"be right back" take 2

recently, when down in sd with friends and visiting other friends, i rewatched black mirror's "be right back" episode. my friends and i ended up arguing a bit about it, so i thought i'd write a post. as i started, i thought i'd see if i'd written a post about it before, and, me being me, it turns out that i had! that post is here.

it's interesting to see that i basically feel the same way as i did seven years ago. the only thing that's changed is that i now DO think it's disrespectful to "upgrade" your person, but i'm still not sure if it's ethically wrong to do so. i think that may depend on the consent of the original person, and probably your motives for doing so. giving something to someone they always wanted seems fine, giving them something they never cared about also seems fine. but giving them traits they never wanted, and would find insulting if changed, seems morally dubious. but i wonder sometimes if motives should affect morality as much as we want it to, but i dunno, so imma leave that part "blank."

anyway, back to now. my friends seem to think that this is terrible tech and should never be implemented because 1. people should move on and 2. relationships with real people are better than relationships with fake ones. another fear of theirs is that by 3. not moving on, one will disregard all real relationships and become a non-contributing member of society, which is bad.

i had a lot of issues with pretty much all aspects of this.

1. people should move on.
i already addressed this in my previous post so i'm not going to get into it again, but while i agree that people should move on, i don't think it's as necessary as my friends seem to think it is. i also don't think it's a moral imperative that people do move on, especially if not moving on doesn't really hurt anyone else.

2. relationships with real people are better than relationships with fake ones and
3. one will disregard all real relationships and become a non-contributing member of society, which is bad.
my friends seemed to stress that you can't have a real relationship with a non-sentient being, and especially not if you can control that being. the show seems to indicate that you can alter the personality of the android thing more to your liking, and less what the person would have really done/said/been. let's accept that premise. my friends seem to think that if you can now create a "perfect relationship," you will, and that that will negatively affect your relationship with others since, presumably, you won't have prefect relationships with others, so you'll cast aside all other real relationships and only up keep only the perfect one.

firstly. why are real relationships better than ones you create?
normally, reality matters. i'm thinking about celebrity stalkers here. but if this isn't even a real person, the relationship isn't really reciprocal, so you're not misinterpreting something to someone else's deficit.

second. would that many people want to create a "perfect relationship" if they could? let's say that yes, they do. but would that negatively affect your relationship and interactions with others? i don't really think it would. and if it did, would it so terribly affect your relationship with others that you would give up on all interactions with the real world? my friends seem to think so, but i really don't. i don't see that happening hardly ever. in the show, the main character seems ashamed of the android so she hides him away, but would people do that if this tech were mainstream? i can imagine going to a friend's house where her andriod husband is there and we all hang out as real humans do. he can't come to my place, sure (in the show, they have to remain within ~30m of their activation point), but i imagine she would have a normal life outside of her home. she still has to go to work, and grocery shop, and such. it's not like her whole life would revolve around this android. and if it did, it would no more or less a problem that if her whole home life revolved around a huma. also, many people have pets that are exclusively confined to the house and that doesn't seem to be an issue. in fact, you don't even have to feed or potty break an android, so maybe it'll less of an inconvenience than a housebound dog with no yard.

also, i don't think that being a contributing member of society is so important. we have a lot of people who don't particularity "contribute" to society but we're okay with them. (i'm thinking people in comas, people in prison for life, severely mentally or physically disabled people, the list goes on.) we don't complain about these people not giving back to society, and in fact, they may actually "take up" resources in ways that an android wouldn't.

actually, what does contributing to society mean anyway? having a job, volunteering, spending money which grows the economy and keeps people employed, being part of a community which enriches people's lives, creating something long lasting, making at least one person happy?

ultimately, i'm not saying that i'm for this kind of tech. i just don't think it's as bad as some others seem to think it is. i'm generally a "you do you, and i'll do me" person. if it makes you happy and doesn't hurt anyone else (feel free to hurt just yourself), then go right on ahead. i think A LOT about morality and i try to form my judgements based on morals, not just what feels right or wrong. i think that's why i'm a lot more accepting of things and people. ...which i think is good, lol.

refocus

this month I went to Tennessee with the girls. we had planned to take a trip together for our 30th birthday, but for some reason or another, we didn't do it. we did manage this year tho! we took about a 8 day trip, which included nashville, gatlinburg, the great smoky mountains, and knoxville. ac and i extended our trip two extra days to visit memphis.

