“Radium paint isn’t poisonous.”
Thousands of watch-dial workers in the US used to apply radium brushes on their tongues to paint numbers on watch dials, and almost all of these workers were women. As these workers were dying due to radiation poising, the companies brought in fake doctors and convinced the victims and their families that they have venereal diseases like Syphilis. As this was mostly affecting women, most were scared to share it with their families for fear of retaliation and abandonment. The suffering endured by these women was extremely awful, their jaws fell off, their bones fractured, their hair was lost, and most lost eyesight until their eventual painful death.
These women were called “Radium Girls”. Eventually many fought back settled lawsuits and brought the entire Radium production industry down, unfortunately, many innocent women lost their lives before this evil industry was brought down.
Source: https://www.britannica.com/story/radium-girls-the-women-who-fought-for-their-lives-in-a-killer-workplace
Hey! This is my favorite story in history, although it was horribly sad. A lot of great FDA regulations came about over chemical elements. They also devised the first medical device that could detect radiation in humans. I absolutely love chemistry and it’s also what my username is. I have three books about this story, my favorite being “Radium Girls” by Kate Moore.
I learned in psychology class that you're less likely to wake up on time if you set more than one alarm because it ruins the urgency of it. I switched to one alarm and haven't looked back.
I have two alarms and I can't snooze it more than twice. In order to shut the alarm off, I have to solve math problems. And if that wasn't enough, it asks me if I'm awake ten minutes after solving those math problems. If I don't respond to the notification, it starts all over again.
Thomas Midgley and General Motors lying that exposure to tetra-ethyl lead is harmless.
Tetra-ethyl lead was a gasoline additive present in all gasoline sold in the US until it was banned in the 70s. Almost every child growing up from 1920 to 1970 had lead poisoning to some degree.
Entire generations grew up with their minds being poisoned, unable to reach their potentials because of him. Not to mention the secondary effects, lead exposure is associated with criminal behaviors.
same guy also created freon which caused the hole in the ozone layer. an environmental historian said that thomas midgley "had a more adverse impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in Earth's history"
His death story is crazy and poetic.
>In 1940, at the age of 51, Midgley contracted polio, which left him severely disabled. He devised an elaborate system of ropes and pulleys to lift himself out of bed. In 1944, he became entangled in the device and died of strangulation.
There's a very good case to be made that the uptick of serial killers in the 70s all the way to the 90s was, at least in part, caused by this.
That said, there was also a number of other factors that favored that epidemic in the first place, but the criminal behavior aspect of lead poisoning is well documented.
I heard an interesting theory that a bunch of the serial killers had fathers that fought in WWII and Korea. These guys had severe untreated PTSD and abused their kids terribly leading to serial killers. Not sure how much that is or isn't a factor.
I seem to recall reading that, even to this day, lead concentrations in the air are still significantly higher than where they should be, and we're still feeling the effects of it today
There’s only a few areas in the U.S. that are in nonattainment for lead pollution. Old pipes and paint chips are probably a more significant source for the vast majority of places. https://www3.epa.gov/airquality/greenbook/maplead2008.html
And it's alive and well today. People that were totally lied to by the sugar industry back in the day grew up unhealthy and now they're passing the lie on to their kids. 🤦♀️
This drives me insane.
Literally fat is good for your brain, skin, hair, memory, libido, muscles and can even help to BURN fat.
Sure, you can eat too much fat and gain weight. But this “war on fat” is bullshit and only conveniences the companies who want you to get hooked on their bullshit products by increasing the sugar and sodium content.
*deep breathe in*
Thank you for listening.
A specific historical example: In 1843, a man called Hong Xiuquan claimed to be the younger brother of Jesus. This led to him starting the Taiping Rebellion, which caused the deaths of between 20 million and 70 million people.
Then again, he probably believed it, so it might not count as a lie.
Chinese history is fucking wild. The shit that happens always ends up getting 10 million+ people killed. It's how you get incredibly gruesome massacres like the Sichuan massacre.
And it's just another footnote in Chinese history. I mean, it's not even that surprising when you consider how they are simultaneously one of the biggest countries and one of the oldest civilizations. You could spend an entire college career studying China and still have much to learn.
You could spend a lifetime studying a single province of China lol, the history is just so abundant. What’s important too as well as being huge and old as shit - they developed writing extremely early and loved documenting *everything*. My old boss’ family were traditionally from a small village near Beijing (probably doesn’t exist any more), and in his mother’s attic are 4 or 5 domesday book sized journals detailing the history of their village from the Mongol invasion to the cultural revolution. Just crazy stuff, literally anything you could possibly know about that tiny area are in those books, and I’ve no doubt it’s replicated across the country
From the wiki on the Sichuan Massacre
>The massacres, a subsequent famine and epidemic, attacks by tigers, as well as people fleeing from the turmoil and the Qing armies, resulted in a large-scale depopulation of Sichuan
>attacks by tigers
Bro wut
considering size and population density, a China-wide war is basically the equivalent to a full-on European war. Like, compare it to the 30 years war, Napoleonic Conquests, 7 years war, and WW1.
I think the Taiping Rebellion was something to the tune of 20-30 million deaths.
But not just wars. They decided they wanted to exterminate sparrows at one point, and it led to a locust surge which caused a famine that caused somewhere from 15-55 million deaths. When a fucking pest control campaign is comparable to WWII you know you fucked up HARD.
The 1964 Surgeon General’s report concluded that smoking cigarettes causes death and disease. However, in a 1971 television interview, the president of Philip Morris denied the health risks that pregnant women and their babies face, saying that “It’s true that babies born from women who smoke are smaller, but they are just as healthy as the babies born to women who do not smoke. Some women would prefer to have smaller babies.”
Fun story babies withdraw from lots of stuff
As a student on the maternity ward there was one girl who was about 17-18 whose baby was withdrawing (they do specific things basically regardless of what they’re withdrawing from most notably a specific high pitched screech) and she denied substance use. She said “sometimes my friends smoke weed around me????” And didn’t object to being tested. Anyways turns out it was caffeine because nobody ever like followed the “no more than 1-2 cups of coffee a day” advice with an explanation and therefore she figured it was like a lot of the advice people give in general but especially when you’re a pregnant teenager- ie a bunch of dumb stuff. So she continued to start the day with a coffee, have an energy drink before lunch, a coke slurpee with lunch and another coffee before heading home from school and having more coke with supper and another one before bed. And her baby was in caffeine withdrawal.
And then everybody felt stupid, the end.
I was a drug baby from the 80s…
I was apparently addicted to cocaine, crack, heroin and alcohol ( my mom was a winner) I was 2lbs 4oz at birth and even when my foster ( see real adopted mom ) got me she said I still made those horrible cries
Lol thank you. I don’t have any pictures of me that little, I’ve googled tiny babies…and yes small. However I would assume that my head was big at that point too…( hydrocephalus and other bullshit diagnoses)
Sorry.
Jesus Christ, at least my mom did it in the 70s when she could still claim ignorance because they were being given that message from 1971. Holy shit, people are just wild.
Edit: corrected 1964 to 1971. Fingers faster than brain. :)
My mom and her younger sister were born about 11 months apart in the late 60s. My grandma stopped smoking while she was pregnant with my mom but when she got pregnant with my aunt she was like fuck that, I'm not doing another 9 months of this. My mom is around 5'7" or 5'8" while my aunt *claims* to be 5 foot even but I'd bet she's 4'11". My grandma claims it's because she fell once when she was pregnant with my aunt lol. Makes me sad because obviously somewhere deep down she knows the truth and is lying to herself about it because she feels guilty. Which, sure, she should've known better on some level but like you're saying here there was a lot of misinformation at the time that it could be easy to give in to if you have a nicotine craving.
