I sincerely cannot imagine what was going through their minds. In addition to the ableism there’s an incredible lack of self awareness on display here.

Ah, one of my favorite meals! Good choice. Now for the real question: how spicy?

Dragonfruit is delicious, but this depends heavily on where you get it. Most non-tropical markets get imported dragonfruit that was picked too early and shipped/stored over long periods, resulting a relatively bland taste and drier texture. Ripe, fresh dragonfruit is lovely. It’s in my top 5 fruits personally.

A lot of folks thought he would push fascist policies, though? He was notable for his nativist and protectionist rhetoric on the campaign trail. The audacity of it all is what got him all that free print and airtime.

I am vegan. I also find hunted meat to be drastically less cruel and harmful to animals and the environment than our meat agriculture system. Your comment reeks of unexamined privilege.

What an unworthy life. What a depressing existence.

You’re gonna need to find a new fascist dog whistle.

My sister and I are PKs. Our father is a closeted gay man who for some unfathomable reason gravitated toward increasingly conservative megachurches during our childhoods. We’re both queer atheists now, and our childhoods left us damaged, angry, and sad. Now he’s retired and half-out while our mom is bemusedly waiting for the other shoe to drop. The relationship is emotionally exhausting so we both moved far away to minimize contact. I have a great relationship with my in-laws and would love something similar with my parents, but I feel there is likely too much baggage to unpack.

Let’s not fight, y’all.

I feel very seen right now

It does seem depressingly common for formerly disadvantaged people to abandon empathy once they gain a modicum of power. See: the divide and conquer strategy that has been effectively wielded against the working class for all of history.

Human cognition/consciousness is not special. There have likely been many now-extinct intelligent species whose evolutionary niche did not encourage the indefinite expansion and subsequent habitat destruction that we are currently experiencing. Moreover, other intelligent species will likely evolve after we are extinct. There is also no reason to believe that consciousness is unique to biological creatures, although mechanical sapience will most likely look very different from ours.