this trip was great fun! it was our first time all traveling together and i think it went real,ly well! sure, there were little frictions here and there but i think all those smoothed over quite quickly. it was really interesting since while we grew up together, we haven't spent that much time together as a total group since school. even in college or after, we would reunite for a few hours for someone's birthday (or a wedding!) but nothing ever more than overnight.

i do fairly frequently say that we're friends now because we were friends then. but if we had all met now, we likely wouldn't be friends. certainly not all five of us, and i wonder if any pair of us would be real friends if we met now. it's not just the geographical thing, but we're all really quite so different.

outside of everything, for me, this trip made me want to refocus my work back into environmentalism, or at least environmental adjacent.

most everyone in my life now is so "normal" in their consumerism. j, of course, not withstanding. most everyone else (my family, friends, coworkers) seem to only not buy things because they can't afford it. need barely factors. i don't even mean real actual need, but just regular need.

being with my friends that week, being with them all day, i got to see habits like what, how, and when we eat and what we buy and for how much. it was interesting. the last few years, i've seen people around me live their lives and each time i feel a little void between us. that trip, being with them all week, i felt more of that void than ever. it made me wonder what i was doing, and why, and if it was really what i wanted.

and, honestly, yes; it is what i want. i want to be actively engaging in conscious decision making. and i want to be a good person, doing what i can to create a better environment around me. (environment not just used in the nature / green sense) and that environment means the people i surround myself with. i want to be more with people who inspire me to do better, be better, live better. not people who make me question my morals.

i certainly won't be throwing off my friends or family because they unthinkingly use single-use plastics or anything like that. but i can choose to engage more with the "green" community, whether thru social groups or professionally. and because i don't really like making new friends, making them thru work would be the easiest thing to help keep me on track.

so while i wanted to get away from environmentalism after algalita (because emotionally it was hard to see 8 years of work "down the drain", i think i may be ready to return again. the work at hbcfl makes me feel good, certainly, but it is a bit too far removed for me as well. i need to find a better balance of professional and personal fulfillment. i think, when possible, i would like to volunteer with food orgs when we're away. i really do hope to use this time to explore, not just the country, but myself. i want to know myself better and better myself as well.

project prevention

one my most favorite podcasts recently replayed an old episode called Inheritance. i was specifically interested in the third section called: What If There Was No Destiny? it centers on barbara, a woman who adopted multiple children from another woman who was giving them up near annually, as soon as they were born. this woman was addicted to drugs and her children would all likely be affected, physically and mentally, because of it. she had three prior children to the four barbara had adopted also. all had given up for adoption. 

after adopting the fourth child, barbara founded a non-profit called Project Prevention, which pays women with drug addictions to get IUDs or get sterilized. 

obviously, this is a pretty controversial org! the money ($300-$400) is given without any drug prevention care. it's just given if the woman gets an IUD or sterilization. it's not given *for* the woman, you see. it's given to prevent more "drug addicted babies."

there are racial implications, of course, especially because barbara is white. altho she does say that the majority of the women who accept are white. (tho what's the breakdown of women they're approaching?)  and you have to wonder if there's any coercion, especially when it comes to sterilization. but it's an interesting idea.

i don't have solid opinions about this org but i will say that i don't intend to donate to them. that may change, but barbara used some rather offensive (and umempathetic) language when describing some of these women and it seems like the org is very strongly driven by her vision alone, rather than by a board, which also makes me uncomfortable.

the rachel divide

remember rachel dolezal? she was the white lady who represented herself as being black, was "caught", then lost her job as instructor in africana studies at eastern washington university and position of president of the NAACP spokane chapter. turns out there's a 2018 documentary about her on netflix.