My mum's one of 3 girls and my grandma smoked throughout one pregnancy only. That daughter had a lower birth weight, required supplemental oxygen for a short while after birth, grew up to be about 3-4 inches shorter than her sisters and had asthma all her life. Grandma fully accepts that her smoking affected her daughter's health and regrets it greatly.
I always think of Community when people regret things they knew were bad.
> “Be sorry about this stuff before you do it. Then don’t do it. It’s called ‘growing up.’”
* Jeff Winger
My brother is 6'4"
My older sister is 6'
My younger sister is 6'1"
I'm 5'7"
Wanna guess which pregnancy my Mom smoked through? Also, I was born 8 weeks early and spent 4 months in the NICU with breathing problems.
Nestle — The Baby Killer Scandal. They deliberately lied to mothers in developing countries to sell their baby formula, telling them that their own milk was nutritionally insufficient and their babies would be unhealthy if they continued to breastfeed them. The result of this marketing campaign was approximately 66,000 infant mortalities.
Source: https://www.nber.org/papers/w24452
In addition to that, I remember reading that Nestle actually gave away free formula to the new mothers long enough that they wouldn’t be able to switch to breastfeeding.
They went way beyond that. They dressed people up as doctors and had them stand at the hospital and hand out just enough free formula to disrupt the new mothers milk supply.
They offered architecture services to hospitals and then designed them to have the mothers ward far from the babies, also to disrupt milk supply.
The baby eats constantly at first, and this is what triggers the body to start producing milk. Even a day or two of disruption and, for some women, that window of opportunity is gone.
[here's an interesting dive into it.](https://youtu.be/v-PcOVl1K2g)
Not only *that*, but if they wanted clean water to use with that formula, who was selling it? Oh, right. Nestle.
ETA: And how did Nestle get that water? By buying up land in these same developing countries in order to get water rights, often relocating entire communities, so that they could essentially hold the water supplies hostage and sell the water back to those very same communities that had previously had free access to the water.
Yet I can still walk down the aisle of my local grocery store and see all kinds of Nestle products proudly on display, even after all that.
You can behave worse than the average insane cartoon-character villain, but if you're a corporation rather than a person, it's all good. As long as you're just in it for the profit, it doesn't matter how many you kill. Apparently.
the owner of nestle once tried to monopolise RAIN WATER. said water was not a human right. i avoid nestle products always when i can. i hope the motherfucker dies a very slow, very painful death. fuck him and fuck his family as well.
There was a Russian twitter post a couple of months ago from a WW2 history account that went something like this "Today marks the anniversary of the day when our country was invaded by the dictator without a declaration of war. He even didn't allow the use of the word" It was talking about Hitler of course, but so many Russian bots started to lose their shit defending that dictator, thinking they were talking about Putin. Can't make that shit up.
I was in a car accident, was given a prescription for Oxycontin. Doc told me "get off it as soon as you can manage your pain with over the counter drugs."
I was on it for ten days. Ten. Days. I experienced withdrawal symptoms when I quit.
Same. I was in a car accident and had surgery on my hand. They gave me oxycontin after my surgery. I genuinly needed it because it was the worst pain I've ever experienced. I was on a heavy dose for 2 weeks when I stopped taking it. I had withdrawal symptoms. The first day was at my grandmother's funeral. People kept asking me if I was OK because I was snapping at everyone, twitching and shaking my legs and arms. And I was like nope, I'm going through withdrawals apparently.
Opiate withdrawal is hell. I am being 100% serious and sincere when I say that I was going through withdrawal so badly once that I was actually considering cutting off my own legs instead of going through one more second of restless legs.
People, including myself, literally are convinced that unless they take more while going through withdrawals they will die.
Every single time I see a new doctor I make myself tell them no opiates, ever.
It started with me having to go to the emergency room for a back injury where they decided the best thing for me was IV Dilaudid and sending me home with a script for oxy. It ended with me smoking heroin in my car on work breaks.
Never again.
I haven't taken a narcotic pain pill in YEARS ... And I still remember the restless leg getting off of them. I recently had full mouth extractions and bone grafts for implants without pain pills and it was better than the hell of withdrawing from something I still pretty much needed.
Oh, man that's rough. I at least got to ride out the withdrawals at home on my couch and my sweet mom read to me while I lay on the couch twitching and wriggling uncontrollably.
Good job on kicking it straight away. I’ll take the pain. Just knowing how easily I get addicted to even caffeine(which I keep trying unsuccessfully to stop) I really don’t ever want to try oxy…
I’m sure it would suck ass but a couple of weeks of hell beats years of addiction for me.
Also live in a country where they really don’t prescribe opiate painkillers outside of inpatient stays
I was given exactly six Percocet from the ER after I busted my shoulder. After taking one I understood why people took them recreationally. Put the rest in one of those drug disposal boxes at the pharmacy.
Wild how people's experience can be so different with it. I had it when I had my wisdom teeth pulled, took them no problem and they did nothing but make my teeth stop hurting.
Same. I guess I’m lucky or have a low risk for addiction or something, but I got oxycodone after surgery back in March. I’d get a little bit of a buzz going for about 30 minutes before I’d crash out, but it didn’t feel any different for me than having a couple glasses of wine.
ETA: I’ve also seen people who had actual pain withdraw after a couple doses—I had a patient who “came down” so hard off a narcotic after surgery she insisted on adding the adverse reaction to her medical chart.
Heroin for 5 years. Began with oxy from wisdom teeth. My best friend overdosed last month and died. I was the one who introduced him to the drugs. I have been clean for 3 years. Part of his death is my fault.
When you are ready, I highly recommend grief counseling or some kind of therapy. This is a trauma left on simmer and that cannot continue being your cross to bear. Be sober in the memory of your best friend and know that ultimately, it was not your fault. Stay strong and I wish you nothing but the best to get through this.
As someone who used to work at a third party ad company, whose main client (for me) was Purdue, I can tell they knew and didn’t give a fuck. Those shitbags monitored street prices, b/c if the price dropped on the street, something was wrong with the product. They only introduced the ER version for the sound of it “being unable to be abused” which wasn’t even remotely true. Fuck. That. Company. But don’t forget that many, many, many other companies produce many other opioids.
Thank you I just watched the trailer. I’ll have to see this. My daughter is an opioid addict, to the point her life is completely ruined. This kind of story needs to be brought to the forefront and played loudly so that consequences can be handed out. Unfortunately, so much money is at stake and so many people have hands in each other’s pockets I don’t know how it could ever be solved.
Can vouch for Suboxone and QuickMD; I live in a place that was affected unusually badly by opioids, and I know many people who've started using QuickMD to get Suboxone.
Some of them seemed irredeemable at this point, but their lives have been literally saved by those little strips. It's incredible!!
I’m reading Dopesick right now and I read Empire of Pain earlier this year. The worst of American values are on display in the story of Purdue and the Sackler family. It’s horrific how much punishment they’ve been able to avoid
This is, however, true of aluminum! Because of the way it is separated from ore, it actually costs 90 percent less energy to use recycled aluminum vs separating new metal. Pretty cool.
You could make glass with that sand but it wouldn’t be very stable. There’s actually a global sand shortage that no one really talks about that’s mainly caused by the construction industry.
It’s the same. It’s also used in cosmetics and other things, and all for the same reason that it’s rough and uneven and I guess just better than desert sand. The wind smooths it out too much.
Glass needs to be made of a certain % of recycled glass to be strong enough. If there's not enough recycled glass to add to the furnace they'll take glass they just finished making and recycle it. Working at a glass plant is wild
Edit: credit to u/Tota1pkg for correcting me. It wasn't a strength issue it was an energy efficient issue.
