Gaythia Weis @Gaythia@qoto.org

Union of Concerned Scientists: The Hidden Costs of #IndustrialAgriculture

Published Jul 11, 2008 Updated Aug 24, 2008

Industrial farming is bad for the health of workers, eaters, and downstream neighbors. Here are some of its costly health impacts:

• #Pesticide toxicity. #Herbicides and insecticides commonly used in agriculture have been associated with both acute poisoning and long-term chronic illness.

• Water #pollution from #fertilizer runoff contaminates downstream drinking water supplies, requiring costly cleanup measures with an annual price tag of nearly $2 billion.

• Loss of mid-sized farms. Once the backbone of US agriculture, medium-sized farms are a dwindling breed, which means that fewer and fewer people make their living as farmers—a trend that has been bad for the economies of rural communities and farm states.

• Harm to neighboring and downstream economies. Industrial agriculture can pack an economic wallop hundreds of miles from its origin—just ask local governments and utility managers who must install expensive equipment to remove fertilizer by-products from public drinking water supplies. Or ask people who make their living from fisheries or tourism on the Gulf of Mexico and elsewhere, where "dead zones" and toxic #algae blooms caused by farm runoff do damage with an annual price tag in the billions. CAFOs, too, create pollution problems that reduce livability and depress property values in surrounding communities.

#ClimateCrisis #Pollutants #Pesticides #ClimateChange #RedTide #Sargassum #BigAg #Runoff #WaterIsLife #Biodiversity #RedTide #Sargassum #DeadZones

Read more: https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/hidden-costs-industrial-agriculture

Republicans will force a 10-year-old to carry her rapist’s baby to term, let a 6-year-old carry a gun, permit a 12-year-old to work an 8-hour shift in a meat packing plant and allow a grown man to marry a 14-year-old with a Judge’s consent, all while telling us that the reason they’re banning drag queens, gender-affirming care and books about Rosa Parks is that they want to "protect our kids."

A Utah parent says the Bible contains porn and should be removed from school libraries. Here’s their full challenge. The parent writes that the book should be considered indecent under Utah’s new book banning law, after seeing the other titles that have been pulled.

“Incest, onanism, bestiality, prostitution, genital mutilation, fellatio, dildos, rape, and even infanticide,” the parent wrote in their request, listing topics they found concerning in the religious text. “You’ll no doubt find that the Bible, under Utah Code Ann. § 76-10-1227, has ‘no serious values for minors’ because it’s pornographic by our new definition.” https://www.sltrib.com/news/education/2023/03/22/utah-parent-says-bible-contains/

Thank you, Senator Cavanaugh.

More people need to stand up against these harmful, hateful laws being proposed against trans people, gay people, women, drag queens, minorities, and other marginalized groups that Republicans are demonizing just to win votes from Evangelical Christians who wouldn't know morals or ethics if they hit them over the head with 100 pound marble tablets or a statue of David.

Machaela Cavanaugh to Keep Filibustering Over Trans Rights in Nebraska-
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/machaela-cavanaugh-filibustering-trans-rights-nebraska-1234701504/

To kick off a congressional hearing on anti-wildlife bills on Thursday, Rep. Lauren Boebert waved around photos of dead babies before launching into an argument for expansive wolf killing.

That's just weird.

That her bill is named the "Trust the Science Act" is even weirder.

→ https://theintercept.com/2023/03/24/endangered-species-lauren-boebert-wolves-grizzly-bear/

Today’s Republican Party, while claiming to stand for limited government, stands for government intrusion everywhere. They are:

-Outlawing abortions.

-Prohibiting teachers from teaching about America’s racist past.

-Making it harder to vote.

This is not limited government.

An urgent alarm from me today in @Slate. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/03/republicans-mitch-mcconnell-1980s-breaking-democracy.html

I have a new favorite fly. I thought it was a little mirid bug when I first saw it in the field, but no.

This is Stictomyia longicornis, a tiny picture-winged fly whose larvae feed on damaged cactus tissue.

Photographed at Seminole Canyon, Texas.

#Diptera #Ulidiidae #Insects #Photography

This should be headline news:

The main opposition leader in the world's biggest democracy has been sentenced to years in prison for criticizing the authoritarian dear leader

#India #RahulGandhi #UndeclaredEmergency

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-65048602

The former guy is holding a rally tonight in Waco, Texas. It coincides with the 30 year anniversary of the fed raid and battle there with armed radicals.

That’s not a dogwhistle to anti-government extremists. That’s a call to arms.

Idaho Republicans Take Brave Stand Against 'Woke' Tampons In Schools https://www.wonkette.com/idaho-republicans-take-brave-stand-against-woke-tampons-in-schools

#Period_poverty #Menstrual_poverty #Menstrual_products #Tampons #Menstrual_stigma #Menstruation

The American Library Association has released new data about book bans in the United States. The numbers shattered last year's records.

This page has a lot more explanation of what's happening, more images to share, and ways you can get involved.

https://uniteagainstbookbans.org/2022-book-bans/

h/t @elaterite

#BookBans #Books #Libraries #FreeSpeech #Literacy #History #Histodon

Florida teacher: Rosa Parks was ordered to sit in the back of the bus.

Student: Why?

Teacher: We're not allowed to tell you. But that act of defiance led to a movement for equal rights.

Student: Rights for whom?

Teacher: We're not allowed to tell you.

#RosaParks #Florida #DeSantis #TrueHistory #history #Education
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A publisher removed references to Rosa Parks' race in a draft of its textbook to comply with Florida's laws, NYT reports
https://www.businessinsider.com/florida-textbook-removed-rosa-parks-race-comply-state-desantis-rules-2023-3

NEW: How Cigna Saves Millions by Having Its Doctors Reject Claims Without Reading Them

Internal documents and former company executives reveal how Cigna doctors reject patients’ claims without opening their files. “We literally click and submit,” one former company doctor said.

https://www.propublica.org/article/cigna-pxdx-medical-health-insurance-rejection-claims @ProPublica

An op-ed by our Policy Director and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER):

"These loopholes are being exploited by the energy industry and local BLM managers to the detriment of the sage grouse and the fragile sagebrush habitat they depend on."

#BureauofLandManagement #sagegrouse #sagebrush #Advocacy

https://www.wyomingnews.com/opinion/guest_column/rosenthal-and-osher-groups-sound-alarm-over-hidden-threat-to-sage-grouse-in-wyoming/article_030337e4-c8e9-11ed-8d09-4b4866a063e0.html

Photo: Tom Koerner/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Meanwhile, California’s stormy winter season has hampered the recovery of the western monarchs, which nearly went extinct a couple years ago.

https://www.kpbs.org/news/environment/2023/03/17/californias-punishing-winter-storms-pummel-monarch-butterfly-population

The eastern monarch butterfly population is still declining. The new numbers from the 22-23 overwintering site are in.

#MonarchButterflies #Butterflies #Conservation #Insects

https://monarchwatch.org/blog/

@pluralistic

Mass tech worker layoffs and the soft landing (21 Mar 2023)

The capital classes are ready for the final rug-pull, where all the value is transfered FROM people who #make things for a living TO people who #own things for a living.

"Activist investors" have triggered massive waves of tech layoffs, #firing so many #tech #workers so quickly that it's hard to even come up with an accurate count. The total is somewhere around 280,000 workers:

https://layoffs.fyi/

These layoffs have nothing to do with "trimming the fat" or correcting the hiring excesses of the lockdown. They're a project to #transfer #value FROM workers, customers and users TO shareholders.

– Cory Doctorow

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/21/tech-workers/