> > > More than 1,500 graduate students, teaching assistants and researchers are expected to walk off the job at UC Santa Cruz today, launching the first labor strike over the University of California’s response to pro-Palestinian protests in the past month. > >

> > > Workers will picket from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the two main roads leading into campus, disrupting package deliveries and transit into the university that’s become a hotbed for labor activity in the past few years. > >

> > > The union, UAW 4811, won approval from its members last week to call for strikes at select campuses throughout the UC. > >

> > > While many work stoppages are over pay and benefits, this one is in response to the union’s anger over the UC’s use of police to clear overnight encampments in support of Palestinians that propped up at multiple campuses. Some union members took part in those protests. The largely peaceful demonstrations sought to put pressure on the university to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, divest from weapons companies and cut various other economic ties to Israel. After Hamas, which governs Gaza, killed an estimated 1,200 people in Israel on Oct. 7, the country waged a military campaign in Gaza that has killed an estimated 35,000 Palestinians. > >

> > > Days after police swept the encampments at UCLA and arrested scores of protesters, the union filed an unfair labor practice violation with a state labor relations agency. The union filed similar violations after police cleared encampments at UC San Diego and UC Irvine that also led to arrests of protesters. > >

> > > The percentage of reef areas experiencing bleaching-level heat stress is increasing by about 1% a week, scientists say > >

I thought this would be of interest to the coral-lovers among us. Ethical reef-keeping could help mitigate the extinction of some species (but is unlikely to prevent all extinctions).

I was just working on my current Ironsworn story at work, and I suddenly wondered about whether I considered it to be personal or private, or how I would feel if someone started watching over my shoulder. It made me think if I would roleplay differently if I knew someone else was watching or would read the story later.

How do you feel about your solo roleplays? Are they private, deeply personal stories or would you be happy showing them to other people?

> > > Critical thinking and open debate are pillars of scientific and medical research. Yet experienced professionals are increasingly scared to openly discuss their views on the treatment of children questioning their gender identity. > >

> > > This was the conclusion drawn by Hilary Cass in her review of gender identity services for children this week, which warned that a toxic debate had resulted in a culture of fear. > >

> > > Some said they had been deterred from pursuing what they believed to be crucial studies, saying that merely entering the arena would put their reputation at risk. Others spoke of abuse on social media, academic conferences being shut down, biases in publishing and the personal cost of speaking out. > >

> > > “In most areas of health, medical researchers have freedom to answer questions to problems without fear of judgment,” said Dr Channa Jayasena, a consultant in reproductive endocrinology at Imperial College London. “I’ve never quite known a field where the risks are also in how you’re seen and your beliefs. You have to be careful about what you say both in and out of the workplace.” > >

> > > Her conclusion was echoed by doctors, academic researchers and scientists, who have said this climate has had a chilling effect on research in an area that is in desperate need of better evidence. > >

> > > Vermont (75%), New Hampshire (66%) and Maine (66%) have the highest share of adults who say they never or seldom attend church or religious services, compared to the national average of 49%, per a new Axios analysis of Household Pulse Survey data. > >

> > > The recent release of a leaked transcript of a private WhatsApp group for Jewish writers, artists, musicians and academics has stirred a controversy that has led to threats of violence, a family in hiding, and the fast-tracking of new federal legislation to criminalise doxing. > >

> > > The WhatsApp group in question, administered by writer Lee Kofman, was formed to give Jewish creative people a private and supportive space to connect, in the wake of the October 7 Hamas attacks and Israel’s war in Gaza. Not all members knew they had been added to the group at first, and many didn’t participate in the conversations that resulted in the leak. > >

> > > Last week, a transcript from the group chat was leaked and uploaded onto social media by pro-Palestinians, including the writer Clementine Ford. The leak included a spreadsheet with links to social media accounts and “a separate file with a photo gallery of more than 100 Jewish people”. > >