I don't remember much about the controversy. pretty much just what's in the bit above. but the documentary talks about her younger life and how here parents were very religious and strict. they had two biological children and adopted a few more. all the adopted children were black. I'm not going to go into her history because I think the documentary is really worth watching, but in watching the film, her situation made a lot more sense to me.

some interesting things that come up during the film are reactions from black women. namely, that she doesn't get to call herself black, regardless of how she feels, because she doesn't live the struggles that black people have. but is that true? sure, when she was younger, she lived life as a woman person. but in the last number of years, she outwardly presented herself as black, her job had to do with the black experience and history, and her volunteer work as naacp head was also very much done "as a black woman." so how hadn't she been discriminated against in the last number of years as a black person? does it not count because she didn't always struggle?

also, what about black people in black majority places like africa or jamaica? sure they face discrimination, but certainly it's very different than what it's like as a black american. and like, probably less racial discrimination because they're in a place with majority black people and with black people in positions of power. but they also didn't struggle primarily because of their race.

so is it more so your outward appearance and how society perceives you that makes you black? cause i also watched "passing" lately, which was also very interesting and not just because of the casting choices, and would you say that clare is less black than irene because she lives as a white woman, where irene only occasionally does? is irene less black than her husband who couldn't pass at all?

obviously it's not just culture and knowledge of history. because a lot of black (hell most people of all backgrounds) don't know the history of their people but rachel knows africana studies well enough to teach it at a university. [I do wish they had interviewed some students] of course there's a big difference between personally living experiences vs learning about them, but she does seem pretty knowledgeable, at least academically.

a lot of people are mad that she culturally appropriated blackness, and while I guess she did, she also literally tried to walk a mile in their shoes. most people just want the benefits, the cool culture, the tasty dish, the street cred. she literally tried on the whole life.

I don't have an opinion about what she did, but I do wonder if she should have been treated so harshly.

couple reviews of the documentary:

Vulture - The Rachel Divide Is a Rorschach Blot for Its Viewers

Vice - The Rachel Dolezal Documentary Is a Hollow, Manipulative Spectacle

my body, my choice

there are anti-vaxx people who are now saying "my body, my choice" which, obviously, upsets pro-abortionists. here's the thing, they're not the same bodies or choices. anti-abortionists don't generally deny abortions in order to take control of your body, they do it because (they say) they don't want the fetus (which probably would become a baby) to be "murdered." there's a direct causation that if you have an abortion, this baby will not be born.

on the other hand, anti-vaxxers want to control their own bodies mostly for themselves. yes a large pool of unvaccinated people will give a virus opportunity to mutate into something that be cause vaccinations to become ineffective which in turn may cause you to become sick, but you can't say that this person not getting vaccinated will definitely get someone sick.

this is a poor analogy, and we should stop getting riled up about it. 

all this being said. I do believe in a right to abortions, and also lean towards mandatory vaccinations. I can't say that I'm 100% for it because, like, how would be enforce that? by forcibly vaccinating people at gunpoint or by threatening fines or jail time? those options seem crazy. altho, we have actually vaccinated people by gunpoint before (seriously, see slide 4). I do like that in many public schools kids can't attend unless their vaccinated against certain things (usually DTaP and MMR) but I don't quite know how you can enforce that with adults working in non-governmental agencies. I guess you could say people entering federal land need to show proof of vaccination along with govt issued ID, but that seems kind of ridiculous since there is a LOT of federal land and what does this regulation even really do?

one thing I would like to see if that the govt should at some point establish a deadline of "get the shot before then or we won't pay for your medical bills if you do get COVID." like, you had PLENTY of opportunity to get the shot, for free, and you just didn't. there would be exceptions for certain people (those who can't vs those who won't), but most of the currently unvaccinated have just chosen not to get it done.  

best friends

a month ago, as I was walking Roux, a man on a bike kept circling back to us and complimenting Roux. eventually he asked "isn't he the best boy?" "yeah, he's pretty good" I replied. he did not seem to like this answer. he asked "isn't he your best friend?" "no" "why not?" "cause he's a dog."

my dog isn't my best friend partly because he doesn't conversate back. I don't know what he's thinking most of the time. in fact, my relationship with Roux is pretty one-sided. I provide him everything he needs, plus extra but he doesn't doesn't give me much of anything in return. he snuggles me sometimes, but I don't generally want or need that. I haven't had anything really bad happen in the last two years so I haven't needed his comfort, even if he were to offer it. (which apparently dogs are good for)

mostly tho, he's not my best friend because I have people for that. people who care for me more than for what I give them. people who may not always be happy to see me, but then, neither does Roux seem to be.

some people say their pets are their best friends because of the unconditional love. well, I don't need that either. I have human friends and parents who provide me close to unconditional love. and should they withdraw it, I should really take a good look at myself to see what I'm doing wrong. I don't need (nor want) a constant cheerleader telling me how much they love me or how well I'm doing. I would prefer someone to keep me accountable, someone who will keep me honest and good. less than that.

