I could if I happened to know that someone was exempt, but usually I just ask about 4 times if they're comfortable with it and if they want to practice beforehand
She/her. Science, politics, cats, Judaism.
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I could if I happened to know that someone was exempt, but usually I just ask about 4 times if they're comfortable with it and if they want to practice beforehand
The Jewish population of Texas is around 220,000. In our religion, we do not say ‘The Lord’s Prayer.’
I found out I'm going to have to clock out early today to take care of something and that has had the annoying consequence of making it impossible to concentrate.
Especially when the clergy spot you on the way up
Yeah being able to separate your arms enough for that is hard!
That's very cool! If you're ever in Tucson I have an extra-large scroll he could try 😆
Sorry!
It's definitely a skill, especially to show three columns! I've done it a couple of times mostly to prove to myself I can and I'm nervous every time!
And every year I watch this hagbah through my fingers, it stresses me out so much!
We read from it YK afternoon specifically because that's Leviticus and that makes it balanced. I can do hagbah with a regular scroll as long as most of the weight is on the right hand (rotator cuff injury), but I only know of one woman who's done it with the big scroll.
Most of our torahs are a size where basically any able-bodied man can do it (yes, this honor does skew to the male-bodied because of the upper body strength thing, though plenty of female-bodied folks can do it, too), but for this particular scroll - it's not just very heavy, it's tall.
So someone just got added to the potential volunteers list and I am literally texting someone going "Is that the tall guy I sat next to at [event]?" and it's specifically *not* because I want to date him (and not just because his wife is lovely) 😂
It’s a huge bummer that “Empath” basically got highjacked to mean “person who absolutely will find a way to make it about themselves” instead of what it is: a maladaptive coping mechanism by which a person manages another’s mood and needs by fixating on minute cues in order to protect themselves
I am *incredibly* picky about this particular honor because 1) it's my favorite torah scroll 2) It's Yom Kippur afternoon so folks are shaky and 3) I have, in fact, seen someone almost drop it once.
Coordinating all the lay honors for high holy days is one of those things that is quietly hilarious if you think about it too hard - like one honor has the qualification "must be a strapping young person" because it's hagbah with a 40 pound Torah, this is a thing I have to figure out every year. 🙃
The fact that he's talking about Baltimore when Baltimore *very famously* lowered their crime rate significantly under the current mayor...tells you everything you need to know. He's gonna come after Minneapolis when we elect a new mayor, folks.
My city has a Hispanic mayor, I assume he'll get to us once he gets through the Black mayors.
The thing that often blows by is not only is crime the lowest its been for any non-senior citizen's life, it has been roughly that safe for *fifteen years*. We have had fifteen years of steady, low crime while the irrational freakout over crime has relentlessly grown to a fevered, disordered pitch.
Partially this is a result of weaponizing “centrist” (and formerly “neoliberal”) to mean “person I currently mad at” without any regard to who people are or what they support
Donald Trump bragged that he took Space Force command away from Colorado because they have mail-in voting and "joked” that he gave it to Hunstville because he won Alabama. Then three people (and counting) got up to do cleanup and insist it wasn’t political.
Science friends! If you could go back in time and tell your first year self one piece of advice about doing STEM at the graduate level, what would it be?
No
is crime actually up or are you just seeing more of the kind of people you think don't belong in your spaces and you just assume it means crime is up
If the US Postal Inspector service was being sent to Chicago it would not be fucking national news. Soldiers are not cops. If you need a reminder of why go watch Battlestar Galactica again, it's a fucking meme.
It's not "federal law enforcement", it's the fucking National Guard. He's not sending in the US Marshals and the FBI.
I've been at work for less than 3 hours and I am already done with this week.
It helps to remember that the word “antisemitism” was coined by German race scientists in the 1800s because they needed a scientific-sounding term to replace Judenhass, literally “Jew hate.” The term was coined by people who hated us to make their hatred look objective. It’s always been their word.
I worry about saying this because I really don’t want people to tune out when Jews talk about antisemitism. It’s real, it matters, and it’s the canary in the coal mine. That’s why the right is trying to weaponize it and/or make it meaningless. Don’t stop caring. Just consider the source.
I keep saying it because it matters: the people talking the loudest about “antisemitism” right now hate Jews. I know it’s confusing. Being Jewish is often confusing.
Which one is it so I can tell folks to yell about it? I'm apparently not on the correct email list
FYI folks, the Big Holidays coming up are: Rosh Hashanah is Mon 22 Sep-24 Sep Yom Kippur is Wed 1 Oct - 2 Oct And also? You don't have to KNOW who's Jewish to not schedule meetings these days. Just do it. (AND DON'T BE ALL "WE HAVE TO MOVE IT BECAUSE [PERSON] IS JEWISH" THAT'S TACKY & GROSS)
About every 10 years the local shuls have to organize because one of the public school districts is pulling shit like disqualifying our kids from sports because they don't come to practice on Yom Kippur. This isn't about Trump, it's about the US being a Christian hegemony, and therefore antisemitic.