> > > In the two years I've been writing about Americans' changing relationship to work, there's one theme that's come up over and over again: loyalty. Whether my stories are about quiet quitting, or job-hopping, or leveraging a job offer from a competitor to force your boss to give you a raise, readers seem to divide into two groups. On one side are the bosses and tenured employees, the boomers and Gen Xers. Kids these days, they gripe. Do they have no loyalty? On the other side are the younger rank-and-file employees, the millennials and Gen Zers, who feel equally aggrieved. Why should I be loyal to my company when my company isn't loyal to me? > >

> > > I knew it would happen again the other month, when I was reporting on white-collar workers who secretly juggle multiple full-time jobs. Overemployment, as the phenomenon is known, violates society's implicit norms of loyalty to one's employer more flagrantly than anything else I've encountered. But when I asked these overemployed professionals whether they felt bad that they were essentially cheating on their bosses, they were unapologetic. "My parents told me, 'Don't switch companies, grow in one company, be loyal to one company, and they'll be loyal to you,'" one guy told me. "That may have been true in their days, but it definitely isn't today anymore." > >

> > > In the silence of the Civil War’s Antietam battlefield on a winter day, bucolic hills give way to rows of small, white gravestones in the nearby cemetery. Wandering over the deadliest ground in American history, a melancholy visitor may be excused for wondering if this November’s presidential contest poses the greatest threat to the nation’s future since the election of 1860. > >

> > > After his victory in Iowa, Donald Trump is the favourite to become the Republican nominee. Leading commentators on the Left warn that, should he get re-elected, he will become a dictator and end democracy. On the Right, meanwhile, the belief is unshakeable that Joe Biden is mentally incapable of fulfilling the duties of president and won’t survive a second term. > >

> > > These raw emotions are not simply the quadrennial outbursts of partisan feeling that emerge in an election season. Rather, they are portents of a much deeper dislocation in American society. For over two decades now, Americans have been battered by non-stop crises at home and abroad — from the long War on Terror to Covid and the George Floyd protests — leading to what feels like national exhaustion and a deep pessimism about the future of democracy. > >

> > > Our pessimism has resurrected the once-unthinkable idea of disunion, or in today’s parlance, “national divorce”. In a 2021 poll conducted by the University of Virginia, more than 80% of both Biden and Trump voters stated that elected officials from the opposite party presented “a clear and present danger to American democracy”. Most shockingly, 41% of Biden voters and 52% of Trump voters stated that things were so bad, they supported secession from the Union. Two years later those numbers remained essentially the same in an Ipsos poll, with a fifth of Americans strongly wanting to separate. > >

> > > For those who believe that such concerns are simply hysteria, we should remember that America’s road to the Civil War took decades. In March 1850, southern statesman John C. Calhoun gave a prescient warning to the Senate: “It is a great mistake to suppose that disunion can be effected by a single blow. The cords which bound these States together in one common Union, are far too numerous and powerful for that. Disunion must be the work of time.” > >

On Windows 10, I often have a problem where the laptop will charge and then stop charging and then charge again with one second intervals. I've updated the firmware to the latest version and the issue persists. I'm not sure if this is caused by the charger, internal hardware, or is a Windows bug.

Anyone else experience this?

I've been growing some plants emersed, particularly Java ferns. I'm wondering if any of you have tried this and what fertilizers you've found to work the best. I've been using MiracleGro 24-8-16, but I'm not sure if that's the best formula.

Any recommendations for lightweight sleeping pads under $50? Most of the highly-rated options that I'm seeing are over $200.

Whether it’s picking a meetup location for a hike, choosing a campground from miles away or finding help if you stranded off the beaten path, California State Parks has announced a new tool that’s as simple as three words.

Is it considered acceptable to "revenge downvote" by going to a user's profile and downvoting all their posts or comments? I've seen some of this behavior going on and I don't think it reflects very well on the Fediverse or Kbin.

EDIT: Honestly didn't expect this post, of all posts, to be the one to open me up to hate. Thought fedizens were friendlier than that.