I may have written about this before, but I really do wonder how ethical it is to keep pets. they're mostly for our entertainment. they're little different from the animals at the zoo except that the cages are our own homes. they are expected to be obedient to us and sleep, pee, eat, play when we want them to. zoo animals can at least pee and poop when they want. as much as some would like to think that we're on semi equal ground, because we have to take them on walks, pick up their poo, provide separate meals and medications for them, we're not equal at all. at any moment you decide not to keep your pet, yet they have no such freedom. it's a little like slavery if you think about it. and how can you be best friends with someone who is so beholden to you? 

sex work

t and i recently talked about porn and sex work. t referenced it and said how she and I agreed that porn was not good and sex work should not be allowed. i corrected her. I don't think porn is bad. some porn, sure, but not all porn. porn can have negative impacts, but then, can't everything? 

I used to be against porn and sex work in general. I thought it was anti-feminist. we've always been able to use our bodies for money, how does this advance our rights? but you know what? it does. feminism gives you the power to do what you want. and if that's sex work, cool. there's certainly a market for it. and if that's something you like to do or are good at, why not make money doing it? plus, I think if it were legal, sex workers would have more rights. you might not need to hire a pimp to keep you safe, because you can call the cops cause you're doing legal work. you can form a union and maybe get pooled medical benefits, special pay by the hour hotels that are especially sanitized. you can write off condoms and lube and all sorts of stuff on your taxes. and you can likely charge more because there will be a more clear industry standard. in general, anyone participating in the sex industry, including customers, will be safer if it's legalized. and that's a good thing. 

also, maybe more importantly, there's nothing inherently "wrong" about sex. (t, being religious, believes that sex is sacred and should be saved for marriage and i dunno, possibly only for procreation?) biologically, sex is good for you. it helps you relieve stress, gives you a rush of good hormones, and let's face it, we orgasm for a reason! there's no reason ejaculation has to come with an orgasm, but it does! and women, who generally don't ejaculate, orgasm too! we're one of the few animals that has sex for fun. i imagine it's cause sex doesn't feel great for most animals. hell some species have developed barbed penises and corkscrew vaginas so to either make sure the sex happens, or that it doesn't. humans, on the other hand, have orgasms. especially women who can have multiple in a session. 

personally tho, i am a little squeemish about sex work. I wouldn't want my daughter doing it. and I can only imagine doing it if i were desperate for money. even then, I'd prefer to do cam work, or something more "anonymous". but i think that has much more to do with social stigmas, my conservative upbringing, and america's puritanical views on sex (breastfeeding is somehow sexual?), than with any actual adult reasoning.

the measure

Ravi Patel (of Meet the Patels) has a new show called Ravi Patel's Pursuit of Happiness. it's a travel show where he tackles different theme each episode rather than a new destination. 

in one, he focuses on work-life balance. he goes to south korea with an equally workaholic friend and there they "die," give their own last words, and go to their own funeral. in ravi's self-eulogy he says that he read of a "Buddhist philosopher who said, the measure of one's happiness in life is the extent to which, by the time he's passed, he's contributed to evolution."

I often think that the point of participating in anything is to make it better. people should feel like you've made their life better for having been friends with them. your work should be better for having employed you. your team better for having you on it. your club for having you in it. this betterment can be big or small. you can bring in huge profits to your company, or you can be a pleasant co-worker that everyone likes to have around. you can be team leader or club president, or you can always bring a main course and extra napkins and utensils to potlucks. holding doors open, letting people in front of you in line, getting off the phone for the cashier, saying please and thank you to everyone. these small things count. 

most of us won't have a big effect on the world, and that's okay. but I would hate for anyone to actually think the world would be better place were I dead. hell, I wouldn't even want someone to think their day would be better were I not to exist. we're here, so let's make the best of it. 

