What are the limits of a pet’s loyalty? Can a pet ever display unrequited love? You may have heard of Hachiko, a long fabled dog from Akita Prefecture who visited a train station to wait on his owner who would never return every day for the rest of his life. Today, in Phuket, Thailand, the tale of a dog mysteriously left by the roadside has spread across the country and to the rest of the world.
The dog seems to have been abandoned, and yet it waits, everyday, out in the road, for his owner to come back. Why was he abandoned? Did his owner, like Hachiko, also die without him knowing? Or is this a callous owner who does not deserve this show of love?
Strangers have offered him umbrellas, food, and some have even tried to collect him, but he continues to wait on the edge of the road, for his beloved owner that may never come?
It makes a romantic image, but we hope, if he cannot be reunited, that this dog can be rescued by Thailand’s animal services, so that they can place him in a proper home with a new family to love him.
In this lead up to the second anniversary of the Schitt’s Creek finale, I’m revisiting some of my favorite articles:
“This is one key to Schitt’s Creek’s abiding appeal — the opportunity to watch characters we’ve come to know staying true to who they are even as we can see them evolving. The Roses didn’t fundamentally change, but they grew – they added layers of humanity, sincerity and vulnerability, even as the series allowed them to hold on to a sense of self-awareness that kept things from getting too sticky-sweet.”
I dislike the use of ‘political’ in such a context; it seems to me false. It seems clear to me that Frodo’s duty was 'humane’ not political. He naturally thought first of the Shire, since his roots were there, but the quest had as its object not the preserving of this or that polity, such as the half republic half aristocracy of the Shire, but the liberation from an evil tyranny of all the 'humane’*–including those, such as 'easterlings’ and Haradrim, that were still servants of the tyranny.
Denethorwas tainted with mere politics: hence his failure, and his mistrust of Faramir. It had become for him a prime motive to preserve the polity of Gondor, as it was, against another potentate, who had made himself stronger and was to be feared and opposed for that reason rather than because he was ruthless and wicked. Denethor despised lesser men, and one may be sure did not distinguish between orcs and the allies of Mordor. If he had survived as victor, even without use of the Ring, he would have taken a long stride towards becoming himself a tyrant, and the terms and treatment he accorded to the deluded peoples of east and south would have been cruel and vengeful. He had become a 'political’ leader: sc. Gondor against the rest.
But that was not the policy or duty set out by the Council of Elrond. Only after hearing the debate and realizing the nature of the quest did Frodo accept the burden of his mission. Indeed the Elves destroyed their own polity in pursuit of a 'humane’ duty. This did not happen merely as an unfortunate damage of War; it was known by them to be an inevitable result of victory, which could in no way be advantageous to Elves. Elrond cannot be said to have a political duty or purpose.
* humane: this (being in a fairy-story) includes of course Elves, and indeed all 'speaking creatures’.
–J.R.R Tolkien, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, #183
As Taliban fighters took Kabul on Sunday evening, roaming through the halls of the abandoned presidential palace, the group issued a statement: It would soon revive Afghanistan’s former name.
The country that was built in the wake of the 2001 U.S. invasion at a cost of over $2 trillion would revert to the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.” (That’s the name the country bore between 1996 and 2001).
The Taliban, which means “students” in the Pashto language, have been waging an insurgency against the Western-backed government in Kabul since they were ousted from power in 2001.
The group was formed by “mujahideen” fighters who fought Soviet forces in the 1980s with the backing of the CIA.
Emerging in 1994 as one of several factions fighting a civil war, the Taliban gained control of much of the country by 1996 and imposed its own strict version of Sharia, or Islamic law.
Men were forced to grow beards. Women were forced to wear burqas, flowing garments that cover the entire face and body. Schools for girls were shuttered. Women who were unaccompanied in public places could be beaten. Soccer was banned. So was music, aside from religious chants. The Taliban government held public executions in Kabul’s Ghazi Stadium.
There were photos of children dying of preventable illnesses in a dilapidated pediatric hospital. Images of the ancient Buddhist statues pulverized by the Taliban because its leaders considered the stone images to be idolatrous. The sea of refugees and displaced people living in makeshift tents across the region.
The group is infamous for its use of suicide bombers and has been accused of assassinating top Afghan officials and holding kidnapped Western citizens for ransom.
Only four countries recognised the Taliban when it was last in power: neighbouring Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Turkemnistan.
After sheltering Osama bin Laden and key al Qaeda figures in the wake of the 11 September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, the Taliban would fall after a US-led military coalition launched an offensive on 7 October 2001.