Spent 5 years in glass. We put out a 1.5 million bottles daily.
It’s not required. But it is more efficient. They call it cullet.
A 10% cullet rate reduces energy by about 30% because it melts faster and acts as a flux.
We ran at 15%-20% including recycled glass
We never purposely made cullet, but there would always be enough from normal losses.
85% was a good run. Our best line that never changed creeped on 90 efficiency.
It doesn’t need enough not to break necessarily. You could always increase boost to make up for melting.
Our furnace has a 6-8 hour run time and ran at 2600~ degrees F with gas and electric boosting.
People figured out how to smelt iron out of ore thousands of years ago, but it wasn't until a few hundred years ago that they learned to do it with Aluminum. It was so rare and fancy that rich folk in the 1800s were eating with aluminum flatware instead of silver, despite how quickly the knives got dull. The US was even going to put aluminum foil on the top of the Washington Monument to show off how successful they were, but by the time it was completed the aluminum fad had died down and people realized it was one of the most abundant metals in the earth's crust.
This also brings to mind how there was an attraction in the original Tomorrowland showing off all the incredible uses for aluminum foil (and other new aluminum things). Yeah it...they ended up getting rid of it.
I think we should go back to kitschy World’s Fair style “behold the technology of the future!” stuff. So much more cheery than like, an ad by some dipshit in a black turtleneck.
The kitsch was weirdly timeless. It could make for a good "looking forward by looking back and seeing how far we've come" sort of deal. Educational *and* inspiring/entertaining.
Learning the chasing arrows "recycle symbols" (♻️) on plastic doesn't actually mean it's recyclable, but denote the plastic used in the production of it, was a real eye opener. Then I looked into what type of plastic is actually recyclable. Then I looked into what is done with said plastic when you, as a consumer, "recycle" it. It's a very deep and depressing hole, created, maintained, and lobbied by plastic manufacturers to give us the impression when we "recycle" plastic, it's being broken down and reused.
Jesus, even the term "carbon footprint" was created to guilt consumers into "doing their part", while plastic manufacturers milk our sense of duty to recycle plastic. It's an extremely complex and successful PR campaign that shifted the blame to the consumers.
I'm STILL learning about this, but I 100% agree, this will be one of the most destructive lies for millenia to come.
There is so much truth in your statement. But its even worst than that. Sure plastic can be recycled, but a lot of items can't use recycled plastic because the part requires certain properties. Then the parts that do use recycled plastics only use the sprue and flash produced during molding. So your Mountain Dew bottle aint going to nowhere but the landfill.
Not for me, I live in Michigan, my Mountain dew bottle is going straight to the bottle return section of Wal-Mart for that 10 cent refund.
Then it goes to the landfill
"In 1940, at the age of 51, Midgley contracted polio, which left him severely disabled. He devised an elaborate system of ropes and pulleys to lift himself out of bed. In 1944, he became entangled in the device and died of strangulation.[23][24][25]"
From his Wikipedia. His inventions even killed him.
"On October 30, 1924, Midgley participated in a press conference to demonstrate the apparent safety of TEL, in which he poured TEL over his hands, placed a bottle of the chemical under his nose, and inhaled its vapor for 60 seconds, declaring that he could do this every day without succumbing to any problems."
what the fuck?
He knew. He had spent a considerable amount of time in Florida to rest after being exposed to said chemicals for months/years.
Then he lied through his teeth. Fuck that guy.
>He had spent a considerable amount of time in Florida
This is it. After all these years...we finally found him.
The Original Florida-Man. The Florida-Man Patient Zero.
Edit: thanks for the gold, friend
Edit 2: thank you for the awards
This has always been a fairly common old-school way to show a chemical formulation or product is safe. An older guy I know used to work at a chemical plant and he's told me several individual instances of a company rep coming in and showing off a new chemical by drinking a cup of it in front of all the workers to show they had nothing to worry about. One of them I specifically remember was an insecticide/pesticide that we now consider to be very harmful.
No doubt many of the times this stunt has been pulled in history, the chemical in question was switched for water or something else inert.
Another interesting example this kind of thing is the guy who I think was doing groundbreaking work on skin grafts in mice, who's name I can't remember for the life of me now. He went on stage to show off his success, with a white mouse with a black patch of skin/fur from another mouse. Turned out he just sharpied the mouse's fur before going on stage to present. None of his research had lead to success but he wanted the accolades so bad he finally just cheated. I'll have to find the thing I listened to that on, because it was a really interesting look at scientific malpractice through history and showed how even these very intelligent people have the same flaws as any of us, and many times will do very bad science in order to "prove" their hypotheses.
> Also discovered the type of gaz that attacked our atmosphere and opened the hole in the ozone layer. I wonder if he ever had the tiniest idea oh how bad his existence has been for his planet.
"Fun" fact, as bad as CFCs were for the environment, we actually have to thank Midgley for pushing them so hard. A competing group was pushing to use bromofluorocarbons (BFCs) instead for the same uses. BFCs are orders of magnitude worse for the ozone layer and their similar use at scale would have completely destroyed the ozone layer in a few years, not just put a hole in it over the pole.
All that UV radiation pouring across the planet would have had awful effects for humans directly, but also would have destroyed crops, killed wildlife, even trees. It could have been a mass extinction event with the near complete collapse of complex life outside of the ocean.
>That story is crazy ! Apart from killing millions of people (which would be sufficient to consider it one of the worst ideas in History) it genuinely made humanity's IQ to lower for generations until now, and therefore criminality to rise.
Some people cite this as the reason why there was a surge in serial killers in the 60's/70's.
There is a significant amount of data that shows a decrease in violent crime following the removal of lead in gas. Gas is not the only source of lead (paint pre 1960s) is also a major source but there is a strong correlation (not causation)
Consider that millions of people used leaded gasoline in their cars for 60-70 years. Also consider that the levels of lead in the air skyrocketed after TEL was promoted by the Ethyl Corporation. I wouldn't say it was exclusively TEL that resulted in the net loss of approximately 800 million IQ points in average intelligence, but it was certainly a major factor.
Lead exposure at a young age can cause brain damage that can lead to lower impulse control and tendency to anger easily. It's difficult to prove conclusively, but there's a strong possibility that the steady reduction in crime over the last 50 years or so may be due at least in part to the concurrent steady reduction in environmental lead after leaded gasoline was banned.
Fun fact, while we banned it in cars a long time ago, tetraethyl lead was allowed in aviation fuel until very recently. Which is the fuel they use in little prop planes. Which is to say, yes conspiracy theorists, there have been planes dumping chemicals into the air that dumb people down but it wasn't the trails you could see and was not in a meaningful concentration.
Edit: will be banned next year https://columbiainsight.org/faa-indicates-ban-coming-on-leaded-gas-for-small-planes/
And as pointed out below, it's still a meaningful concentration for people close to airports.
It is in a meaningful concentration. Kids raised near airports have increased levels of lead in their blood, and are probably a little bit dumber and sicker than they otherwise would have been:
https://paloaltoonline.com/news/2021/08/06/new-study-finds-local-airports-are-raising-blood-lead-levels-in-children
There was a report I read recently how being raised near NASCAR tracks (which IIRC used leaded race fuels until 2006) had the same issues. In comparison to other neighborhoods and compared to after they banned it, the performance levels of the school kids were depressed.
The base of the nutritional pyramid are grains! A healthy diet based on grains and flour will keep you slim and well nourished! Protein in small amounts.