#blackouttuesday

got a bit fired up this morning seeing all those blank black rectangles on instagram. that doesn't DO anything! I get that you're showing solidarity with the BLM movement, but are you really? this has been said a lot lately, and I'm all for it: it isn't enough not to be racist; you have to be ANTI-racist. and if posting this on your insta is all you're doing, you're doing it wrong.

after some thought, i posted an amazingly still relevant quotation from writer Ta-Nehisi Coates from his book Between the World and Me. 

do you remember Eric Garner? he too was suffocated to death by a cop. his last words were "I can't breathe." that was 2014. the cop, Pantaleo, was finally fired in 2019. AND "A state grand jury declined to press criminal charges." in fact, NY police commissioner James O'Neill actually said that "had I been in Officer Pantaleo's situation, I may have made similar mistakes." um... Pantaleo isn't the victim here. and he broke rules to kill Garner; chokeholds are banned by the NYPD. (short article)

there were a couple other slides from my post, but below is my caption. 

DO MORE. join a protest, help cleanup the next day if looters/rioters hijacked that protest, sign a bunch of change.org petitions, watch a documentary, read a book (Ta-Nehisi Coates @tanehisipcoatesis amazing), EDUCATE yourself, support family owned black businesses, boycott companies that exploit black people (that exploit anyone really!), DONATE! as someone who helps with fundraising for a non-profit, i can tell you that every donation, no matter how small, is appreciated. 
this year i'm donating about $25 a month to a different org/cause. this month i'm choosing Equal Justice Initiative @eji_org which "works to end mass incarceration, excessive punishment, and racial inequality." I found them on charity navigator @charitynav and they have an incredible 100% overall rating. 
#blackoutuesday

trans rights

"discrimination laws don't apply to transgender people"?! well, I looked up the laws and can see how they don't. =\ I mean, technically transgender people change their gender, but not their sex (which is biological and has to do with the x and y chromosomes) so I can see how a total asshole of an employer can legally discriminate someone over this.



an article about Aminee Stephens and her case: She came out as transgender and got fired. Now her case might become a test for LGBTQ rights before the US Supreme Court.

the case is still pending, but hopefully, if SCOTUS does hear it, they will make the right decision. trans people already suffer so much, they need to be protected against employment discrimination.

harm vs harm

I've been thinking a lot about harm lately, and unintended consequences. you cannot live life without causing harm. and it's not even as easy as trying to live causing the least amount of harm possible because sometimes it's impossible to weigh.

at our office, sometimes even deciding where to eat brings up a lot of questions. do we get slightly better tasting burritos at whole foods which is owned by amazon which annually produces nearly as much carbon as swizerland or denmark? not to mention all their terrible workers' rights issues, and lack of paying taxes. or do we get not as tasty burritos at chronic taco which probably also does a lot of terrible things that we just don't know about because they're not as closely scrutinized as amazon?

and that's just lunch! where do you stand on bioplastics or the conventional kind?

a lot of people would say, bioplastics, of course, because it doesn't come from petroleum, and it has a smaller carbon footprint because most oil doesn't come from america anyway. but that's just the oil aspect. most bioplastic in the states is made from corn since we have govt subsidies for that. but it's those same subsidies which ultimately led to high fructose corn syrup in everything because we have too much corn and the govt asked scientists to come up with ways to use it up. and, while both oil and corn require water, corn requires more land and possibly causes more water pollutants because of fertilizers and pesticides. oil has led to war, which farming hasn't as much, but our modern conventional farming has led to hella cancers and also involves migrant workers / illegal immigration issues which oil likely has too much definitely on a smaller scale.

end of life is murky too. bioplastics are rarely recycled or composted. in fact, they actually contaminate regular plastic recycling and most waste haulers don't even want it. almost all bioplastics end up in landfill where they don't biodegrade at all, but do release methane, which regular plastic doesn't. methane, of course, contributes to increased greenhouse gases which aggravates climate change.

so, which is better? well, they both suck. just in different ways.

