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Avens O'Brien
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Avens O'Brien
@avensobrien
Ah-venz. My friends call me the troll-whisperer. Mycologist. Entrepreneur. Birds. Liberty. Psychedelics. 🍄 Co-Founder & VP Ops @advancedmyco
Los Angeles, CA Katılım Nisan 2009
1.1K Takip Edilen4K Takipçiler
Avens O'Brien retweetledi
Avens O'Brien retweetledi
“I strongly dislike the notion that if things get absolutely rotten here, we can run away to somewhere else. I think it’s a silly idea on economic and on moral grounds. Nevertheless, it’s true, in my opinion, that the maturity of the human species will be connected with our ability to leave the earth, our mother, and seek our fortune in the galaxy… but not to abandon the earth, by any means. If we don’t put our house in order, we'll never be able to explore the cosmos.”
— Carl Sagan
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Avens O'Brien retweetledi
Avens O'Brien retweetledi
Verdict is in: Afroman FULL victory, with no claims going to any of the Adams County Sheriff plaintiffs, total courtroom W for @ogafroman
Solid news for First Amendment protections of free speech, parody, artistic creation and fans of Lemon Pound Cake.
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My mother made it very easy for my brothers to live at home thru their 20s (one lived at home until he got married). No rent if in college, affordable room/board after, she still sometimes did their laundry if they left it for her. They were 25 & 29 when they moved out.
I was offered the same arrangement but opted for my privacy & independence. I moved out at 18, and 4 years later built my life 3000 miles away. I've been her most independent child (& the most financially successful). My brothers live within 10 miles of her. I live 3000 miles away.
I certainly wasn't kicked out, she encouraged us to stay & be close.
With my own kids, I want love & closeness. But if done right, their capability & interest in leaving the nest should be an indicator of a job well done. I want motivated, ambitious & highly competent kids. If we're still running our company by then I'd love their first jobs to be "in the mailroom"/on the assembly line, maybe learning how to take over for us (starting from the bottom), IF compelled to do so.
I don't want my kids to feel like they are being kicked out or that they have to leave - I want them to desire to grow in the discomfort of new experiences & enjoy flying without a net.
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Are a lot of 18 year olds getting kicked out of their parent's house? When I was 18, I YEARNED for my own independence, it wasn’t something my parents had to force on me.
Of course I’d love for our son to feel like our home is always open to him. If he wanted to stay close, live nearby, or even on the property one day, that all sounds great.
But the key part is as long as HE wants. Once he becomes an adult, what I want becomes irrelevant.
Trying to pressure your children into this type of dynamic will backfire.
Trust me on this one.
Matt Walsh@MattWalshBlog
I used to be entirely in the camp that said you should kick your kids out at 18 and force them to live independently and make their own way in the world. I don’t feel that way at all anymore. I want all my kids to live with us until they get married. Even after they’re married, if they want to live on our property, or close by, my wife and I would love that. The important thing is to teach your kids responsibility, which we’re doing. They need to contribute and help around the house, which all of our kids do from a very young age. Provided you aren’t raising ungrateful useless moochers, why kick them out? Why drive them away from your family home? I don’t see the point in it anymore. I actually like my kids and like being around them. Maybe they’ll all end up scattered to the wind. But I’d prefer to keep the family together. Why wouldn’t I?
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My mother made it very easy for my brothers to live at home thru their 20s (one lived at home until he got married). No rent if in college, affordable room/board after, she still sometimes did their laundry if they left it for her. They were 25 & 29 when they moved out.
I was offered the same arrangement but opted for my privacy & independence. I moved out at 18, and 4 years later built my life 3000 miles away. I've been her most independent child (& the most financially successful). My brothers live within 10 miles of her. I live 3000 miles away.
I certainly wasn't kicked out, she encouraged us to stay & be close.
With my own kids, I want love & closeness. But if done right, their capability & interest in leaving the nest should be an indicator of a job well done. I want motivated, ambitious & highly competent kids. If we're still running our company by then I'd love their first jobs to be "in the mailroom"/on the assembly line, maybe learning how to take over for us (starting from the bottom), IF compelled to do so.
I don't want my kids to feel like they are being kicked out or that they have to leave - I want them to desire to grow in the discomfort of new experiences & enjoy flying without a net.
English
My mother made it very easy for my brothers to live at home thru their 20s (one lived at home until he got married). No rent if in college, affordable room/board after, she still sometimes did their laundry if they left it for her. They were 25 & 29 when they moved out.
I was offered the same arrangement but opted for my privacy & independence. I moved out at 18, and 4 years later built my life 3000 miles away. I've been her most independent child (& the most financially successful). My brothers live within 10 miles of her. I live 3000 miles away.
I certainly wasn't kicked out, she encouraged us to stay & be close.
With my own kids, I want love & closeness. But if done right, their capability & interest in leaving the nest should be an indicator of a job well done. I want motivated, ambitious & highly competent kids. If we're still running our company by then I'd love their first jobs to be "in the mailroom"/on the assembly line, maybe learning how to take over for us (starting from the bottom), IF compelled to do so.