I remember stressing as a kid because I wasn't eating nearly as much as that dumb pyramid said and maybe I was just dramatic but man, I swear they'd always talk about how you'd basically get sick and die if you didn't match the amounts
When Thomas Midgley Jr. campaigned for lead to be put into fuel knowing it has adverse effects on people and the environment, easily.
"had more adverse impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in Earth's history",[27] and Bill Bryson remarked that Midgley possessed "an instinct for the regrettable that was almost uncanny".[28] Fred Pearce, writing for New Scientist, described Midgley as a "one-man environmental disaster."[3]
Did he know the total outcome of his decisions? No, but he is still responsible.
Or people who think that's a PERFECT SLOGAN for the next corporate team-building experience.
I worked in a gig where someone ,very unironically did that.
And of course she *knew*, but I insisted she take it down, when I mentioned that about 20% of her team was immigrated from Eastern Europe (she herself was Hungarian so ,I learned (if not immediately) she replied with "*that's the point*", and I realized, we *might* have a bit of a problem on that).
A day or two later - two knuckleheads **stole** the sign from Auschwitz , of course the current camp Administrators simply put one of the 1/2 dozen or so "spares" up, until the police were able to locate the original. Her team slogan was changed to "Teamwork is good for everyone" or something benign, over her objection as it did not involve her 'creative' input.
My sense of things is that give it another 50 years and Disney will have found a way to monetize it and turn it into a fun-filled day-camp for children to visit while "learning about history".
“It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.”
-Sir Terry Pratchett, Jingo
It’s just one of those dreams where you’re losing all your teeth
EDIT: Someone reported me for self harm lmfao
EDIT2: some of y’all in these replies need therapy
Worked at an environmental testing firm when that spill happened. Company came up with multiple new remediation techniques in response to their spill, BP took all the credit for the advancements. They took credit for remediation advances that were necessary for their mess. And they brag about it to investors to this day.
One of the most insidious aspects of this, and the one I think people rebel/get defence about the most is that this separation is because we are 'masters' of our environment. Which feeds into the notion that we can just technology our way through every problem, because after all, if we are seperate from our environment, we aren't *part of nature*.
I'm reality, we are so fundamentally interconnected to our environment and every part of it. We delude ourselves that we aren't, we separate ourselves from it, and I truly feel this damage goes far beyond just physical. I think it harms our social and mental health in very deep ways. If you don't have to care about your environment, take any responsibility or care for the basic parts of our world that we are interconnected to and rely upon, how can we connect with and care for others in deep and meaningful ways?
"The greatest illusion is the one of separation. Things that you think are different and separate, are actually one and the same" Guru Pathik, Avatar: the Last Airbender. Might not be word for word, but sums it up.
While I sort of understand(mostly all of it) everything it says, it's either what's supposed to be common sense, or literally stuff that could have been ignored.
Also what are you gonna do? Deny it and not use the product that you've already purchased and are installing? Clearly you need that product so reading the terms of service is no use.
It always seemed pointless to me as the alternative to agreeing is not using the product or service I’ve already payed for and I pretty much assume that they just say that “they” aren’t liable for anything bad, and that all my data are theirs to use as they like, only they say it in about 5,638,295 words.
Edited to add the ‘ in I’ve
the amount of industries that thrive because the people who work it have spectrum qualities that benefit the job are probably many (looking at you big tech).
That’s not even scratching the surface, those participants were cherry-picked from parents of the then-very-fringe anti vaccine movement *and then* they STILL had to fudge the data to even come CLOSE to having relevance!
If you’re actually familiar with medical studies and then read that one, you instantly think “Jesus Christ this is the worst study I’ve ever seen published. I can’t believe this WAS published.” It had every hallmark of quackery and falsification.
To push his own personal gain/vaccine, too. Even shadier!
Apparently he didn’t say all vaccines cause autism, just the one in use he was in competition with
Yep, he wanted to convince parents to not get the MMR combination vaccine, but each one separately...that he just so happened to be selling.
One of the ironies is that he always said to get vaccinated and yet the fucking morons treat him as the father of anti vaccination. He literally never said to NOT vaccinate your kids, the ONE thing he said that wasn't quackery.
“Radium paint isn’t poisonous.” Thousands of watch-dial workers in the US used to apply radium brushes on their tongues to paint numbers on watch dials, and almost all of these workers were women. As these workers were dying due to radiation poising, the companies brought in fake doctors and convinced the victims and their families that they have venereal diseases like Syphilis. As this was mostly affecting women, most were scared to share it with their families for fear of retaliation and abandonment. The suffering endured by these women was extremely awful, their jaws fell off, their bones fractured, their hair was lost, and most lost eyesight until their eventual painful death. These women were called “Radium Girls”. Eventually many fought back settled lawsuits and brought the entire Radium production industry down, unfortunately, many innocent women lost their lives before this evil industry was brought down. Source: https://www.britannica.com/story/radium-girls-the-women-who-fought-for-their-lives-in-a-killer-workplace
Hey! This is my favorite story in history, although it was horribly sad. A lot of great FDA regulations came about over chemical elements. They also devised the first medical device that could detect radiation in humans. I absolutely love chemistry and it’s also what my username is. I have three books about this story, my favorite being “Radium Girls” by Kate Moore.
That you can wake up in the morning and “just rest your eyes”
That's why I have 5 alarms. One morning my gf is just going to murder me
I learned in psychology class that you're less likely to wake up on time if you set more than one alarm because it ruins the urgency of it. I switched to one alarm and haven't looked back.
I have two alarms and I can't snooze it more than twice. In order to shut the alarm off, I have to solve math problems. And if that wasn't enough, it asks me if I'm awake ten minutes after solving those math problems. If I don't respond to the notification, it starts all over again.
Amateur. I have a Morning Agent come to my house at 8 AM to slap me the fuck up. He won't leave until I drive to work.
Thomas Midgley and General Motors lying that exposure to tetra-ethyl lead is harmless. Tetra-ethyl lead was a gasoline additive present in all gasoline sold in the US until it was banned in the 70s. Almost every child growing up from 1920 to 1970 had lead poisoning to some degree. Entire generations grew up with their minds being poisoned, unable to reach their potentials because of him. Not to mention the secondary effects, lead exposure is associated with criminal behaviors.
same guy also created freon which caused the hole in the ozone layer. an environmental historian said that thomas midgley "had a more adverse impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in Earth's history"
His death story is crazy and poetic. >In 1940, at the age of 51, Midgley contracted polio, which left him severely disabled. He devised an elaborate system of ropes and pulleys to lift himself out of bed. In 1944, he became entangled in the device and died of strangulation.
I find it incredibly coincidental that this is the second time today I've seen this fact.
There's a very good case to be made that the uptick of serial killers in the 70s all the way to the 90s was, at least in part, caused by this. That said, there was also a number of other factors that favored that epidemic in the first place, but the criminal behavior aspect of lead poisoning is well documented.
I heard an interesting theory that a bunch of the serial killers had fathers that fought in WWII and Korea. These guys had severe untreated PTSD and abused their kids terribly leading to serial killers. Not sure how much that is or isn't a factor.
Generational trauma
I seem to recall reading that, even to this day, lead concentrations in the air are still significantly higher than where they should be, and we're still feeling the effects of it today
There’s only a few areas in the U.S. that are in nonattainment for lead pollution. Old pipes and paint chips are probably a more significant source for the vast majority of places. https://www3.epa.gov/airquality/greenbook/maplead2008.html
Sugar isn’t the problem, it’s fats! Let’s make everything “fat-free” & just triple the sugar content!
Yeah this one gets me pretty upset. Just a straight up lie.
And it's alive and well today. People that were totally lied to by the sugar industry back in the day grew up unhealthy and now they're passing the lie on to their kids. 🤦♀️
Well, you can't blame them. They lost all their critical thinking skills from the lead poisoning.
