.
But societies do not respond to challenges as a whole; rather, it's a unique class of elites within a society that are the problem solvers. He calls them the "creative minorities" who find solutions to challenges, and inspire—rather than force—others to follow their lead. The masses follow the solutions of the creative minorities by 'mimesis' or imitation, solutions they would have otherwise been incapable of discovering on their own. This synchronicity between the creative minorities and the masses brings civilization to its height. Toynbee did not attribute the breakdown of civilizations to environmental forces or external attacks by other civilizations. Rather, it is the decline of the creative minority that leads to a culture’s downfall. Through moral decay or material prosperity, the creative minority degenerates. They are no longer the great men who solve society’s problems but are simply a ruling class intent on preserving their power. They become what Toynbee calls the “dominant minority.” Toynbee points to a kind of self worship that takes hold of the dominant minority. They become prideful about their positions of authority yet are wholly inadequate to deal with the culture’s new challenges. Ultimately the dominant minority, incapable of solving their culture’s actual problems, form a “universal state” in a gambit to shore up their power, but it stifles creativity and subjugates the proletariat (common people). Toynbee used the Roman Empire as a classic example.
Toynbee writes: "First the Dominant Minority attempts to hold by force—against all right and reason—a position of inherited privilege which it has ceased to merit; and then the Proletariat repays injustice with resentment, fear with hate, and violence with violence.” As society deteriorates, four sentiments exist within the proletariat:
Archaism - idealization of the past
Futurism - idealization of the future
Detachment - removal of oneself from a decaying world
Transcendence - confronting the decaying world with a new worldview
From the disunity between the dominant minority and the proletariat, and between the different proletariat dispositions, a unified culture is impossible, and the civilization eventually ends. Toynbee sums up the three aspects of failing cultures: “...a failure of creative power in the minority, an answering withdrawal of mimesis (imitation) on the part of the majority, and a consequent loss of social unity in the society as a whole.”
It’s interesting to observe Toynbee’s formulation in light of the West’s current struggles. What do you think—was Toynbee observing universal patterns of civilizational development that might shed light on our culture today?"
Uzay Bulut on X - "Pakistan's oppression of occupied #Kashmir is worsening. As the world's attention is largely fixated on the war between Israel and Hamas in the Middle East, unrest has erupted in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in South Asia. Tensions are rising in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) as the Pakistani government has been deploying troops from Punjab Province to suppress the imminent protests in the region due May 11. The protests aim to address the Kashmiri people's economic, social and political problems that Pakistan's government has failed to solve. The United Kashmir People's National Party (UKPNP) and the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC) have issued warnings to the government of Pakistan against the use of any force against protestors. The warnings have apparently been ignored as Pakistan mobilized its troops to the area, leading to more protests. Historical background info: "In 1947, the Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir became part of the Republic of #India. Shortly thereafter, Pakistani armed forces and Pashtun tribesmen invaded the area, forcing the largest Kashmiri political party to approve the accession. Indian forces were deployed to counter the attacks by Pakistan. In 1948, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 47 requiring all Pakistani military personnel to withdraw from the region before a plebiscite—which would have confirmed the people’s wishes to join India—could be called. Instead of this Pakistan increased its military presence, and no plebiscite was held. In the areas of Kashmir which remained outside of India, Pakistan Occupied Kashmir, 41,000 Hindu families were forced to flee from Pashtun tribesmen. "The historic region of Kashmir has a total area of 85,807 sq. miles and is now divided between three countries. Pakistan occupies approximately 30,160 sq. miles, known as (PoK) and the Northern Areas." Clashes between Pakistani troops and Kashmiri locals are expected to further escalate. Fore more historical background info, please check: https://hinduamerican.org/wp-content/upl"
Time to blame India and the BJP's anti-Muslim agenda
Noah Smith ππΊπΈπΊπ¦ on X - "Unpopular opinion: The best cities are built around pedestrians, and one reason American urbanism struggles is that most of our urbanists are hardcore cyclists instead of wannabe pedestrians"
How the Praying Mantis Hears - "Scientists long thought that praying mantises were deaf, but now biologists know that the insects have a single ear that enables them to pick up sounds far beyond the range of human hearing... "The ear doesn’t look like any other ear," says Yager, who is studying the auditory systems of insects. "They're the only animals known to have just one ear.""
Cock throwing - Wikipedia - "Cock throwing, also known as cock-shying or throwing at cocks, was a blood sport widely practised in England until the late 18th century. A rooster was tied to a post, and people took turns throwing coksteles (special weighted sticks) at the bird until it died. Cock throwing was traditionally associated with Shrove Tuesday. A contributor to The Gentleman's Magazine in 1737, during an anti-Gallican phase of British culture, was of the opinion that cock throwing arose from traditional enmity towards the French, for which the cock played an emblematic role. Cock throwing was a popular pastime with people of all classes, especially with children, and although widespread, was less common than cockfighting."
