A realistic prairie dog standing in a hole with its head just poking out on a desert landscape at sunset, dressed like a journalist. The prairie dog is wearing a brown fedora hat and a blue tie, and is holding a paper notepad with a silver pen. The background features a warm, golden horizon with dry grass, a few wildflowers, dusty soil, and storm clouds in the distance. The prairie dog is looking directly at the camera with a focused expression, creating a whimsical but professional scene. Highly detailed, warm color tones, shallow depth of field. The image is in a 16:9 aspect ratio.
Weirdly, fascist leaders can be excellent coalition builders, welcoming and supportive to anyone who seems to be pissed at the same people as them. RE: bsky.app/profile/did:plc:q325u…
An Ontario migrant farm worker says there is "wickedness" in a federal government proposal that could allow employers to charge workers upwards of 30 per cent
Daily writing prompt What traditions have you not kept that your parents had? View all responses
I come from many generations of mixed-marriages. That is, one spouse was Catholic and one Protestant. Anyone familiar with Irish history will understand the tension that such a relationship caused. Ireland was not the only country affected either. Wherever the British Empire had a colony, there was always tension between those, who were a different religion, and the British Protestant establishment. It was particularly prevalent in the 19th century.
Take my Haigh great-great-grandp
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A QUESTION OF RELIGION by Veronica Smith
Daily writing prompt What traditions have you not kept that your parents had? View all responses
I come from many generations of mixed-marriages. That is, one spouse was Catholic and one Protestant. Anyone familiar with Irish history will understand the tension that such a relationship caused. Ireland was not the only country affected either. Wherever the British Empire had a colony, there was always tension between those, who were a different religion, and the British Protestant establishment. It was particularly prevalent in the 19th century.
Take my Haigh great-great-grandparents as an example! Great-great Granny was an Irish Catholic, married to an English Protestant. Under Roman Catholic guidelines at the time, the children of such a mixed marriage should be brought up Catholic. However, in this case, only the daughters were brought up Catholic. The sons were brought up Protestant, like their father. This had unfortunate consequences because, when my great-grandmother insisted on bringing up her son, my maternal grandfather, as Catholic, it caused an irreconcilable rift with her Protestant brother, who argued that all male children in their family line should be brought up Protestant.
Both my parents came from such mixed marriages, where one parent was Protestant and one Catholic. Mind you, only my Catholic grandparents seem to have bothered about religion, the Protestant ones being only nominally “different”! This made for more harmonious house-holds!
My parents decided to be practising Roman Catholics. That meant Mass on Sundays; fish dinners on Fridays; the Rosary……. It is what suited their generation, to have a formal religious identity. For their children, it was a different matter. Growing up in the 1960s brought new influences and new ways of thinking (like the Beetles making Indian philosophy fashionable).
One of my siblings married a Jewish spouse and converted to Judaism, bringing up their children following Jewish traditions. Another of my siblings drifted from one Protestant sect to another, even dabbling with Free Masonry, until discovering better “spirits” in a bottle of alcohol! I myself tried very hard with Catholicism, even wanting to become a nun in my youth – until witnessing the vicious in-fighting between the nuns in my boarding school! It reminded me that even those in religious orders are only human and subject to petty squabbling!
So, I spent decades searching for a religion that could satisfy my spiritual needs. That included most of the major, established world religions but they all seemed too worldly to me. It was not until I was in my fifties that I discovered Celtic Spirituality and the Shamanic animistic world view. It seemed to click in a way that my parents’ formal religion had not. My poor elderly mother feared that I was joining some weirdo occult group, which would “steal my Soul”! She failed to see the improvements in my overall attitude to life, how I became less prone to panic-attacks and bouts of depression.
Whether you agree with Shamanism or not, I will tell you about something that I have witnessed at Shamanic gatherings in Ireland. I have seen people from both Protestant and Catholic communities sitting down together, getting to know each other, and forgetting about old religious divisions. They unite in a way that the old religions actively discouraged, despite ecumenical efforts. A belief that brings people together in peace and harmony cannot be “evil”, as my parents would have labelled it, bless them! They were products of their generation, as I am of mine.
ENDS AUTHOR: Veronica Smith first published 30th August 2025
Attached: 1 image
DUKE OF LIMBS. A tall, awkward, ill-made fellow.
A selection from Francis Grose’s “Dictionary Of The Vulgar Tongue” (1785)
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#books #literature #dictionaries #history #society #language #slang @histodons@a.gup.pe
A marketing automation startup called Conversation has a founding story that sounds like it could have been an episode of the HBO show “Silicon Valley.”
The congressional rescissions bill cutting more than $1 billion in funding to public broadcasting has rural communities at risk of losing primary news sources.
With Best Buy's Deals of the Day, you can also score a four-pack of Apple AirTags for almost 20% off and the Epson WorkForce Pro WF-3820 AIO printer at a $70 discount.
The journalist Karen Hao – who published an absolutely fantastic book about OpenAI called “Empire of AI” recently – coined (as far as I know) one of the best terms for describing modern “AI” systems: Everything Machines.
spannende Gedanken! Das Thema der Berührung findet auch bei #EliasCanetti Eingang in den ersten Sätzen seines Hauptwerks "Masse und Macht". Vielleicht findet sich hier eine gute Kontrastfolie zu den im Artikel beschriebenen Überlegungen zur Dystopie der Einsamkeit in der Unberührtheit.
»Nichts fürchtet der Mensch mehr als die Berührung durch Unbekanntes. […] Es ist die Masse allein, in der der Mensch von seiner Berührungsfurcht erlöst werden kann.« Canetti: Masse und Macht. 1960, S. 13–14.
Apple’s MacBook Air with M4 is currently at its lowest price to date. You can also get a free gift card with Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 7, and save on Google’s Pixel Watch 3.
Everyone loves a slide deck, right? NotebookLM now generates narrated visual summaries using your uploaded files, starting with slideshow-style videos.
After the new U.S.-EU trade deal was announced Sunday, many Europeans felt they had come out on the losing end. But analysts say that it needs to be seen in the context of Mr. Trump’s broader relationship with Europe. #tariffs #EU #Trump #europe
Many Europeans feel they came out on the losing end of the new U.S.-EU trade deal. Analysts say it needs to be understood within Mr. Trump’s broader relationship with Europe.
Woot's Deals of the Day are also offering $110 off some Google Pixel Buds Pro (great for Android users) and a smart little Dragon Touch photo frame that’s now under $30.
This is Diana, a 23 year old woman who was seven months pregnant when Russia murdered her at a maternity ward in Kamianske, Ukraine. RE: bsky.app/profile/did:plc:mxc7l…
Russian glide bombs and missiles targeted and struck civilians in Ukraine overnight, including a prison in Zaporizhzhia and a maternity hospital in Kamianske, killing 16–17 inmates and at least 25–27 civilians, including a 23 year old pregnant woman.
Kim Possible
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in reply to Kim Possible • • •Kim Possible
in reply to Lydia Schoch • • •Kim Possible
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