Despite being ousted from power, the Taliban would continue a guerrilla war against the Western-backed governments and US-led forces in the country.
Around 150,000 British military personnel have served in Afghanistan over the past 20 years, and 457 have been killed.
Also, 2,448 American service members have died in the conflict.
The Taliban entered into talks with the US in 2018 and struck a ‘peace’ deal in February 2020 which committed the US to withdraw its troops while preventing the Taliban from attacking US forces.
However, the Taliban have continued to kill Afghan security forces and civilians…
If there is 1 image that symbolized the brutality of the Taliban regime in 90s, it was that of a woman in a blue burqa being executed in public in KBL’s stadium.
An Afghan judge hits a woman with a whip in front of a crowd in Ghor province, Afghanistan August 31, 2015. REUTERS/Pajhwok News Agency.
tiktok sea shanty (cant find it on YouTube but it’s one of my favorite videos it’s a tumblr post)
do you not feel filled with love?
these are some of the videos I found nd loved
hope they make you smile!
If you know the songs in these, or any of the others in the notes, I whole heartedly encourage you to sing along to them while they play. Singing along to a song is always fun, but there’s something completely and wildly different about singing alongside one person and singing alongside a hundred, or a thousand or more. Something very human, very good.
I really like this photo. The reason is because it depicts how human civilization came to be. Think about it, America, England, Rome, Persia, the Aztecs etc all because strong because they enslaved people, made them suffer and caused pain and built their life off others suffering. This shows somewhat how human nature is..
What if oxygen is poisonous and it just takes 75-100 years to kill us?
My science teacher said he thinks that’s true actually
Yeah this is actually pretty much exactly what is going on. It’s why anti-oxidants are such a big deal. Bonus fact: oxygen oxidizes stuff in your cells or, in other words, it’s not toxic, just setting you on fire
very very slowly.
What if there are aliens out there but they subsist on entirely different substances and they’re just scared as shit of us and our crazy ass hell planet? Once in a while some alien anthropologist type suggests checking out the people on this inhabited planet out towards the galaxy’s edge. The other aliens just look at the naive academic with horror. No!! We do not go to that world. That is where the DEATH BREATHERS live. They recreationally consume poisons and are more or less composed of biological fire. Their atmosphere is made of rocket fuel. We must leave the DEATH BREATHERS in peace. Do not go there. Do not.
Can AI expand a human mind? IBM Research is developing Project Debater, an AI technology that is capable of engaging in long-form discussion and providing impartial arguments on various topics that have no right or wrong answers. It can even rebut an opponent’s point of view. The goal? To help people make evidence-based decisions when the answers aren’t clear. Debate is a cornerstone of learning in our society; in a world full of echo chambers and filter bubbles, a technology that is designed to help people understand each other is an investment in a better future.
I love how humans have literally not changed throughout history like the graffiti from Pompeii has people from hundreds of years ago writing stuff like “Marcus is gay” “I fucked a girl here” “Julius your mum wishes she was with me” and leonardo da vinci’s assistants drew dicks in their notebooks just for the banter and mozart created a piece called “kiss my ass” so when people wish for ‘today’s generation’ to be like ‘how people used to’ then we’re already there buddy we’ve always been
The Hagia Sophia has inscriptions that were considered sacred for centuries until they were deciphered in the 70s to be Nordic runes saying “Halfdan wrote this”
my old english prof told us that theres a cave in Scandinavia where a viking gratified some runes like 14 feet up on the wall and when they finally reached it all it translated into was “this is very high”
Ancient Shitposting
Now on the History Channel
‘People have literally just always been people’ is genuinely my favorite fact about the world
“Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book.” - Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106 BC - 43 BC
I say things like “I’m not interested in sports” I really have to give a caveat to explain I really mean “sportsball”, those mass media team sporting events that lead to white privilege riots and fill the pockets of millionaires and billionaires. Because this? This is incredible, just the athleticism, what bodies can do, female, male, young or adult, differently abled…just awesome.
Does anyone just have those irrational conversations that people drag you into because they think their opinion is an absolute solid fact that’s indisputable but in fact they are fucking idiots? I got drug into a conversation about “gays going to hell” at a bloody maccys. Like no sir we aren’t going to hell a clean 50% of us dug our way up from hell just to get some bloody hot fries and to shitpost the other 50% are absolute angels sent from god to keep the shitposters in line. Bloody hell I can assure you you’ll end up their before any of us do so good day sir and piss off.