Adobe Tells Users They Can Get Sued for Using Old Versions of Photoshop - "Adobe is warning some owners of its Creative Cloud software applications that they’re no longer allowed to use older versions of the software. It’s yet another example of how in the modern era, you increasingly don’t actually own the things you’ve spent your hard-earned money on... In a controversial move, Adobe pivoted away from the standard software model to the cloud-based subscription model in 2013, resulting in notably higher revenues (and higher prices for customers)... It’s yet another example of how the products we buy in the modern era can lose functionality or stop working entirely on a lark. Be it a game console that loses features with a firmware update or entertainment products that just suddenly disappear, it’s a problem that’s increasing popping up in the always online era... this kind of thinking has increasingly permeated countless sectors, including DRM-based media, software as a service, and even client-server games. Both Doctorow and Gilbert noted that this kind of shifting landscape can often be particularly problematic for artists and creators, who often don’t want to risk ongoing projects by suddenly jumping to new versions of software that may contain unforeseen bugs. “When your tools are designed to treat you as a mere tenant, rather than an owner, you're subject to the whims, machinations, and unforeseeable risks of the landlord from whom you rent,” Doctorow noted. “And your legal rights are likely defined by a ‘contract’ that you clicked through a million years ago, which says that you agree that you don't have any legal rights.” It’s a comical, lopsided arrangement that copyright experts say isn’t changing anytime soon, leaving consumers with only one real option: when possible, don’t buy products from companies with a history of pulling the carpet out from beneath your feet.""single mother owned" "please show mercy"
Lottery winner loses big payout to ex-husband - "A court has ordered a woman to give her lottery jackpot of $1.3m (£800,000) to her former husband because she kept it secret during their divorce. The California state lottery commission confirmed that Denise Rossi won the money on December 28 1996 - 11 days before she filed for divorce from Thomas Rossi after 25 years of marriage. The superior court judge, Richard Denner, said Ms Rossi violated state disclosure laws and acted out of fraud or malice. In court papers, she admitted to concealing her winnings because she didn't want her former husband "getting his hands on them". Mr Rossi found out about the winnings more than two years after his divorce when he received a mailed solicitation from a company that pays lump sums for lottery winnings."
Chris π ¨ on X - "Millennials who grew up in the pre-smartphone era are like Tolkein's elves who were the last to see the light of the Two Trees"
St. Vincent on X - ""All due respect," is a wonderful expression because it doesn't actually specify how much respect is actually due. Could be none."
Meme - "Hey Dad. I lost my virginity."
"What??? Who???"
"Sarah next door."
"Son. That poor girl is mentally retarded."
"Dad, you told me my first time should be with someone special."
Meme - "I'M SO TIRED OF WORK"
"TAKE THIS. IT WILL GIVE YOU ENERGY"
"OBLIGATION TO PAY RENT"
Meme - Doug Aoki @Nantanreikan: "Man who kept his boat besides his house was ordered from the city to put up a fence to hide the boat from view. So he built the fence and hired someone to paint it. *fence with boat on it*"
Meme - "TABLE 2. PERCENT OBESE AT WAVE 1 AND WAVE 3 BY RELIGIOUS AFFILIATION: AMERICANS' CHANGING LIVES, 1986-1994
Baptist - 24%, 30%
Fundamentalist Protestant - 18%, 22%
Pietistic Protestant - 13%, 19%
Nondenominational Protestant - 5%, 5%
Reformation-Era Protestant - 9%, 9%
Catholic - 17%, 17%
Nontraditionalist - 2%, 3%
Jewish - 1%, 1%
Other non-Christian - 0.2%, 0.7%
None - 6%, 7%"
Does Religion Increase the Prevalence and Incidence of Obesity in Adulthood? - "Previous research reveals that religion in America is related to variations in body weight. This article examines the relationships between religion and both body mass index (BMI) and obesity, which have increased in prevalence in the United States over the past two decades. Using longitudinal data from a national sample of adults, this study prospectively examines whether dimensions of religious life are associated with weight gain and the development of obesity during eight years of follow-up. We examine four dimensions of religiosity (attendance, salience, media practice, and consolation) and religious affiliation. Ordinary least squares regression analyses reveal that high levels of religious media practice are associated with higher BMI in women. Logistic regression analyses reveal that high levels of religious media practice and affiliation with a Baptist denomination increased the risk of obesity for women, but that a high level of religious consolation reduced the risk of obesity incidence for men. Attendance at religious services was associated with a lower risk of the incidence of obesity for women, suggesting the importance of studying links between dimensions of religious life and body weight."
Someone posted a rubbish unsourced table claiming the opposite - that Pagan + Neo-Pagan and Atheists were the fattest, and Christians of named sects were the least overweight
Meme - virgo * mami: "My daughter said her first word at 5 months and spoke sentences at 1. My son is 1.5 and hasn't spoken a word. They where both talked to and taught the same. Kids are all unique & reach milestones at different times. Don't ever compare your child's development to someone else's."
