Yes, there are legitimate reasons to be wary of the way Monsanto does business.

I wasn’t doubting the existence of this sheep. I was doubting that anyone was ignorant of why modern sheep have more wool than would be practical in the wild.

I feel a bit sad too. I guess it’s no wonder so many people are terrified of GMOs if they don’t realize that we’ve already been creating new and ‘unnatural’ species for all of human history.

Anyone who has ever learned anything about domestication?

Yeah, I was about 90% sure it was a joke, and I thought people were going to be annoyed at me for being weirdly humorless about it, but I just had to make sure. Now I don’t know what to think.

The title is just a joke, right? We all understand that domestic sheep have been selectively bred over millennia in order to have way more wool than they would have had in nature...right?

I could only interpret it to be suggesting something like, “Kids these days don’t have summer jobs anymore. Back in my day, we worked after school and all summer.” But that seems out of tone with the rest of the story.

Let’s not get carried away. There’s a reason I said I’m not trying to diminish Briard’s work. Just because something seems intuitive doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be studied with scientific rigour. That’s how we discover which of our “common sense” ideas really hold water, and which are just superstition and old wives’…

If it makes you feel better, I was sort of an unwilling participant in horse culture. My mom and my older sister loved horses, so a huge amount of the family’s time and disposable income was diverted to them. I resented that my regular chores included mucking out stalls, hauling around bales of hay, and other…

Anyone who has actually spent time around horses knows this. Not trying to diminish Briard’s work, since I’m sure her insights extend beyond this, but it’s painfully obvious that horses are bitchy, clichy creatures if you watch them for about five minutes. My 4H friends always used the term “mare-ish” as a stand-in…

That’s really not how pre-nups work, at least not in the United States. They don’t have any bearing on custody arrangements, and most states do not allow you to factor fidelity into the agreement. Prenups are really just about the division of assets, and they usually only pertain to property that you already own prior…

You’re assuming that all agents work through their backlog in a perfectly systematic way, always starting with the oldest submissions first. It just doesn’t always work that way, especially with email submissions. I interned for a literary agent, and when she set me loose on the emails, she didn’t care which ones I…

Name one real, published writer who could be described as “weak-willed” and “fears real work.” It’s literally fucking impossible, because the act of writing a novel requires a tremoundous amount of willpower and hard work.

You’re the type of commenter who makes me wish Kinja had a down-vote feature. What a condescending ass.

I agree that the article was really patronizing, as if Sam Biddle thought we were all too dumb to understand what advertising is until he helpfully informed us that it was not actually intended for the good of society at large!

Did you drop your ability to be kind and get splattered with an urge to be patronizing?

I started masturbating at an extremely young age (probably less than 10), and yet it NEVER resulted in an orgasm. I was not able to get myself off until I bought a Hitachi Magic Wand in my twenties. I still do not have orgasms from using my hands. So, I can understand pretty well why not all women would enjoy it. Even…

I think that’s true, but it’s probably not a cause and effect relationship. Rather, both are an effect of having a higher level of sensitivity, thus being able to orgasm easily. After all, if you can get off easily, masturbation is much easier and more rewarding, so you are much more likely to do it often. And of…

As someone who loves black coffee, I completely agree with you.

I just really like cream cheese frosting (I am weird in that I strongly dislike regular frosting), so when I see a red velvet cupcake, I’m glad because I know I’ll like the frosting. I would be just as happy with a vanilla cupcake with cream cheese frosting, but a lot of times there’s no way of knowing what kind of…