Yup, anyone spewing garbage to me about “god’s plan” will probably get more venom out of me than anything else that someone could say. I do not believe in a god, but I do know that death is inevitable and suffering for years is not its mandatory prelude.

I would have to agree. I think that with the amazing amount of medical progress we have made, we have also lost our capability to come to terms with death. Gone are the days where a woman would have eight children, die bearing the last baby, and the father sees only two of the kids survive to adulthood. However, it…

This. I go out of my way to never leave my dogs in my car and I cannot understand how anyone could be tempted to do it—especially when considering that if anything goes wrong, the kids/dogs can die a terrible death in what is essentially an oven.

We live in a time where society enables EVERYONE to survive to adulthood and beyond—even the “low-hanging fruit” that would have been picked off by natural selection pre-1900s.

I do not know what kind of plan firefighters have, but for us it will eliminate supplemental retirement payments, require us to pay in more, reduce our pension because it will be based on “high five” instead of “high three” (highest paying years of work), and eliminate the cost-of-living adjustment.

Yup, there is existing documentation/history in several villages, where they buried the dead after outbreaks. Sadly, for many of those villages, they were obliterated by repeated rounds of smallpox.

Like many other things in America, it is okay when white males do it. It is fine for drunk frat guys to do it because “boys will be boys.”

Yup, it has already happened with anthrax in Siberia. Scientists think it is just a matter of time until smallpox-riddled corpses that out and start infecting people. They are testing recent “discoveries” to see if smallpox can survive being frozen for that long, but it is only a matter of time until smallpox…

If I wanted to travel someplace where I can be slut-shamed by religious zealots for how I dress/act, I would go visit my parents in Mississippi. At least I can get in my car and drive away.

I have calmly waited for my conservative, deep-South family to admit that everything is going to hell...but I finally lost it today. Air Traffic Controllers got word from our union that the current incarnation of budget that is up for vote will axe our retirement pensions (along with firefighters, and so on).

...and smallpox. Don’t forget smallpox!

Sounds like a win-win. Dog gets a snack and saves you cleanup.

In addition to consuming less, I want recycle labels on toys. Nothing pains me more than seeing a huge plastic toy sitting in a trash bin that should be made of recyclable materials.

I think the two could be hand-in-hand. If people find a way to prolong their lives significantly more—or become immortal—human overpopulation would be the last straw to trigger the collapse of all ecosystems and a mass loss of life.

The shrug does not appear to imply that she would be fine watching kids die in front of her. It is more along the lines of the majority of the population refusing to budge from our current track—which will cause us to die from antibiotic-resistant superbugs, starvation, buried in trash, and everything else that may…

Heck, I still remember a hour-long briefing when I was a cadet at the Air Force Academy that included the “slideshow” of the most horrific STD images they could find.

A few months ago while on vacation in Paris, I was riding down an escalator at a train station when I heard a woman calling to her unleashed dog from across an open area. It was spooked by the escalator and refused to follow her—then I noticed that she had suitcases with no way back to her dog—who was now running…

If I go on a date with a guy and he acts this way, that is grounds for never speaking to the guy again. I consider it a fundamental flaw of character to be an asshole, and a pretty good indicator of future problems should the relationship be allowed to progress.

Yup, Josh is an asshole—for making employees go way the hell out of their way for his ridiculous order AND for wasting so many resources. (Given his “defense,” he likely does not even recycle)

Never underestimate the power of an asshat to be an asshat.