Cross post in ongoing gallery
Da fuq?
Um yeah, Gender Queer is great, and fer goddess’s sake, it has nothing whatsoever to do with pedophilia.
But yes, good news that at least one library is putting it back on the shelf.
Because, you know, LGBTQ things all imply sex and so are inappropriate for children. As opposed to cis het things, which are suitable for anything all the way down to baby onesies.
Thank god there’s no cis teen romance or coming of age stories.
Practice
I hear it’s going to plant a computer virus into the mother ship.
Congrats!
Was the process all that rigorous? And is it dual, or did you renounce the former?
The process wasn’t so much rigorous as it was opaque. There was a lot of gathering (and translating) documents attesting to my family history and a lot of financial and career stuff, and they never really told me what all of the documents were really looking for. There was an interview, but it was mostly just to go over and verify my information. I was told that there might be a Japanese test if I did not do well enough in the interview, but that never came up (not a single word of the process was in English). I was also told not to run afoul of the law and that something as simple as a speeding ticket could derail the whole application.
I am currently still a citizen of the United States, but Japan does not recognize dual citizenship, and I signed a pledge to renounce all other citizenships as soon as possible (which is actually non-binding in the sense that there is no penalty for failure to do so and, failure to do so does not invalidate my Japanese citizenship). Renouncing US citizenship costs something like 2,000 bucks these days and is evidently quite a process on its own so…I guess we’ll see how the midterms go next year!
“Our objective was to have a space that offers food that is healthy for people but also healthy for the planet,” says Iris Herbomel, the owner of Kilogramme, a zero-waste grocery store in Paris’ northeastern 19th arrondissement. “For us, that means we shouldn’t be using unnecessary packaging. Who needs their bananas sold in a plastic bag?”
Kilogramme, which opened in 2018, is one of a growing number of grocery stores in the French capital attempting to tear up the traditional food supply system, which they see as seriously damaging to the environment, and create a model that is localized, artisanal and less wasteful.
Soon, grocery stores and supermarkets across the whole of France could look more like Kilogramme. In October, the government announced that as of January 1, 2022, the use of plastic packaging for fruits and vegetables under 1.5 kilograms will be banned. Thirty types of fresh produce, from zucchini to eggplants, cauliflowers to radishes, and apples to kiwis will need to be on the shelves without plastic packaging.
The ramifications are considerable. Currently, 37 percent of fruits and vegetables in France are now sold in packaging, according to the French Ministry for Ecological Transition. Some 2.2 million metric tons of plastic packaging is used each year, and the recycling rate is just 27 percent. The government estimates the ban will mean that over a billion fewer units of plastic packaging will be used each year.
For Kilogramme’s owner Herbomel, that public support means there’s no need for French businesses to wait to transition. “It might take us more cleaning work if there’s no plastic packaging,” she says. “Employees might have to disinfect surfaces more. But without packaging, food might even be cheaper. There are so many reasons to do it. We will just need to be more organized.”
As a former produce clerk, I think the rise in plastic packaging came because distributors were trying to find a way to reduce deterioration due to insect infestation. I wonder if transparent plastic bins with hinged lids might be a reasonable substitute?
A grand jury indicted Johnson, 49, last week on a felony charge of violating her oath of office and a misdemeanor count of obstructing police. Johnson was the area’s top prosecutor when three white men chased and fatally shot Arbery last year. The indictment alleges she used her position to discourage police from making arrests in the 25-year-old Black man’s killing.
I’d forgotten about this part:
Greg McMichael worked for Johnson as an investigator in the district attorney’s office before retiring in 2019. Phone records introduced in court show he called Johnson and left her a voicemail soon after the shooting.
Get ready to say, “Whee!”
Yeah well, try wearing a mask or flaunting a Biden bumper sticker in the small towns around where I live. You probably won’t get punched, but you might get cussed at, and you’ll definitely get cold shoulders and stares.