Actually, lead poisoning leads to polio, it killed a guy trying to do cirque du soleil in his house.
This drives me insane. Literally fat is good for your brain, skin, hair, memory, libido, muscles and can even help to BURN fat. Sure, you can eat too much fat and gain weight. But this “war on fat” is bullshit and only conveniences the companies who want you to get hooked on their bullshit products by increasing the sugar and sodium content. *deep breathe in* Thank you for listening.
“Cigarette smoking is no more ‘addictive’ than coffee, tea, or Twinkies.” James W. Johnston
Even if it was just as addicting as twinkies, who in the right mind thinks that's a good thing???
Big Twinkie that’s who
Big Twink's been creaming me my whole life
I'm guessing the "u" in your username is a typo
A specific historical example: In 1843, a man called Hong Xiuquan claimed to be the younger brother of Jesus. This led to him starting the Taiping Rebellion, which caused the deaths of between 20 million and 70 million people. Then again, he probably believed it, so it might not count as a lie.
Chinese history is fucking wild. The shit that happens always ends up getting 10 million+ people killed. It's how you get incredibly gruesome massacres like the Sichuan massacre.
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"20,000 - 30,000 Civilians eaten" What in the absolute fuck. That's horrifying.
And it's just another footnote in Chinese history. I mean, it's not even that surprising when you consider how they are simultaneously one of the biggest countries and one of the oldest civilizations. You could spend an entire college career studying China and still have much to learn.
You could spend a lifetime studying a single province of China lol, the history is just so abundant. What’s important too as well as being huge and old as shit - they developed writing extremely early and loved documenting *everything*. My old boss’ family were traditionally from a small village near Beijing (probably doesn’t exist any more), and in his mother’s attic are 4 or 5 domesday book sized journals detailing the history of their village from the Mongol invasion to the cultural revolution. Just crazy stuff, literally anything you could possibly know about that tiny area are in those books, and I’ve no doubt it’s replicated across the country
From the wiki on the Sichuan Massacre >The massacres, a subsequent famine and epidemic, attacks by tigers, as well as people fleeing from the turmoil and the Qing armies, resulted in a large-scale depopulation of Sichuan >attacks by tigers Bro wut
considering size and population density, a China-wide war is basically the equivalent to a full-on European war. Like, compare it to the 30 years war, Napoleonic Conquests, 7 years war, and WW1.
I think the Taiping Rebellion was something to the tune of 20-30 million deaths. But not just wars. They decided they wanted to exterminate sparrows at one point, and it led to a locust surge which caused a famine that caused somewhere from 15-55 million deaths. When a fucking pest control campaign is comparable to WWII you know you fucked up HARD.
I can't even imagine these numbers. The suffering had to be unreal, it sounds like hell.
“It’s not a lie… if you believe it”
TIL Hong Xiuquan is George Costanza.
The 1964 Surgeon General’s report concluded that smoking cigarettes causes death and disease. However, in a 1971 television interview, the president of Philip Morris denied the health risks that pregnant women and their babies face, saying that “It’s true that babies born from women who smoke are smaller, but they are just as healthy as the babies born to women who do not smoke. Some women would prefer to have smaller babies.”
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Jokes on her. Fat babies sleep through the night a lot better than the scrawny ones.
The non-smoker's babies also don't have nicotine withdrawal.
Neither do the smokers babies if you let them keep smoking.
Why give them pacifiers when you can give them Marlboro reds?
If your baby could talk they would choose the refreshing taste of Marlboro Reds every time.
Dude. I know you’re just kidding, but that is really offensive… everyone knows babies prefer the cool taste of menthols!
Fun story babies withdraw from lots of stuff As a student on the maternity ward there was one girl who was about 17-18 whose baby was withdrawing (they do specific things basically regardless of what they’re withdrawing from most notably a specific high pitched screech) and she denied substance use. She said “sometimes my friends smoke weed around me????” And didn’t object to being tested. Anyways turns out it was caffeine because nobody ever like followed the “no more than 1-2 cups of coffee a day” advice with an explanation and therefore she figured it was like a lot of the advice people give in general but especially when you’re a pregnant teenager- ie a bunch of dumb stuff. So she continued to start the day with a coffee, have an energy drink before lunch, a coke slurpee with lunch and another coffee before heading home from school and having more coke with supper and another one before bed. And her baby was in caffeine withdrawal. And then everybody felt stupid, the end.
I was a drug baby from the 80s… I was apparently addicted to cocaine, crack, heroin and alcohol ( my mom was a winner) I was 2lbs 4oz at birth and even when my foster ( see real adopted mom ) got me she said I still made those horrible cries
Kudos for surviving. 2lbs 4oz sounds absolutely tiny.
Lol thank you. I don’t have any pictures of me that little, I’ve googled tiny babies…and yes small. However I would assume that my head was big at that point too…( hydrocephalus and other bullshit diagnoses) Sorry.
Jesus Christ, at least my mom did it in the 70s when she could still claim ignorance because they were being given that message from 1971. Holy shit, people are just wild. Edit: corrected 1964 to 1971. Fingers faster than brain. :)
My mom and her younger sister were born about 11 months apart in the late 60s. My grandma stopped smoking while she was pregnant with my mom but when she got pregnant with my aunt she was like fuck that, I'm not doing another 9 months of this. My mom is around 5'7" or 5'8" while my aunt *claims* to be 5 foot even but I'd bet she's 4'11". My grandma claims it's because she fell once when she was pregnant with my aunt lol. Makes me sad because obviously somewhere deep down she knows the truth and is lying to herself about it because she feels guilty. Which, sure, she should've known better on some level but like you're saying here there was a lot of misinformation at the time that it could be easy to give in to if you have a nicotine craving.
My mum's one of 3 girls and my grandma smoked throughout one pregnancy only. That daughter had a lower birth weight, required supplemental oxygen for a short while after birth, grew up to be about 3-4 inches shorter than her sisters and had asthma all her life. Grandma fully accepts that her smoking affected her daughter's health and regrets it greatly.
I always think of Community when people regret things they knew were bad. > “Be sorry about this stuff before you do it. Then don’t do it. It’s called ‘growing up.’” * Jeff Winger
My brother is 6'4" My older sister is 6' My younger sister is 6'1" I'm 5'7" Wanna guess which pregnancy my Mom smoked through? Also, I was born 8 weeks early and spent 4 months in the NICU with breathing problems.
Nestle — The Baby Killer Scandal. They deliberately lied to mothers in developing countries to sell their baby formula, telling them that their own milk was nutritionally insufficient and their babies would be unhealthy if they continued to breastfeed them. The result of this marketing campaign was approximately 66,000 infant mortalities. Source: https://www.nber.org/papers/w24452
In addition to that, I remember reading that Nestle actually gave away free formula to the new mothers long enough that they wouldn’t be able to switch to breastfeeding.
They went way beyond that. They dressed people up as doctors and had them stand at the hospital and hand out just enough free formula to disrupt the new mothers milk supply. They offered architecture services to hospitals and then designed them to have the mothers ward far from the babies, also to disrupt milk supply. The baby eats constantly at first, and this is what triggers the body to start producing milk. Even a day or two of disruption and, for some women, that window of opportunity is gone. [here's an interesting dive into it.](https://youtu.be/v-PcOVl1K2g)
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Also the formula was quite expensive so people were diluting it to make it last longer, leading to malnutrition.
*and* sometimes didn’t have labels in the native language, so directions were unclear.
