sitting under my own private toadstool

Screenshot via Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net on bluesky

Tldr Amnesty International, global human rights organisation, published a report called 'A growing threat: the anti-rights movement in the UK'. In it is detailed, amongst others, a whole bunch of transphobic groups and organisations, including Beira's Place, JK Rowling's trans exclusionary sexual violence support service. JK Rowling threw a shit fit and got Amnesty to take the report down by threatening libel. This was obviously not enough, because you can't appease a fascist, so now she's going to bankroll a bunch of lawsuits anyway through the JK Rowling Women's Fund.*

You can read an archived version of the report here, please save it and share it.

Gorgonavis alcyone was an enantiornithean bird that lived in what is now Spain during the early Cretaceous, about 129-126 million years ago.

Enantiornitheans were a diverse and abundant group of Mesozoic birds that retained claws on their wings and often had toothy snouts instead of beaks, and many also had ribbon-like display feathers on their tails instead of lift-generating fans. While they externally looked a lot like modern birds they weren't ancestral to any living forms — instead they represented a separate "cousin" lineage to euornitheans that convergently evolved similar features and lifestyles.

Although known only from an isolated skull, Gorgonavis would probably have been around 14cm long (~5.5") with an estimated wingspan of 30cm (~12"). It seems to have been a close relative of long-snouted enantiornitheans like Longipteryx, having similar elongated jaws with teeth only at the tips. 

If it was a longipterygid it would be the oldest known member of that group and the only one currently known outside of China, suggesting that particular family was much more widespread than previously thought.

Longipterygids were traditionally interpreted as kingfisher-like birds specialized to prey on insects or fish, but two specimens from China with preserved gut contents recently demonstrated that they may actually have been frugivores feeding on the fleshy fruit-like seeds of gymnosperm plants.

———

NixIllustration.com | Tumblr | Patreon

So, we now know on a direct statistical level that Dollar General is literally making the Vimes Boots Theory of Economic Unfairness into a part of its core business model.

But to those working class consumers, Dollar General promises to deliver “everyday low prices.” 

In reality, without knowing it, customers are often paying Whole Foods prices for dollar store groceries. 

A More Perfect Union investigation reveals that Dollar General charges premium prices across a range of staple goods—52% more per pound for chicken breasts than its cheapest competitor, for instance—but masks the high cost from consumers by stocking smaller pack sizes.