I don't want my kids to feel like they are being kicked out or that they have to leave - I want them to desire to grow in the discomfort of new experiences & enjoy flying without a net.
English
The world has billions of people in it. Individuals with hopes, dreams, desires, talents, fears, abilities, emotions, and people who love them and people they love.
Take a look around at some of the absolutely amazing human beings in this world, and also try to recognize they have failings too. They have fears and scars and weaknesses.
You haven't met everyone you will ever meet, and you can learn anything from the people you do.
I know there's a lot of pessimism about the world, but when I think about all of this, I can't help but feel optimism. I can't help but think "what might someone born today do in 20 years that I can't even fathom right now?". I can't help but imagine there are more people I'm going to meet and care about and how fun it's going to be to share our first laugh, our first cuddle, our first adventure, our first secrets.
I don't know what's next or who is out there, and sometimes I get mildly anxious because I want to know everything.
And sometimes I close my eyes and I feel a rush because I can't control it all and i can't know it all, but I can be the only one who has the relationships I have with the people I do, and i can be fearless in the pursuit of new friends and new people to learn from.
Maybe others can't do this, and maybe I need to check my extrovert privilege or some shit.
I'm humbled and grateful to be who I am, where I am, with the people I know and have known, to live in this time in human history with the progresses we've made in human rights and the challenges we have cast to biology and nature --- we've got work to do, but I live in such a time, place and community that I don't just feel like I'm witnessing this time I live in - I'm helping make the future that others will live in.
I'm annoyingly optimistic and happy and sure, I've had lucky draws and good hands.
But I'd be such a fucker if I looked at everything I had and everything I see and was a pessimist.
I'll just stay obnoxiously cheerful. The alternative (from me) isn't actually of value to anyone.
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Avens O'Brien retweetledi
How do you change someone's mind about free markets?
You don't argue. You connect dots.
A grieving mother was crying, telling me “capitalism” killed her son. He drowned trying to reach Europe on a boat.
I sat with her. Then I asked her one question: why did he leave?
To find a job. Why couldn't he find one at home? Because there are none. Why are there none? Because Senegal makes it nearly impossible to start a business.
By the end of our conversation, she understood.
Free markets were the only thing that could have saved her son.
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Avens O'Brien retweetledi
DARE is one of the most successful psyops of all time, and 40 years later, the evidence shows it was all bullshit:
- MDMA cures 70% of PTSD
- Psilocybin beats antidepressants
- Even Congress has bipartisan support now
Yet millions still believe the lies they learned in 5th grade.
DARE wasn't drug education.
It was government propaganda disguised as public safety.
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@orsonscottcard @thomas_garrard For reference this was my Speaking for the Dead:
avens.substack.com/p/set-boundari…
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I love Ender. I picked up that book when I was ~11, it was one of my really formative ones (alongside Deed of Paksenarrion by Elizabeth Moon).
I read through the sequels in my teens. I loved Ender's Shadow & Speaker for the Dead.
A close friend of mine died a few years back & my eulogy touched on some hard truths of his life - my friends said it was very much a Speaker for the Dead moment.
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Thanks for caring about a character I created when I was 24 and a book I wrote when I was 33. I'm old now, still trying to come up with truthful stories, and glad to know that you've taken Ender Wiggin to heart. @thomas_garrard
*I’m also happy to see how many fellow humans have volunteered to replace Grok in a book discussion.
**And speaking of being old, I first posted this incorrectly. Grok may have to replace me.
Just T.J. the Army Vet@thomas_garrard
I just had a conversation with Grok about one of my all time favorite books “Ender’s Game” I had to talk to Grok, because I’ve never met anyone who’s read it, besides me. Lol. It’s a great book, though, if you’re ever so inclined.
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Avens O'Brien retweetledi
I see endless debates about child labor online.
Some people want international bans. Others want free school meals to incentivize attendance.
Nobody talks about what actually made child labor disappear in developed countries.
It was not laws. It was not school lunch programs. It was prosperity.
When families earn enough to survive without their children working, they stop sending them to work.
This happened in Britain, America, Japan, everywhere. Economic growth came first. Child labor ended as a result.
Here is what people also miss: most child labor is not factories exploiting random children.
It is parents who need their own children to help the family survive and feel they face no choice but to send them working at that factory.
The farmer cannot harvest his crops alone because he is too poor to afford tools, so his kids work the fields. The mother selling vegetables at the market brings her daughter along because someone needs to watch the younger children while she earns money.
These families are not cruel, they are desperate. They would love to send their children to school but they cannot afford to.
Just banning child labor does not fix this.
It just forces families to hide what they are doing or pushes children into even worse informal work.
Free breakfast programs sound nice, but a family that needs their child’s labor to eat dinner is not going to send that child to school for breakfast.
The math does not work.
If we actually care about ending child labor, we need to focus on bringing prosperity to these countries so families can finally afford to keep their children in school instead of needing them to work.
Everything else is just noise that makes us feel good while accomplishing nothing.
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My mother's friend once picked up a hitchhiker in the late 60s, early 70s. They started talked and she was driving along the highway when he pulled a knife on her and put it to her neck. She sped up and started intentionally swerving and driving crazy hoping a cop would pull her over. Finally she saw blue lights behind her and she braked HARD. Hitchhiker wasn't wearing a seatbelt, went straight through the windshield.