I tell the customers to decide what matters most to them (for me, i sacrifice taste and eat at chronic because i don't like to support amazon), and not worry too much about the rest. i also suggest they do research so they can make informed decisions, but as demonstrated above, sometimes it's the knowing too much that makes it impossible to make decisions!

articles about bioplastic here and here
fact sheet about bioplastic

i also want to emphasize that a lot of the bioplastic on the market isn't even 100% plant based plastic. something is considered bioplastic even if it's a blend of plant based and petroleum based plastics.

equality vs equity

Amazon announces $15 minimum wage for all US employees

I think profitable companies should pay more than a minimum wage; they should pay a living wage. that being said, it costs a hell of a lot more money to live in san fransisco than it does to live in sandpoint, idaho.

j said the other day that he believes in equity, not equality. and i think that's spot on.

without getting into how each state's minimum wage is determined, or if it's a fair determination or not, i think it would be better if amazon pays not just a minimum $15 across the board, but a few dollars (or percent) above minimum wage to employees in that state. is that still somewhat unfair? sure. but again, it costs more to live in san fransico than it does to live in grass valley, california, so at least it's more fair.

it ain’t easy being green

I forget what my 2017 new year’s resolution was. I’m pretty sure it was to eat less beef, which I totally have. I did it because our “regular” cows are terrible for the environment. they hella pollute our land, air, and water. damn things taste so good tho!

this year I’m going to focus on lessening my overall negative environmental impact. starting last week, lol. I’ve always donated lightly used items rather than throwing them away, and have always been careful about conserving electricity and water, and, of course, recycling paper, aluminum, and common plastics. since volunteering with SoCal harvest a number of years ago, I’ve also been pretty aware of my food waste and convinced my dad to get a compost bin for our yard. and I think he’s also on the verge of getting a rain barrel, yahoo! of course, since volunteering with algalita I’ve cut more and more plastics out of my life and have mostly stopped frivolous shopping too.

but the other day, ab said something that really got me thinking. she said that ocean institute had asked her to give a 20 minute talk at their facility down in Dana Point, which is a 60-90 minute drive from here. I said that is they were also willing to compensate her driving time... she said that even so, it wouldn’t be worth the greenhouse gases of driving down there. she is so right!

I don’t mind driving, long distances anyway. and I always try to carpool, take efficient driving routes, and don’t idle my car for more than a couple minutes (more than a minute or two, the co2 released is more than how much you would produce turning off the car and restarting it). but I really don’t think anything of driving 40 minutes away for a meal. and while I think about riding my bike to work, if I’m honest, I haven’t really seriously considered it. well, I’m gonna. ...not bike to work. it’s winter and too damn cold. but if I need to go to stater brothers up the street, I’m going to bike. and when it gets warm again I’m really really going to consider biking to work and especially to practice. and maybe get a skateboard so I won’t drive to whole foods for lunch. ...tho first learning to be way better at skateboarding, ha. tell ya what tho, I’m probably going to eat out less too. it’s not that great for the environment either. I’ll be working at the farmers market once a month anyway so can get locally sourced stuff there. ...now to learn to cook...

I’m really really gonna stop buying bottled shampoo and body wash, even the refill stuff. I’m gonna remember to avoid stuff with palm oil and too many chemicals. I’m going to pay more attention to where my food comes from and try harder to eat locally and less processed stuff and less meat in general. I’m going to start asking more often for “no straw please” and bringing my bento box for leftovers when I do eat out. and more! oy, there’s a lot to remember and do but it’ll totally be worth it!!

what happened to Monday?

what happened to monday?

oy. such interesting questions this movie brings up!
1. what will happen when the world runs out of resources to support our human population? what lengths should we go to prevent that (or should we at all)?
2. is the collective survival of our species more important than an individual's survival? how about many individuals?
3. is there a right to life? is there a lesser or greater right to life?
4. how far would you go for your children?
5. at what point do your parents' choices for your life become your own?
and the age old 6. nature vs. nurture?

let them eat meat

have been thinking about vegetarianism a lot lately. ab is mostly one, al is sometimes one. and both do it for ethical reasons. at cmg back in may, ashley said she became one after many years of knowing about the issues and caring about them, but not quite caring enough. one day tho, it just clicked.

when i was much younger i used to want to become a vegetarian. a fruitarian even, after a flight where the woman next to me got a special fruit only meal. back then i wanted to because it seemed cool somehow. and also because it seemed like an interesting exercise in discipline. i didn't do either tho because i didn't really care to commit and i ate at home where my mom made at least one meat dish every meal, and still later i realized that i LOVE meat. ha.

but starting maybe 10 years ago, i started becoming aware of all the environmental issues concerning eating meat. i always knew about animal rights, but they didn't really bother me much because i felt that 1. humans had evolved to eat meat and 2. nearly all the animals we eat only exist because we domesticated them for food.