Clearly, if your child is not speaking at 10, there's nothing wrong if you talked to and taught him as you would any other, and you shouldn't compare him to other kids
Popcorn is prepared in the same pot, in the same heat, and in the same oil, yet the kernels do not all pop at the same time. Don't compare yourself to others. Your turn to pop is coming — Chromatical - Chromatical® - Evergreen Business Design for Digital Product Creators
Ironic. Some kernels never pop
People sickened after man runs out of milk when making mash - and uses 'foul' swap - "After seeing what he substituted milk with, however, many have argued that he should've just eaten his food without the mashed potato... the foodie opted to use chocolate milk instead"
Meme - "DEMS "NOBODY IS ABOVE THE LAW" STARTER PACK
LAPTOP *Hunter Biden*
EMAILS *Hillary Clinton*
CLIENTS *Ghislaine Maxwell*
RESEARCH *Anthony Fauci*"
Meme - "What you're looking for is already inside you *man looking into empty fridge*"
Meme - "Imagine telling someone this is your postcode man hahahahaahah"
"NE1 4BJ"
Meme - "Notifications: Your CPU temperature has exceeded 8612 degrees C. Prolonged use at this temperature may shorten the CPU's lifespan"
"Sun Surface temperature 5,505 degrees C"
"The power of the sun in the palm of my hand"
Meme - "Just had this transaction, the last four messages all came in a period of two minutes
Mini Yoto Player with...
"Yes i can would be 5£ extra via royal mail
???"
"Yeo that's fine, PayPal ok?" - Sent 8m ago
"Yes sure but Can you pay via paypal using family friend option to avoid delsys and fees im new account i dont want money on hold
Waste of time i guess
Not interrested? Weirdo like rest of you"
Conversation paused. This person can't be messaged on Marketplace at the moment."
Meme - "You gotta love the communist trolls that infiltrate this group, get butthurt over something you say and then relentlessly stalk your personal and business pages, because obviously they don't have to work today and have nothing but time..... Their hearts are "lost in kindness" though
Edit: The deleted messages he was championing, was me asking him if he knows how pathetic he looks trying to hurt people with laugh reacts etc. Then I decided just thanking him for being a fan was enough engagement."
*Casey Durrett laugh reacting 6 posts/reels in a row*
Casey Durrett: "I got a heart lost in kindness. A mind that's mostly mindless"
"I mean he did admit to being mindless LOL"
Casey Durrett: "Fucking cry harder. Your family deserves so much better than you..."
As usual, the people who talk about "kindness" are the least kind of all
Meme - *Obama Medal meme*
"CATE BLANCHETT NARRATING THE INTRO"
"GALADRIEL BEING CALLED "WISEST AND FAIREST OF ALL.""
Meme - Lioness in zoo: "I DON'T BELONG HERE... I LONG FOR FREEDOM."
Red River Hog in zoo: "THIS WALL SMELLS AMAZING!"
Meme - *Upset American Soyjak*
*Pepe the Frog and AGE OF CONSENT in European countries, with all having it at 16 or below*
Meme - Galadriel: "The mirror shows many things... Things that were... Things that are... And some things that happened in the books but couldn't fit into the 4 hour Return of the King film."
Meme - Quranism -> Islam -> Sunni/Shi'ah/Khawarij
Sunni: Hanafi, Hanabali, Maliki, Shafi'' Schools of law (Madhhab)
Shi'ah: Ismailism, Jafri, Zaidiyyah
Ismailism: Sevener -> Qaramita. Nizari -> Druze. Musta'ii -> Tayyibi
Tayyibi: Bohras. Dawoodi Bohras. Jafan Bohras. Sulaimani Bohras. Alavi Bohrs. Hobitahs Bohras. Aftba-I Malak Bohras. Progressive Dawoodi Bohras
Jafri: Twelver -> Ajbari, Usuli
Jafri: Alawi, Alevi
Khawarij -> Ibadiyya -> Nukkar, Azzabas
Sufi. Orders (Tariqah): Bektash, Chishti, Mawlawi, Oveyssi, Shadhil, *rest are unreadable*: Universal Sufism
Rudimentary groups: *Non-denominational Muslims
Mahdi'ist groups: Ahmadiyya, Mahdavia, Zikri, Faradian N.O.I. (Nation of Islam)"
Meme - "r/VaushV
I'm done with politics. It's so fucking over.
I’m tired, man. We’re going to live in a totalitarian Christian theocracy for the rest of our lives. Our only hope was a decrepit old man who’s too fucking stupid to pressure Israel to call for a ceasefire. And the voters are too blinded by their rage at his stupidity to think rationally, so they can’t even be bothered to vote to save their own lives. Trump is going to win in a landslide and kill every queer person, ethnic, religious, and racial minority, shut down every gender clinic and abortion clinic, and turn us into a theocracy. We are approaching a paradigm shift. A world dominated by technologically enforced totalitarian societies. Deepfakes and government spying will reach 1984 levels. The new fascist government will have literally zero blind spots and it will be completely, 100% incapable of being overthrown, and will last until the end of time. We will be forced to worship our leaders under pain of death. With the invention of things like neuralink, they might even figure out mind control. It’s over. We have utterly and pathetically lost so fucking hard. The day of the rope is imminent and inevitable. I’m Detrans, so I might be spared, but life is going to be unbelievably miserable. We failed."
"I like these peoples' dread. Deep down they know they crossed a civilizational line with 2020 and Covid and are scared to death of being punished by it"