Straightman in the reverse isekai.

Over fifty years of data show a peak in PFAS (also known as "forever chemicals") content in seabird eggs in the 90s, followed by a decrease as regulations went into effect. The most recent findings show a 70% decrease of most common PFAS.

We are making genuine progress! Producers are dramatically altering how much they use PFAS and how much gets released in effluent, but also there's a lot better understanding of how to remove PFAS from the environment!

But because I knew nothing about weaving, everything had to be explained to me, down to the most basic tacit knowledge: things that an eight-year-old girl in 1828 would have known, because when she was not winding yarn around a quill to help her mother, she was working on the family’s loom herself...

For my textile, weaving, historic textile, history enthusiasts

SR: Their expertise as makers has clued me into historical experiences most scholars have glossed right over. A 1930s Federal Writers Project interview with a formerly enslaved octogenarian might reference a grandmother’s sewing prowess, but then a student will say, No, you can’t just skim over by that! Do you know how many hand stitches it takes to do the seam of a dress? If you’ve never handsewn a skirt (and I haven’t), you might need to be reminded of the labor involved. One student reproduced a 19th-century skirt as her final project, and it was all about the stitches. Their reading of primary sources picked up on things that I missed.

general statements: is it a "(people) have been doing (x) for centuries" type statement, that is necessarily a broad generalization? could such a statement possibly be true about various locations or decades? if its a statement about a country, could it apply across class, geographic, national, linguistic, or religious lines? does it presuppose a state unity that existed prior to the formation of the nation state, or even fully after it?

anecdote: is it an anecdote being recounted in one person's letters or autobiography? is it posthumous? are there other corroborations of this event occurring in those terms? can you find other sources on this event?

idealism: what version of history is this statement highlighting? is it a "great man of history" version? is it using a supposed "national character" to explain political developments? is it explaining state decisions through individual actors' feelings and commitments?

exceptionialism: if something is being presented as a contemporary development, especially if it's a negative one, what figures is this statement based on? is it presenting modernity as a break with a timeless tradition? are things really "as they've never been before"? is it presenting a nuanced understanding of past and present, continuity and rupture, or is the past painted in broad strokes without the attention given to the present?

primary sourcing: did the author base their analysis on other people's analyses or comments? if they are, for example, talking about the state of a city in a certain year, are they going through municipal archives or only relying on subjective testimonies? if they rely on subjective testimonies, are they highlighting the fact that this is a subjective perception or treating it as an objective assessment?

metatext: what in the sources would need to be true for this claim to be correct? if a claim is being made about an identity, how does the author define the boundaries of this identity and the relationship of the claim to this identity (correlation, cause, consequence)? if the source is a medical or social study, is this study (or sometimes, is any study) capable of proving or disproving the claim being made? what assumptions does this claim being correct or incorrect rest on?

In the US, there is no meaningful legal definition for educational/academic neglect in any of the 50 states or federally. What this means is that a child can be "homeschooled" and exclusively be taught how to cook and clean, reach the age of 18 being unable to read, write, or count, and this alone is not considered neglect. That 18yo, should they even have the knowledge that suing exists, has no legal grounds to sue their parents for denying them an education.

In over 40 US states, a convicted child abuser can homeschool their children. So someone who has done time for child abuse and somehow regains access to their child(ren) can decide upon returning home that they want to "homeschool" their kids. Those children are now locked in a home with their abuser where nobody can see them.

There are no welfare checks.

There are no routine assessments.

There aren't even databases — state or federal — keeping track of how many homeschooled kids there actually are.

Meaning a child can be locked in their home for their entire life with their convicted abuser, learn absolutely nothing, never go to the doctor, and so long as that child is fed, clothed, and the abuse isn't physical or sexual, that child has almost no chance of rescue and no legal ground to seek restitution if/when they escape.

The only way homeschooled children get rescued is if they're beaten, starved, or physically neglected and they're able to get the right person to see that. Otherwise? They have to wait until someone finds out they were murdered as a result of their parents "homeschooling".

And feral homeschool parents love to jump down my throat about this, and then get even more pissed when I tell them I'm a homeschool alumni.

Because I know it's not all homeschoolers. But even one is too many, and the lack of protections should scare everyone. If you're a good homeschool parent, nothing will change. If not, you deserve whatever comes your way as a result of adequate oversight.

• the board is in front of a classroom, and the Math is waaay too advanced for whatever level of pupil these kids are supposed to be; like having the calculus integral in front of kindergartners, or relativistic physics in front of high schoolers.

• the board is in front of Criminals, who are Planning Something, and by all rights there ought to be no Math there to begin with. Like. You’re planning a Heist why do you have the Full Lagrangian on there. Are we taking a rocket to the bank.