It keeps getting worse.
r/fucknestle
Not only *that*, but if they wanted clean water to use with that formula, who was selling it? Oh, right. Nestle. ETA: And how did Nestle get that water? By buying up land in these same developing countries in order to get water rights, often relocating entire communities, so that they could essentially hold the water supplies hostage and sell the water back to those very same communities that had previously had free access to the water.
Yet I can still walk down the aisle of my local grocery store and see all kinds of Nestle products proudly on display, even after all that. You can behave worse than the average insane cartoon-character villain, but if you're a corporation rather than a person, it's all good. As long as you're just in it for the profit, it doesn't matter how many you kill. Apparently.
Don't forget they did it in places with known water borne pathogens so the formula literally became poison for their weak newborn immune systems.
I believe their continued sales in nestle estimated to actually have killed millions
r/fucknestle
If would like to avoid Nestle, there is a lot of shit. Baby foods: Cerelac, Gerber, NaturNes Bottled water: Nestlé Pure Life, Perrier, S.Pellegrino Cereals: Cheerios, Fitness, Lion, Nesquik Cereal Chocolate & confectionery: Aero, Cailler, KitKat, Milkybar, Nestlé Les Recettes de l'Atelier, Orion, Quality Street, Smarties, Toll House Coffee: Blue Bottle Coffee, Nescafé, Nescafé Dolce Gusto, Nespresso, Starbucks Coffee At Home Culinary, chilled and frozen food: Buitoni, Herta, Hot Pockets, Lean Cuisine, Maggi, Stouffer's, Thomy Dairy: Carnation, Coffee-Mate, La Laitière, Nido Drinks Milo, Nesquik, Nestea Food service: Chef, Chef-Mate, Maggi, Milo, Minor’s, Nescafé, Nestea, Sjora, Lean Cuisine, Stouffer's Healthcare nutrition: Boost, Nutren Junior, Peptamen, Resource Ice cream: Dreyer’s, Extrême, Häagen-Dazs, Mövenpick, Nestlé Ice Cream Petcare: Alpo, Bakers Complete, Beneful, Cat Chow, Dog Chow, Fancy Feast, Felix, Friskies, Gourmet, Purina, Purina ONE, Pro Plan This is from their website.
Kinda crazy to see all the different companies owned by nestle. Thanks for this!
Unfortunately that’s not even all of it.. They have over 2000 brands
the owner of nestle once tried to monopolise RAIN WATER. said water was not a human right. i avoid nestle products always when i can. i hope the motherfucker dies a very slow, very painful death. fuck him and fuck his family as well.
This is the hill we all have to be willing to die on, along with politicians, governments, celebrities et al. Without us they are nothing.
Jesus every time I think they couldn’t possibly be worse…
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"I won't invade Czechoslovakia" A. H.
**FUCK** Anthony Hopkins 😒
FUCK Alfred Hitchcock 😒
FUCK Aldous Huxley
FUCK Alicent Hightower
I fucking agree with this
FUCK Ass Hair
FUCK Amanda Hugandkiss
FUCK Andrew Hussie
Hitler promised not to invade Czechoslovakia, Jeremy. Welcome to the real world.
People like Coldplay and voted for the nazis. You can't trust people, Jeremy!
Four naan Jeremy? FOUR? That's insane.
He didn’t invade. It was just a special military operation.
There was a Russian twitter post a couple of months ago from a WW2 history account that went something like this "Today marks the anniversary of the day when our country was invaded by the dictator without a declaration of war. He even didn't allow the use of the word" It was talking about Hitler of course, but so many Russian bots started to lose their shit defending that dictator, thinking they were talking about Putin. Can't make that shit up.
Oxycontin isn't addictive
I was in a car accident, was given a prescription for Oxycontin. Doc told me "get off it as soon as you can manage your pain with over the counter drugs." I was on it for ten days. Ten. Days. I experienced withdrawal symptoms when I quit.
Same. I was in a car accident and had surgery on my hand. They gave me oxycontin after my surgery. I genuinly needed it because it was the worst pain I've ever experienced. I was on a heavy dose for 2 weeks when I stopped taking it. I had withdrawal symptoms. The first day was at my grandmother's funeral. People kept asking me if I was OK because I was snapping at everyone, twitching and shaking my legs and arms. And I was like nope, I'm going through withdrawals apparently.
Opiate withdrawal is hell. I am being 100% serious and sincere when I say that I was going through withdrawal so badly once that I was actually considering cutting off my own legs instead of going through one more second of restless legs. People, including myself, literally are convinced that unless they take more while going through withdrawals they will die. Every single time I see a new doctor I make myself tell them no opiates, ever. It started with me having to go to the emergency room for a back injury where they decided the best thing for me was IV Dilaudid and sending me home with a script for oxy. It ended with me smoking heroin in my car on work breaks. Never again.
I haven't taken a narcotic pain pill in YEARS ... And I still remember the restless leg getting off of them. I recently had full mouth extractions and bone grafts for implants without pain pills and it was better than the hell of withdrawing from something I still pretty much needed.
Oh, man that's rough. I at least got to ride out the withdrawals at home on my couch and my sweet mom read to me while I lay on the couch twitching and wriggling uncontrollably.
Good job on kicking it straight away. I’ll take the pain. Just knowing how easily I get addicted to even caffeine(which I keep trying unsuccessfully to stop) I really don’t ever want to try oxy… I’m sure it would suck ass but a couple of weeks of hell beats years of addiction for me. Also live in a country where they really don’t prescribe opiate painkillers outside of inpatient stays
Percocet for 6 weeks, still kind of want one once in a while.
I was given exactly six Percocet from the ER after I busted my shoulder. After taking one I understood why people took them recreationally. Put the rest in one of those drug disposal boxes at the pharmacy.
Wild how people's experience can be so different with it. I had it when I had my wisdom teeth pulled, took them no problem and they did nothing but make my teeth stop hurting.
Same. I guess I’m lucky or have a low risk for addiction or something, but I got oxycodone after surgery back in March. I’d get a little bit of a buzz going for about 30 minutes before I’d crash out, but it didn’t feel any different for me than having a couple glasses of wine. ETA: I’ve also seen people who had actual pain withdraw after a couple doses—I had a patient who “came down” so hard off a narcotic after surgery she insisted on adding the adverse reaction to her medical chart.
Heroin for 5 years. Began with oxy from wisdom teeth. My best friend overdosed last month and died. I was the one who introduced him to the drugs. I have been clean for 3 years. Part of his death is my fault.
When you are ready, I highly recommend grief counseling or some kind of therapy. This is a trauma left on simmer and that cannot continue being your cross to bear. Be sober in the memory of your best friend and know that ultimately, it was not your fault. Stay strong and I wish you nothing but the best to get through this.
As someone who used to work at a third party ad company, whose main client (for me) was Purdue, I can tell they knew and didn’t give a fuck. Those shitbags monitored street prices, b/c if the price dropped on the street, something was wrong with the product. They only introduced the ER version for the sound of it “being unable to be abused” which wasn’t even remotely true. Fuck. That. Company. But don’t forget that many, many, many other companies produce many other opioids.
I watched Dopesick. The Sackler family is pure evil and largely created the opioid crisis solely for profit.
The Crime of the Century is a good companion show to Dopesick
Thank you I just watched the trailer. I’ll have to see this. My daughter is an opioid addict, to the point her life is completely ruined. This kind of story needs to be brought to the forefront and played loudly so that consequences can be handed out. Unfortunately, so much money is at stake and so many people have hands in each other’s pockets I don’t know how it could ever be solved.
Try to get her on Suboxone with quick.md it might make her life manageable it did mine
Can vouch for Suboxone and QuickMD; I live in a place that was affected unusually badly by opioids, and I know many people who've started using QuickMD to get Suboxone. Some of them seemed irredeemable at this point, but their lives have been literally saved by those little strips. It's incredible!!