recently tho, it's really starting to bother me. even the animals rights stuff. we treat our livestock terribly. really really terribly. and eating large-scale commercially sourced meat is bad for the environment. really really bad.

my parents leave on a month-long vacation later this year. i think i'll try out vegetarianism then. i probably won't be too strict on it, but i'll try much harder than i am right now. currently i'll do non-meat when i remember to, and when i feel like it. to be fair, i usually feel like it, but i very often forget. that's the problem when your convictions aren't too strong, i guess. anyway, why not now? because most of my main meals are prepared for me by my mom or even j. ...i know, i know... but let's save that ethical dilemma for another post, yeah?

ps, while vegetarian, should i come across a restaurant serving roadkill tho i'll probably stuff myself silly. it sounds gross, but here's why.

making a murderer

have you watched netflix's making a murderer yet? if not, you ought to. it'll scare the hell out of you. buting says "We could all say that we're never going to commit a crime. But we can never guarantee that someone else won't accuse us of a crime." not only that, you might be fucking convicted, innocent or not!!

I think dassey is definitely not guilty. and I think Avery is very likely not guilty. and if he did do it, I totally don't think he did it the way the prosecution said he did.

even outside of the questionable evidence, I don't think Avery did it because (as his lawyers pointed out) he had way better ways of getting rid of her body and the car. I know he's not the smartest man, but I don't think he's that stupid. 2 her blood wasn't anywhere in his room, house, garage. if he killed her, it certainly wasn't in any of those places, as the prosecution said he had. 3 why put her body in the car only to drive her to his backyard?    I do think that it's possible he killed her, tho I don't think it was premeditated. it's possible she showed up, they fought, he hit her and knew it would look bad so decided to go all the way and kill her. even so, I feel like he would know this was a big big fucking deal, given his history. so why call dassey over for the bonfire? (alibi?) but he also seemed totally normal / unstressed on those two phone calls with Jodi that night.

what I actually think happened is that someone killed her and that blank faced sheriff colborn found her car (as evidenced by his call to verify the license plate) and he and lenk decided to frame Avery. lenk found the key fob after no one else had found it in multiple searches and it had none of her dna on it, only avery's. why bother with the whole thing? they were embarrassed (to put it lightly) after the first case. maybe no one was in actual cahoots with manitowoc, but they're all law enforcement agencies. there's got to be some kind of loyalty there.

and I think no one gave a shit about dassey. he was collateral damage. but the thing that really pisses me off is that none of his appeals went thru! fine, so the county has something against him, but the state too? the fuck for? its so obvious kachinsky wasn't ever on his side and did no good for him. terrible.

regardless of what you actually think happened, I don't think you can deny that everyone should have the right to a good lawyer and a fair trial. hell, you should also get an impartial jury, honest law enforcement, unbiased judge, and more. unfortunately I don't think dassey got any of that. Avery at least had good lawyers.

not holier than thou

Breaking: We’re ignorant and lazy consumers who judge people for doing the right thing

"Researchers have found that a) we’re lazy when it comes to investigating the ethics of our purchases, and b) we resent those who do take the time to research the social and environmental impacts... then opt for a more ethical alternative."

at algalita we try not to guilt people into using less plastic. it makes them resent us, we know. we also don't want to shock anyone into agreeing with us (the way peta does sometimes with their campaigns). but it's hard then, to get your message across. what is the best way to get people to change their habits? we don't know. we use education. we explain the issue, and let the data / images speak for themselves. but we don't don't use clickbait, we don't post super graphic photos, and we don't talk anyone's ear off when they clearly don't care.

we also try to lead by example, of course, but i think that only goes so far.

no lectures, please

last year a friend of mine cheated (once) on his fiancee. he told me about it before he broke up with her. he basically just told her that it was over and didn't mention the cheating. i think in the space of him cheating and him telling her, it was a few days to a week. i didn't immediately tell rip, but i did tell him before my friend told his fiancee.

this week there was poll thing going around on fb. someone asked if they saw the friend's significant other cheating, would they want to be told. this friend of mine very quickly and unequivocally answered yes.

i messaged him to say that his answer was interesting because rip and i actually got in a fight about just this thing last year over his situation.