😹
So many people are making this about the current administration, and they're just telling on themselves anyone who has ever had regular conversations with a Jewish American would know this happens every year, in every sector, under every administration.
See also: Gen Con, school year start dates, etc. It’s not like you have to take all the Jewish holidays into consideration when scheduling, just Pesach and Rosh Hashanah/Yom Kippur, which if you can remember to check the date for Easter, you can do for major Jewish holidays as well.
I need ppl to understand that this not a “Trump” or “Republican” thing. well-meaning con organizers asked me to do Shabbat candle-lighting at midnight instead of sundown. major conventions have been scheduled over Passover. I ask for my major holidays off every year when Christmas is a bank holiday
It wasn't consistent here, but even places that used to mask before the pandemic started frequently stopped masking after.
I went to my new dentist today and the entire clinical staff masks. Not all the office workers do, but everyone in the back does. No commentary, they just do. Almost like it's bullshit to claim it's impossible for health care professionals to mask at work.
Luddism about pharmaceutical research and development is not a good look on anyone, including progressives.
a thing I’ve been thinking about lately is the public’s simultaneous willingness to be very upset about RFK’s COVID vaccine agenda coupled with the public’s general unwillingness to mask. I’m one of 4 masks I can see on this crowded train platform and we’re mid-spike in Brooklyn
I wish there were children's and YA books about abled kids who are not weird about or embarrassed by their disabled siblings. Most books with a disabled sibling character start off this way and that's not representative of my family's experiences, nor is it something I want my kids to read
It's the mentality that only the US or the UK (if you're Iraj Pezeshkzad's uncle) can do ill. They're the only ones with agency. It denies complex origins and evolution to human ideas.
White Christian senior scientists: *you* need to be complaining to NASA about this.
If you schedule something that requires people to travel for the day before a major holiday, you are requiring them to miss that holiday. No one would think it was reasonable to have a workshop until 5 pm on December 24 because it wasn't *actually* a holiday.
Eid and Diwali, along with the major Jewish holidays, are just on the calendar. Ignoring them is an active choice.
I didn't end up going so I didn't end up partaking, but the very fact that someone was having to do that is ridiculous.
Of course they did. Again. The mission I was working on once had a major workshop the day before Yom Kippur and a Jewish member of the team at the institution that was host was frantically emailing the other Jewish members of the team offering to arrange local shul tickets for them.
And no, boosting a Nazi to say that the Jews aren't going to turn off the entire internet like 4chan thinks, they're just going to censor it, is not in fact incisive commentary in any scenario, and if you think it is, you're already cooked and need to get off the internet for your own good.
Taylor Lorenz is getting defended for boosting a Nazi by an awful lot of covid conscious accounts, so yeah, looks like she's become the entry point for introducing that crowd into the fash pipeline.
Based on my experience in NJ politics, non-voter voices aren’t pandered to. Holding your vote hostage just isn’t an effective means of doing politics. Especially since those people are seen as individuals rather than an organized bloc.
I'm extremely tired of the "schools were closed!" The physical building, yeah, but people were still working and trying to teach your kids. You just had to deal with it more directly for like, two months.
Got into a groove with cleaning, so the catboxes are clean, the hallway is vacuumed, and the kitchen is pretty clean pending the dishwasher finishing. Gonna do a bit of HHD stuff and then shower and relax.
I now have 2759 emails.
I think I would love Vintage Story but I would also absolutely not sleep for a week if I bought it.
Having watched an hour of a live stream it is now email time for a while!
Today I am planning to rotate between 4 activities: 1) Fun (Videos, games, xstitiching) 2) Personal email (I have 2816 emails) 3) House cleaning/chores (Priorities: kitchen, catboxes, vacuuming) 4) HHD work (I coordinate the services at my shul)
Aww, good scamperbeasts!
I sent the email I needed to send, I get to get off the internet now!
It's real bad that major news outlets have decided to report on Trump as if he's the king of america
It comes up occasionally, but it is fairly rare to encounter in the mainstream (4chan, on the other hand...)
My reply (fairly) got flagged by an auto-labeler for the slur, so you might not have gotten notified about it.
Yes, you see Claire, if you're talking about how Israel is secretly censoring the media, that's definitely not antisemitic, even if you're doing it by posting a 4chan screenshot about how kikes are controlling the media with "kike" blacked out.
So much of this today.
Sometimes things really are simple. Using that slur to talk about Jews is Jew hate. No if, ands, or buts.
I'm glad I missed most of the discussion about this but yes, if you are even indirectly using the word "kike", you are doing antisemitism, there is nothing complicated or nuanced to talk about.
Guardian getting better at headlines: Trump says he plans unconstitutional executive order to mandate ID for voters.” Makes clear it’s a plan, it’s an EO, & it’s unconstitutional.
A lot of people on the right are manipulating concerns about misogyny and sexism to push extreme violence against the trans community. This does not mean misogyny and sexism are not very real problems. This is a post about antisemitism.