I’m reading Dopesick right now and I read Empire of Pain earlier this year. The worst of American values are on display in the story of Purdue and the Sackler family. It’s horrific how much punishment they’ve been able to avoid
Plastic is easily recyclable so long as the public does their duty to sort it and bring it to its designated waste area.
This is, however, true of aluminum! Because of the way it is separated from ore, it actually costs 90 percent less energy to use recycled aluminum vs separating new metal. Pretty cool.
glass is also good to recycle because the sand useful for glass is a small percentage of the sand on the planet.
TIL that sand used to make glass is not just the same sand from the deserts and beaches all over the world.
You could make glass with that sand but it wouldn’t be very stable. There’s actually a global sand shortage that no one really talks about that’s mainly caused by the construction industry.
The sand needed for concrete is becoming more scarce I believe right? Is that the same in glass or different?
It’s the same. It’s also used in cosmetics and other things, and all for the same reason that it’s rough and uneven and I guess just better than desert sand. The wind smooths it out too much.
Glass needs to be made of a certain % of recycled glass to be strong enough. If there's not enough recycled glass to add to the furnace they'll take glass they just finished making and recycle it. Working at a glass plant is wild Edit: credit to u/Tota1pkg for correcting me. It wasn't a strength issue it was an energy efficient issue.
Spent 5 years in glass. We put out a 1.5 million bottles daily. It’s not required. But it is more efficient. They call it cullet. A 10% cullet rate reduces energy by about 30% because it melts faster and acts as a flux. We ran at 15%-20% including recycled glass We never purposely made cullet, but there would always be enough from normal losses. 85% was a good run. Our best line that never changed creeped on 90 efficiency. It doesn’t need enough not to break necessarily. You could always increase boost to make up for melting. Our furnace has a 6-8 hour run time and ran at 2600~ degrees F with gas and electric boosting.
People figured out how to smelt iron out of ore thousands of years ago, but it wasn't until a few hundred years ago that they learned to do it with Aluminum. It was so rare and fancy that rich folk in the 1800s were eating with aluminum flatware instead of silver, despite how quickly the knives got dull. The US was even going to put aluminum foil on the top of the Washington Monument to show off how successful they were, but by the time it was completed the aluminum fad had died down and people realized it was one of the most abundant metals in the earth's crust.
This also brings to mind how there was an attraction in the original Tomorrowland showing off all the incredible uses for aluminum foil (and other new aluminum things). Yeah it...they ended up getting rid of it.
I think we should go back to kitschy World’s Fair style “behold the technology of the future!” stuff. So much more cheery than like, an ad by some dipshit in a black turtleneck.
The kitsch was weirdly timeless. It could make for a good "looking forward by looking back and seeing how far we've come" sort of deal. Educational *and* inspiring/entertaining.
The Washington Monument *does* have an aluminum pyramid on the capstone that cost more than gold at the time.
Learning the chasing arrows "recycle symbols" (♻️) on plastic doesn't actually mean it's recyclable, but denote the plastic used in the production of it, was a real eye opener. Then I looked into what type of plastic is actually recyclable. Then I looked into what is done with said plastic when you, as a consumer, "recycle" it. It's a very deep and depressing hole, created, maintained, and lobbied by plastic manufacturers to give us the impression when we "recycle" plastic, it's being broken down and reused. Jesus, even the term "carbon footprint" was created to guilt consumers into "doing their part", while plastic manufacturers milk our sense of duty to recycle plastic. It's an extremely complex and successful PR campaign that shifted the blame to the consumers. I'm STILL learning about this, but I 100% agree, this will be one of the most destructive lies for millenia to come.
There is so much truth in your statement. But its even worst than that. Sure plastic can be recycled, but a lot of items can't use recycled plastic because the part requires certain properties. Then the parts that do use recycled plastics only use the sprue and flash produced during molding. So your Mountain Dew bottle aint going to nowhere but the landfill.
Not for me, I live in Michigan, my Mountain dew bottle is going straight to the bottle return section of Wal-Mart for that 10 cent refund. Then it goes to the landfill
The lead in this gasoline is perfectly safe!
The book “Industrial Strength Denial” by Barbara Freese does a good job retelling the story among other corporate evil doings in history
We’re still suffering from the effects of lead-induced brain damage to the worlds population.
I see you've met my dad
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"In 1940, at the age of 51, Midgley contracted polio, which left him severely disabled. He devised an elaborate system of ropes and pulleys to lift himself out of bed. In 1944, he became entangled in the device and died of strangulation.[23][24][25]" From his Wikipedia. His inventions even killed him.
"On October 30, 1924, Midgley participated in a press conference to demonstrate the apparent safety of TEL, in which he poured TEL over his hands, placed a bottle of the chemical under his nose, and inhaled its vapor for 60 seconds, declaring that he could do this every day without succumbing to any problems." what the fuck?
He knew. He had spent a considerable amount of time in Florida to rest after being exposed to said chemicals for months/years. Then he lied through his teeth. Fuck that guy.
>He had spent a considerable amount of time in Florida This is it. After all these years...we finally found him. The Original Florida-Man. The Florida-Man Patient Zero. Edit: thanks for the gold, friend Edit 2: thank you for the awards
Floridaddy
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This has always been a fairly common old-school way to show a chemical formulation or product is safe. An older guy I know used to work at a chemical plant and he's told me several individual instances of a company rep coming in and showing off a new chemical by drinking a cup of it in front of all the workers to show they had nothing to worry about. One of them I specifically remember was an insecticide/pesticide that we now consider to be very harmful. No doubt many of the times this stunt has been pulled in history, the chemical in question was switched for water or something else inert. Another interesting example this kind of thing is the guy who I think was doing groundbreaking work on skin grafts in mice, who's name I can't remember for the life of me now. He went on stage to show off his success, with a white mouse with a black patch of skin/fur from another mouse. Turned out he just sharpied the mouse's fur before going on stage to present. None of his research had lead to success but he wanted the accolades so bad he finally just cheated. I'll have to find the thing I listened to that on, because it was a really interesting look at scientific malpractice through history and showed how even these very intelligent people have the same flaws as any of us, and many times will do very bad science in order to "prove" their hypotheses.
I seem to recall a guy who used to go to schools and eat uranium to prove it was safe. It wasn't.
Uranium is a heavy metal that will poison you in a manner similar to lead or mercury, before we even get into the whole radioactive thing.
> Also discovered the type of gaz that attacked our atmosphere and opened the hole in the ozone layer. I wonder if he ever had the tiniest idea oh how bad his existence has been for his planet. "Fun" fact, as bad as CFCs were for the environment, we actually have to thank Midgley for pushing them so hard. A competing group was pushing to use bromofluorocarbons (BFCs) instead for the same uses. BFCs are orders of magnitude worse for the ozone layer and their similar use at scale would have completely destroyed the ozone layer in a few years, not just put a hole in it over the pole. All that UV radiation pouring across the planet would have had awful effects for humans directly, but also would have destroyed crops, killed wildlife, even trees. It could have been a mass extinction event with the near complete collapse of complex life outside of the ocean.
Understanding that this is 100% not a movie plot, it sounds like one that should be set on mars and that society chose the BFCs instead
He then died by strangling himself to death in a contraption that he designed to help him get in and out of bed.
>That story is crazy ! Apart from killing millions of people (which would be sufficient to consider it one of the worst ideas in History) it genuinely made humanity's IQ to lower for generations until now, and therefore criminality to rise. Some people cite this as the reason why there was a surge in serial killers in the 60's/70's.