rip had met the fiance a few times. he didn't know her well, but he would have recognized her on the street. rip felt that he should tell the fiancee about my friend's cheating. if nothing else, it would help her get over my friend faster. i didn't argue that point, but i felt he shouldn't say anything. i mean, he only knew her because of me and my friendship. he's knew my friend way before the fiancee came into the picture, and i don't think he's ever personally contacted either of them. certainly not the fiancee! i figured he also shouldn't say anything because my friend was imminently going to break up with her. and, yeah, also cause him telling her would put me in a really terrible position.

there is a little big more to the story, but it's too long to type out, and is besides the point. but basically, rip wanted to tell and i didn't want him to. he eventually didn't.

at the time, i didn't tell my friend that i told rip. i mean, i kind of figured he knew. rip and i had been dating for 14 years so yeah, it's a pretty good assumption that i'll probably tell him what you tell me. mind you, i don't tell him everything. he doesn't know your sexual predilections, your serious crimes, your drug or sex abuse, or any trauma in your life. he doesn't know anything you would basically only tell a therapist or a priest and for some reason trusted me enough to tell me. i wouldn't tell him that stuff unless it was actually imperative he knew. and i can't imagine why that would ever be. but he does know why you and your last relationship didn't work out, and what i honestly think about that.

anyway, back to my friend. so i told him what happened with rip and me. my friend said:
"Well I didn't think they were friends. And I didn't know you decided to tell rip but that's fine." etc "It's one thing to tell someone something you saw. It's another to say something you know third hand that you probably shouldn't know anyway."

you know what also isn't okay? a fucking lecture. esp an indirect one. you know that saying? "don't do something if you don't want people talking about it." now, that's obviously a general statement that doesn't hold true in every situation, but... it's a big fucking deal: you cheating on your fiancee. we've all known each other for years and here we all thought you two were well on the way to marital bliss. i kept my mouth shut for the months afterwards when you decided to not tell any of our mutual friends. and in fact, i don't even know /remember if you did tell them because we all generally respect your privacy so none of us have discussed that portion of the breakup.

and, dear reader, i know you might think i may be reading into his message to me, but no, trust me. there was more to his message to me that i'm not including. anyway, i just had to vent this a little. but what do you think? do you tell your significant other everything, nothing, or something in between?

social surrogacy

"Should a woman be allowed to hire a surrogate because she fears pregnancy will hurt her career? Or "ruin" her body? What if she's just afraid of giving birth?" An article from ELLE May 2014 about  social surrogacy

our society place value in motherhood and pregnancy, but we don't really. we may coddle pregnant women, but we also have like the shortest maternity leave of any 1st world nation. we expect women to immediately return to pre-baby bodies, we freak out at women breast feeding in public, and find fault in stretch makes.

i'm a fairly practical person. so it doesn't make much difference to me why you want to hire a surrogate rather than having one yourself. honestly, i feel like purposely setting out to create a kid, even one you diy, is a little bit a selfish thing anyway, so adding vanity to the mix is no big deal. so yeah, i think social surrogacy is fine. i mean, it's not the best thing ever, but since you can't deny surrogacy based on motive alone... i do think the best alternative to not carrying your own child is to adopt. but that's a whole other thing.

the slap

nbc has a new show that sounds really interesting, tho i've not watched it. after watching the trailer, what do you think? should he have slapped the kid? did he deserve it?

i'm going to answer in a really round about way, in the way that i usually do:

1. in general, i'm okay with corporal punishment. but to a point. i don't think slapping someone in face is acceptable. a swat on the bottom is generally cool. hitting someone in the face is really crossing the line. you're not just disciplining someone, you're insulting them too. that's how i see it, anyhow.

2. can you hit someone else's kid? this is a really though question. i really don't think you should. even if their parent is being negligent, i don't think you have the right to touch their kid like that. the commercial is interesting tho. this kid is being dangerous. he's swinging around a baseball bat! then he kicks the adult! but, if you'll notice, the adult holding the kid's arms down by his side. i mean, i would feel threatened if someone tried restraining me that way. i might kick them too. in a way, the man provoked the kick. adults are supposed to remain level headed and kids... well, they don't have to.

3. so, specifically, should he have slapped the kid? no. did he deserve it? no. the kid had something coming towards him, but it wasn't a slap across the face. he should've been swatted on the butt. and i think that in this case, it would've been okay for a non-parent to do it because the kid was behaving dangerously towards everyone in his vicinity.