Both being a hitchhiker and picking one up was dangerous.
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@LizWolfeReason @SarahTheHaider I am so sorry for your loss. 💕
Thank you for sharing your journey and his life with us. 💕
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King Solomon died yesterday at two and a half months old. We loved him really well, and we don't have any regrets. We got nine days at home with him after 61 days in the NICU. Nine will never feel like enough, but we must accept what is given to us––we were never in control.
Let's take stock of all God's mercies, how He worked through people: My OB, who heard my conviction about carrying Sol to term even with his disabilities, and supported it fully, with empathy and respect; the nurses in the Lenox Hill NICU, where he spent the majority of his time, who loved him so tenderly, like he was their own; his physical therapist, who saw extreme hope for him despite his disabilities, and tried to make it so; my mom, who put her own life on hold to come live in New York with us for the whole winter, to watch Zev and keep our household running; Zev, who wanted to wear matching pajamas with his brother each night he was home (and some of the nights Sol was in the NICU), who was eager to come to the hospital with us to play in the lobby even though he wasn't often allowed in the NICU, who chose not to be afraid of hospitals or tubes but to touch and kiss and snuggle his brother whenever he was able; @nwilliams030 and @rSanti97, who camped out at the hospital during Sol's final days so we would never feel alone, who watched Zev whenever our family had to dip back down to Texas; the people who covered us in prayer all over the country. Perhaps most of all, I'm grateful for my husband: He wasn't Catholic or pro-life when we met, but life experience has brought him to these beliefs. They ground us now; his faith is steadfast. He didn't leave Sol's side during those final, hardest days. He doesn't falter.
Something tragic happened to our family, but we won't become permanently sad or dark; we really believe in God's promises. We're called to hope, no matter what, and the best we can do is serve our children with everything we've got. That's what we did, and in the process we got to glimpse the goodness of the Lord over and over again.
Liz Wolfe@LizWolfeReason
After 61 days in the NICU, our Solomon was finally released last week to come start life at home. Thank you for all of your prayers; it was the darkest, scariest, worst two months of my life. But God showed his grace to us in so many ways, and many people banded together to allow me to spend every single day with him in the NICU. We are so grateful to the nurses who loved him like their own; to his physical therapist who is helping him overcome & adapt to his disabilities; to the doctors who performed his surgery; to our priest who baptized him in the hospital; to the friends and family who packed lunches for us, and watched our toddler, and did our laundry, who prayed with and for us and still do. I am grateful in particular for my husband and my mom, who showed me Christlike grace throughout, and for our 3-year-old, who didn't let his joy become dampened by all this fear and sorrow—an example from which we could all stand to learn. "I remain confident of this," Psalm 27 reminds us. "I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." The Lord's goodness has been shown to us every day of these 61. People sometimes denigrate Christians as just those seeking comfort, needing a story to tell themselves. But yes! We are comforted by the Lord. He shows up for us in all kinds of ways, when we're looking—and when we're not. And He looks after the scared and grieving mother, the sick and vulnerable child, the family in need. He did for us, many times over. And many of you did, too, through prayer and acts of kindness. Thank you.
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We began fostering Fry (the torby girl) & Shake (white & orange boy) on Dec 22nd when they were ~4 months old, having been rescued off the street with their brother Nugget in early November by Del Gato Rescue.
When I picked them up, the two of them fit in a single carrier with plenty of room. They were so tiny!
@juddweiss started talking about keeping them as early as January 9th, having fallen in love with their personalities. We started trying out alternative names.
We've loved having them these past 10 weeks. Everybody who has met them has loved them. Every house guest who has stayed in our guest room with them has loved them. They are incredibly social and sweet.
Last weekend we threw a party. 100 loud people upstairs, and the kittens were confined to a bedroom - completely unperturbed by the sounds upstairs and outside the door. At one point there were seven people hanging out in this bedroom with them happily talking and laughing and sitting on the floor and the kittens were running between them playing and cuddling.
I think that sealed the deal for us. We love these kitties, but our lives are pretty hectic. We travel a lot so we've got house sitters and people who have to take care of them for us - they're compatible with that. We throw events with lots of people - the kittens handled that. We are very busy, and they have to spend some time alone - with each other - but they're fine with that!
These kittens are adorable, sweet, loving, playful, and handle every weird quirk of our lives with a sense of "this is fine".
Last week, someone inquired with the rescue about possibly adopting these two and when we realized we might lose them, we said "no, please, we want to keep them forever".
So today they got microchipped. I'm paying the adoption fee tomorrow and registering them. They each needed their own carrier, they are 6 months old now.
Fry became Chai. Shake became Latte.
She's 6.8 lbs. He's 7.5 lbs.
They're part of our home.
You should consider fostering and potentially adopting cats. It's amazing. We successfully fostered a cat before this, and she found a wonderful home. We did not intend to keep these two, until we fell in love with them.
Welcome home, Chai & Latte. 💕
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@LibertarianFBos Yep. For posting a photo of a protestor at her panel at freedom fest.
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