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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • The area and time I grew up in had zero non-English classes until high school! Literally just skipping the most beneficial periods of language learning. It was only required that we take 1 year of a foreign language to graduate, and that’s not really enough time to be proficient (or it wasn’t the way we were taught, anyway).

    I’ve been casually learning Spanish for the past few years, and doing it on your own as an adult without paying for courses is hard, especially if your native language is in a different language family. I can definitely understand why people who emerge from the school system monolingual just stay that way.








  • Historically fried chicken and watermelon are stereotypical foods associated with black Americans as part of minstrel shows, which were usually performed in blackface, and other racist portrayals of black people. Watermelon in particular was turned into a negative racial stereotype because growing watermelon was one way that emancipated slaves could be financially independent.

    Fried chicken has been associated with enslaved black people since before the Civil War, because chickens were the only livestock they were allowed to keep. Well into the 20th century there were also white-owned restaurants and brands that drew on these stereotypical images over the protests of black people.

    At best it is very ignorant of the history of racism in the US to have a fried chicken and watermelon special on Juneteenth, because the thought process is just black people holiday = fried chicken and watermelon. At worst it’s just signaling to other racists, which is definitely not an unviable business strategy in some parts of the US.






  • This month, Walmart became the latest retailer to announce it’s replacing the price stickers in its aisles with electronic shelf labels. The new labels allow employees to change prices as often as every ten seconds.

    “If it’s hot outside, we can raise the price of water and ice cream. If there’s something that’s close to the expiration date, we can lower the price — that’s the good news,” said Phil Lempert, a grocery industry analyst.

    Jesus, I can’t imagine just coming out and saying this like it’s not fucking deranged to charge people more for WATER during a heat wave.

    Also, the first time the price of something rises in the 5 minutes it takes for me to get my shopping done and get to the checkout, I’m taking a shit on the floor.