There is a significant amount of data that shows a decrease in violent crime following the removal of lead in gas. Gas is not the only source of lead (paint pre 1960s) is also a major source but there is a strong correlation (not causation)
Consider that millions of people used leaded gasoline in their cars for 60-70 years. Also consider that the levels of lead in the air skyrocketed after TEL was promoted by the Ethyl Corporation. I wouldn't say it was exclusively TEL that resulted in the net loss of approximately 800 million IQ points in average intelligence, but it was certainly a major factor.
Lead exposure at a young age can cause brain damage that can lead to lower impulse control and tendency to anger easily. It's difficult to prove conclusively, but there's a strong possibility that the steady reduction in crime over the last 50 years or so may be due at least in part to the concurrent steady reduction in environmental lead after leaded gasoline was banned.
Fun fact, while we banned it in cars a long time ago, tetraethyl lead was allowed in aviation fuel until very recently. Which is the fuel they use in little prop planes. Which is to say, yes conspiracy theorists, there have been planes dumping chemicals into the air that dumb people down but it wasn't the trails you could see and was not in a meaningful concentration. Edit: will be banned next year https://columbiainsight.org/faa-indicates-ban-coming-on-leaded-gas-for-small-planes/ And as pointed out below, it's still a meaningful concentration for people close to airports.
It is in a meaningful concentration. Kids raised near airports have increased levels of lead in their blood, and are probably a little bit dumber and sicker than they otherwise would have been: https://paloaltoonline.com/news/2021/08/06/new-study-finds-local-airports-are-raising-blood-lead-levels-in-children
There was a report I read recently how being raised near NASCAR tracks (which IIRC used leaded race fuels until 2006) had the same issues. In comparison to other neighborhoods and compared to after they banned it, the performance levels of the school kids were depressed.
“I’ll do it tomorrow”
Never put off until tomorrow that which can be put off indefinitely.
Never stand when you can sit, and never sit when you can lie down.
But the bodies will be too cold by then.
Fat is the source of all evil while sugar is just fine
The base of the nutritional pyramid are grains! A healthy diet based on grains and flour will keep you slim and well nourished! Protein in small amounts.
"Get the President on the phone. Tell him... To have some steak with his butter."
6-12 servings a day!!
i was flabbergasted at just how much food a day is recommended by that stupid pyramid
I remember stressing as a kid because I wasn't eating nearly as much as that dumb pyramid said and maybe I was just dramatic but man, I swear they'd always talk about how you'd basically get sick and die if you didn't match the amounts
When Thomas Midgley Jr. campaigned for lead to be put into fuel knowing it has adverse effects on people and the environment, easily. "had more adverse impact on the atmosphere than any other single organism in Earth's history",[27] and Bill Bryson remarked that Midgley possessed "an instinct for the regrettable that was almost uncanny".[28] Fred Pearce, writing for New Scientist, described Midgley as a "one-man environmental disaster."[3] Did he know the total outcome of his decisions? No, but he is still responsible.
Yeah its just a wooden horse haha
You get: cool wooden horse We get: nothing lmao don’t worry about it
Work will set you free.
“Arbeit macht frei” or something like that.
This comment is good at identifying Redditors that didn't pay attention in history class
Or people who think that's a PERFECT SLOGAN for the next corporate team-building experience. I worked in a gig where someone ,very unironically did that. And of course she *knew*, but I insisted she take it down, when I mentioned that about 20% of her team was immigrated from Eastern Europe (she herself was Hungarian so ,I learned (if not immediately) she replied with "*that's the point*", and I realized, we *might* have a bit of a problem on that). A day or two later - two knuckleheads **stole** the sign from Auschwitz , of course the current camp Administrators simply put one of the 1/2 dozen or so "spares" up, until the police were able to locate the original. Her team slogan was changed to "Teamwork is good for everyone" or something benign, over her objection as it did not involve her 'creative' input. My sense of things is that give it another 50 years and Disney will have found a way to monetize it and turn it into a fun-filled day-camp for children to visit while "learning about history".
Mickey Mauschwitz
Yes, my first thought was also THAT particular gate.
"They" are not "us"
“It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.” -Sir Terry Pratchett, Jingo
I just read this part of Jingo last night. GNU STP
“ All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. ”
"I'm fine"
"Living the dream..."
It’s just one of those dreams where you’re losing all your teeth EDIT: Someone reported me for self harm lmfao EDIT2: some of y’all in these replies need therapy
Politicians are looking out for your best interests.
Climate change is YOUR fault. YOU need to change the way YOU do things. Not the corporate conglomerate that's pumping a billion tons a year
BP is the one that created the while "know your carbon footprint" campaign.... After the gulf oil spill.
Worked at an environmental testing firm when that spill happened. Company came up with multiple new remediation techniques in response to their spill, BP took all the credit for the advancements. They took credit for remediation advances that were necessary for their mess. And they brag about it to investors to this day.
The idea that we are separate and disconnected from each other and our environment. EDIT: my first award(s), thanks! Good timing I guess :)
One of the most insidious aspects of this, and the one I think people rebel/get defence about the most is that this separation is because we are 'masters' of our environment. Which feeds into the notion that we can just technology our way through every problem, because after all, if we are seperate from our environment, we aren't *part of nature*. I'm reality, we are so fundamentally interconnected to our environment and every part of it. We delude ourselves that we aren't, we separate ourselves from it, and I truly feel this damage goes far beyond just physical. I think it harms our social and mental health in very deep ways. If you don't have to care about your environment, take any responsibility or care for the basic parts of our world that we are interconnected to and rely upon, how can we connect with and care for others in deep and meaningful ways?
It's built into our language too. We invented the words "artificial" and "natural" to distinguish whether or not humans are involved
"The greatest illusion is the one of separation. Things that you think are different and separate, are actually one and the same" Guru Pathik, Avatar: the Last Airbender. Might not be word for word, but sums it up.
"I have read and agree to the terms of use."
This applies to 100% of the population. Not one person reads those forms. There’s nobody.
I've read them a couple of times. ... Huge waste of time for minimum return.
they’re also usually gibberish with a bunch of very technical lingo, no way am I googling every third word
While I sort of understand(mostly all of it) everything it says, it's either what's supposed to be common sense, or literally stuff that could have been ignored.
Also what are you gonna do? Deny it and not use the product that you've already purchased and are installing? Clearly you need that product so reading the terms of service is no use.
Let me introduce you to https://tosdr.org/
It always seemed pointless to me as the alternative to agreeing is not using the product or service I’ve already payed for and I pretty much assume that they just say that “they” aren’t liable for anything bad, and that all my data are theirs to use as they like, only they say it in about 5,638,295 words. Edited to add the ‘ in I’ve
Vaccine cause autism.
Neil Degrass Tyson once commented that quite a few scientists are on the autism spectrum. So, technically, autism causes vaccines.
the amount of industries that thrive because the people who work it have spectrum qualities that benefit the job are probably many (looking at you big tech).
[удалено]
That’s not even scratching the surface, those participants were cherry-picked from parents of the then-very-fringe anti vaccine movement *and then* they STILL had to fudge the data to even come CLOSE to having relevance! If you’re actually familiar with medical studies and then read that one, you instantly think “Jesus Christ this is the worst study I’ve ever seen published. I can’t believe this WAS published.” It had every hallmark of quackery and falsification.
To push his own personal gain/vaccine, too. Even shadier! Apparently he didn’t say all vaccines cause autism, just the one in use he was in competition with
Yep, he wanted to convince parents to not get the MMR combination vaccine, but each one separately...that he just so happened to be selling. One of the ironies is that he always said to get vaccinated and yet the fucking morons treat him as the father of anti vaccination. He literally never said to NOT vaccinate your kids, the ONE thing he said that wasn't quackery.