Plenty of people also just say hateful shit directly to me on this website. I block them. End of their effect on my life.
I'm a Jewish, disabled woman who criticizes the Israeli government and supports Palestinian rights and talks about COVID a lot. I'm sure I'm on a lot of inaccurate or just plain hateful lists. That is not, actually, a problem I need to solve.
Hopefully actual friends would notice that you've disappeared from their skyline and come looking, if they find you're blocked by one of their lists and they take the word of the list maker without even checking in with you, they aren't your friends.
The people who I've actually developed relationships with over the years will hopefully let me know if I've done something to damage that relationship, and will hopefully notice if I disappear from their skyline because I'm on a list they use. But people are entitled to cultivate their Bluesky.
People are entitled to their own experience on Bluesky, and if they would prefer that experience not include me then that's their prerogative. Go ahead and put me on lists, random people, I do not care.
General reminder that you don't have to look at your own ClearSky and if it's going to have negative effects on you then you absolutely shouldn't.
I just never look at what lists other people put me on, problem solved.
At its best, public health is noble work that strives to improve the wellbeing of everyone, while deeply respecting the individual dignity & worth of all people PH must not be a field that demands the needless deaths of its practitioners. CDC employees deserve to not be killed at work.
I really hope that person is very young because they are just *painfully* ignorant and confident in it.
Whatever that baby did I am sure they're sorry now
I would once again like to point out that collective punishment is explicitly a war crime.
You need more animals in your life
News media needs to stop treating Donald Trump's social medial posts as if they were government orders. Everyone needs to stop attributing to Trump powers he does not possess. And Congress needs to do its job and #ImpeachTrump.
Why do I blame Bill Cassidy for the destruction of the CDC and the NIH? Because he is a physician. He knew or should have known the danger that Kennedy poses to the U.S. and the globe. Kennedy has never hidden what he is—a predator, a fraud, an anti-science hack, and a gargantuan narcissist.
This quilt was hand pieced and stitched and I voted for it Best Quilt
"Nazis, but leftishly" is my least favorite phenomenon of 2025.
Y’all know this but “Antizionism isn’t antisemitism” doesn’t mean “I can be antisemitic and as long as I’m antizionist too it’s fine”. I made the mistake of clicking to see the replies on a post about antisemitism and—whew.
Like JFC you see a Christian with a torture device on a cute little Etsy necklace that got put on the flag of crusaders and used to torment indigenous people on 5 different continents and that’s ok but a Star of David? On someone’s neck at the fuckin deli? How dare they?
List makers, here's the weekend fishing pond. It's gross, I'm not diving in.
Fascinating, thanks for sharing!
Also as a tangent the comments of the video are filled with people pointing out that no archeologist or grave robber has ever been stopped by a warning sign, but someone who digs up the WIPP will *actually die horribly*, which is a *tad* different than a mummy's curse
Note: I'm sure the actual exerts working at the WIPP have considered this approach and either it's just not public yet or it was cut because SciShow was making a 15 minute video about decades of work. But if "WIPP Sealing Day" doesn't become a holiday, I will definitely wonder why.
I am ignorant of aboriginal and indigenous practices but I'm sure they've also got very long-standing commemorations. The UK is gearing up for the 1000th anniversary of the conquest. And that's all off the top of my head.
Especially if you make the date astronomical (tied to a solstice or equinox) rather than relying on our particular calendar. Judaism has been commemorating certain days annually for *at least* 2500 years. Which is only a quarter of the way to 10,000, but still.
Creating an annual holiday for the local town/county/or even the state of New Mexico that involves teaching children about the radiation danger and, say, inspecting and cleaning all the warning signs? I think that is *entirely* viable.
I watched this @scishow.bsky.social video about the efforts to develop warning signs that will be understandable for 10000 years and it mentions that one thing that was considered and discarded was creating a new religion. Fair, but you don't need *religion* to have *ritual* youtu.be/Bj1oITXzqyg?...
I’ve heard from a couple of messaging strategists now that people shouldn’t post so much about COVID19 vaccines because it’s “divisive”. I am here to say that I do not give a damn what is popular. I will never ignore scientific evidence for the sake of expediency, and neither should anyone else.
"Hello, complete stranger, this post you made is not about me and I must point that out." Thanks for your contribution, that definitely was worth your time to write and my time to read, thanks.
I'm not even writing the software and the amount of time I've spent discussing what is and is not TAI time...
Me: "Man, I am way grumpier about [redacted] then is reasonable." Me, several hours later, looks at calendar: "Oh. Right. [Other redacted thing]'s anniversary." It's always weird when that happens.
Try running a spacecraft with 3 different clocks on it!
I once encountered an error message of "BAD ERROR FIX ME" in released commercial software, so until we top that we're doing ok
Yeah, it does happen, but we also know it's likely to happen so we try to build in that understanding? Not perfectly, obviously, but it does tend to drive the point home when some proposals require a "generational PI" for when the first one dies or retires