artisansoulleader:

howtobeterrell:

lickystickypickyshe:

Avocados are toxic to almost all animals (including cats and dogs). Humans are a rare exception. It is the only fruit to contain persin, a fatty acid, which, when eaten by animals causes vomiting, diarrhea, and other nasty symptoms. Consumption of large quantities can cause death within twelve hours.

Avocados are berries (fleshy fruits coming from a single ovary). Interestingly, this broad definition of a berry means that bananas, pumpkin, tomatoes, watermelon, and coffee are also berries (you can tell that to the next person who tries to argue that tomatoes are vegetables). Curiously this also excludes strawberries as berries.

Eighty percent of modern avocados originate from one “mother” tree which was patented by mailman Rudolph Hass from California in 1935. The tree survived until 2002 when it died of root rot. Unfortunately Hass only made $5,000 in his lifetime from his patent on the tree because his partner sold cultivars to anyone who wanted to buy them. Subsequently Hass spent the remainder of his life working for the California Mail Service.

Avocado also has an interesting characteristic: it is the only berry with no living animal large enough to spread it through consumption and release as dung. This has led scientists to believe that it co-evolved with prehistoric megafauna that were large enough to eat the fruit whole. The megafauna went extinct but the avocado remained as an unusual monument to an unknown dinosaur.

A

Mind=Blown

absolutelymadness:

Couch potato

multipleendings:

THOUGHTS ON | puppeteer, gavin moore, and male protagonists

Gavin Moore, the creative director of upcoming PS3 title “Puppeteer" was asked in a recent interview about why players aren’t given the option to play as a girl character. His response was… disheartening. He basically said that it doesn’t matter, that it’s his story and that he shouldn’t have to be “PC" and “[pander] to public opinion” by offering the option of letting the player plays as a female character. The interview rubbed me in the wrong way and you can read the full thing here, but I want to address his comments as I feel they’re pretty indicative of how a lot of male developers treat the subject.

“ Why do we want girls to play girls and why do we want boys to play boys?”

I see this kind of thing brought up a lot, but I think people don’t realize that is not necessarily what this is about. What most people want is the option. Frequently when it comes to gaming, players aren’t given the opportunity to see themselves. Female players aren’t allowed to see themselves as the protagonist because they always have to play as a male. Furthermore, it keeps boy players from being able to relate to and connect with female characters because they are rarely ever in the protagonist role. It’s less about wanting girls to play as girls and boys to play as boys. It’s more about the fact that video games are making everyone play as boys and boys alone. It’s about the fact that video games treat male protagonist as “default" or “universal" and everything else as “special interest".

This is shown clearly by Moore himself later in the interview. When asked if Kutaro (the protagonist) is meant to be seen as “the player" he responds with:

“Exactly. It’s exactly, that’s what it is. I mean, he doesn’t even speak. He has no personality. It’s just you. You just impose your personality on him and play as you.”

But if he doesn’t speak, doesn’t have personality, and it’s all about what the player brings to the character, then why is it so important to Moore that Kutaro is exclusively a male character? If it’s about you, the player and your personality, why is the player avatar exclusively male? What sort of message does that send to players? This is where his argument doesn’t make much sense. If it’s all about the player playing “as you" why is he writing off allowing half of the population to play as themselves as simply “pandering to public opinion"?

“I know how the women are strong and I love women, I think they are wonderful, but, I’m not going to change my creative vision over something because somebody tells me that that’s what’s important now. Because I don’t think that’s important. ”

The unfortunate reality is that having a protagonist who can be either male or female (or even gender neutral) would better fit Moore’s vision of the protagonist being “you". But instead, denouncing it a matter of pandering and being politically-correct, kids get the lesson that being a boy means being an adventurer, means having an active role, while girls are relegated to supporting characters in that boy’s story again.

It’s a statement of ridiculous privilege, the idea that because it doesn’t matter to him, it is simply “not important". And you know, in a perfect world, it probably wouldn’t matter if a character like Kutaro is a boy or a girl. But that’s not the world (or the industry) we live in. Kutaro is just another character in a long line of characters that tell players that girls can’t be the heroes, they have to be the supporting character. Male protagonists overwhelmingly outnumber female protagonists and this disproportional ratio is a problem and it has real effects on people. Media has been shown time and time again to shape our culture and our society and our perceptions. And to frequently see so many male developers be so dismissive of these very real concerns is troublesome.

No one is saying that developers can’t make the games they want to make, or that they have to do xyz. They clearly don’t, and they clearly won’t. But just because you have a “vision" and you can tell whatever story you want doesn’t mean you are free from criticism. Content creators help shape society and culture and that position is not something that should be treated as a “get out of jail free card".

It’s something that should be held up to even more scrutiny.

cleophatrajones:

dapenguinninja:

remierk:

Race in two jokes

haha foreal tho. 

“can I get a receipt for this cup of water?”

This is not an exaggeration.

toastradamus:

THANK YOU I LOST THIS IMAGE NOW I CAN USE IT AGAIN