A "better" Way To Do Planks.

This may seem like a meme, but it is real. It's formatted like this to get people's attention and be memorable, in the hopes that maybe it saves some lives.

Edit 1: If any of you are unsure that this is real, check out the notes of folks talking about it.

Transcript:

[transcript of sign] 

Are you currently struggling with … MEDICAL BILLS? 

… Perhaps you should try … FAPping! 

Financial Aid Policy 

Did you know that most hospitals and some doctor’s offices are what is known as a 501r, or “medical non-profit”? 

This means they are legally required to have a “financial aid policy” or “charity care policy” 

What is means, is that they are LEGALLY REQUIRED under United States Law to provide FREE OR DISCOUNTED healthcare, and also to FORGIVE EXISTING MEDICAL DEBT to individuals with financial difficulty. 

Basically, every household making und $100K a year is eligible for a reduction in their medical costs. 

Billing departments often try to push people to get on a “payment plan” if someone asks, but don’t accept it! 

Ask if they have a Charity Care or Financial Aid policy “Based On Income.” 

If it looks like you might not qualify? 

Apply anyway. They try to scare people away with scary processes. 

YOU QUALIFY. EVEN IF YOU ARE ALREADY IN COLLECTIONS. 

[/end sign] (Credit to Moonlit-wings for the transcription.)

something my mum always taught us was to look for the resources we're entitled to, and use them. public land? know your access rights and responsibilities, go there and exercise them. libraries? go there and talk to librarians and read community notice boards, find out what other people are doing around you, ask questions, use the printers. public records offices? go in there, learn what they hold and what you can access, look at old maps, get your full birth certificate copied, check out the census from your neighbourhood a hundred years ago. are you entitled to social support? find out, take it, use it. does the local art college have facilities open to the public? go in, look around, check out their exhibit on ancient looms or whatever, shop in their campus art supply store. it applies online too, there is so much shit in the world that belongs to the public commons that you can access and use if you just take a minute to wonder what might exist!!!

I know there’s an existing post somewhere, but here’s the list of OBGYNs in the USA and other countries that will perform tubal ligation (aka female sterilization) without arguing with you

Google Docs

Gynecologists who will perform a tubal sterilization

Gynecologists who will perform a tubal sterilization

EDIT: this list is not mine. It has been curated by Dr. Fran Haydanek, here is her instagram

In all seriousness, here are a few resources I think are helpful with regards to understanding just how thoroughly Henry Kissinger screwed the world over:

Kissinger by Behind the Bastards. This is a 6 part series done by the podcast Behind the Bastards, with the hosts of The Dollop on as guests. It's super funny and a very accessible foothold into understanding the scope of Kissinger's vast career.

Kissinger's Shadow by Greg Grandin. This book provides an in-depth analysis of Kissinger's tenure in the white house, covering both how he got into office, the changes he made in office, the policies he put forth, and their repercussions on the world.

ETAN's category on Kissinger. The East Timor and Indonesia action network has long been an outspoken critic of Kissinger's, and they've aggregated a lot of helpful articles here.

The Trial of Henry Kissinger by Christopher Hitchins. While Grandin's book focuses less on the specificities of Kissinger's crimes, Hitchins has no such qualms and details each of them in depth.

I truly think understanding Kissinger, the way he thought, and the things that he did, are all indispensable when it comes to understanding the modern political climate and how foreign policy works in America and therefore, by necessity, in the world at large. The sheer amount of damage he was responsible for should never be underestimated.

it's quick it's easy and it's free: piracy

my roommates are very, very good programmers. some of the most technically competent people in the world. and yet both of them flail around helplessly when it comes to piracy. one of them couldn't pirate rimworld and the other needed help getting howl's moving castle. how? perhaps not all people are gifted with innate knowledge of Crime?? i dont understand it, but ive decided to write this helpful guide for them and everyone else with no cyberpunk in their souls*

Helpful reference but too much information for your first time: r/Piracy megathread

Download vs Torrent vs Stream

There are three main ways to pirate things:

Downloading**: this is when you go to a website and click a button and then your browser firefox gives you a little notification telling you it's downloading a file. Then you have the file on your puter and you open it or run it or whatever.

Torrenting: this is when you go to a website and download a torrent file. Then you open that file with another program called a torrent client and it downloads the real file for you.

Streaming: this is when you go to a website and you press play on a video/song and it plays you the thing right there in your browser firefox. no file ever gets downloaded to your machine

Or in flow chart form:

Downloading: firefox -> website that has Movie (2022) -> download button -> wait for it to download -> Movie (2022).mp4 is in your Downloads folder -> you play Movie (2022) with a video player VLC

Torrenting: firefox -> torrent website The Pirate Bay -> search for Movie (2022) -> download the torrent file -> open the torrent file with qbittorrent -> it downloads Movie (2022).mp4 -> Movie (2022).mp4 is in your Downloads folder -> you play Movie (2022) with VLC

Streaming: firefox -> streaming website swatchseries -> you find Movie (2022) -> click play -> Movie (2022) plays in your firefox window

Security Shit

Will I get in legal trouble (in the US or Canada) (I am not a lawyer this isn't legal advice etc etc):

Downloading: No

Streaming: No

Torrenting: No, see fine print. If you use a VPN Mullvad, then no, definitely not. If you don't then: there is a small chance the copyright holder will notice and send a letter to your internet provider. You will get a scary letter from your internet provider (ISP). If that happens a lot there is a chance your ISP will turn off your service (I don't know anyone who has actually had this happen). There is basically zero chance that the copyright holder will sue you: they don't know who you are. They need to get that information from your ISP, and ISPs don't give that information out very freely. They would also have to actually successfully sue you, and that mostly stopped. Overall the risk is that your ISP gets mad at you, not that you get sued and/or go to jail.****

Will I get hacked???

Streaming: No. If you don't have ad block it'll probably open a bunch of annoying popups tho. Get uBlock

Downloading/Torrenting Data (Video/Music/Books): These will generally be safe. Keep your player/reader software updated. Make sure the file has the right extension (mp4, mp3, pdf/epub/mobi, etc).

Downloading/Torrenting Executables (Games/Applications): Not safe. People can and do insert malware into the executable. It will still run, but it will do things in the background you don't want. The way to avoid this is by downloading only from places that are well-known and vetted by the community. I recommend fitgirl repacks. If for some reason fitgirl goes down, check the r/Piracy megathread

Don't ever give anything administrative permissions unless you're really super duper extra sure.

And of course, standard internet security advice applies. See the r/Piracy list of untrusted sites if you're curious about a particular site.

Books

Use libgen. Note that every once in a while libgen gets kicked out of a particular country and that link will break. In that case you should use your favorite search engine to search for libgen and find the new extension

Scientific Papers

Use scihub. Same thing as libgen applies.

Movies/TV

I generally recommend streaming rather than downloading. There's less risk and it's rare that you can't find what you want. Currently I use 123 chill (use uBlock). You can also use Video DownloadHelper to download a video file from a streaming site.

Music

uhhh tbh I get music with a script I wrote myself. Good luck lads, try reddit???

Games

Get torrents from fitgirl

thread.

*I'm deliberately picking one program/site for each step to minimize complexity. please dont do anything unbearably silly like list 8 different torrent clients or get into the minutiae of Firefox vs Firefox Developer Edition***.

**inb4 someone says "well actually torrenting is downloading too". you fool. you absolute buffoon.

*** if you so much as mention chrome I'll download your car.

**** if you are torrenting a lot then maybe your ISP sells you out. if youre going to torrent idk every video game ever then get mullvad