Good afternoon,
Today is a solemn day, as it was the first day that we have ever processed an animal on our tiny homestead. I just finished. This rooster was from our hatchlings, which was another first since the previous chickens we’d had were all purchased from elsewhere.
I grew up on a small farm, so I am familiar with the care of creatures from birth to death, but this is the first time I have participated in a slaughter in quite a while, and the first time that I was the one in charge of the endeavor.
If you cannot imagine the idea of slaughtering on a small homestead or family farm, I strongly encourage you to read anything from Slowdown Farmstead. Tara writes beautifully and I share her sentiments on the care of creatures through all phases of life, including their death. It is not something I take lightly.
If you are concerned about the consumption of animal products, I will point out that the combination of a perfect amino acid profile, full B vitamins, and omega-3s cannot be found in plants without carefully combining multiple sources and supplementation. But these necessary nutrients can be found in copious amounts in animal products.
The book and documentary Sacred Cow are great places to learn more about how regenerative farming makes a better world, rather than shifting our planet to plant-based diets, which don’t work in the long run for the soil, the environment, the animals, or the humans.
I considered whether or not I would share this, but I intentionally have chosen to bring as much of our food sourcing to our home as possible - meaning our garden, trees, and animals. The decision to do so happened a while ago, but the process has been slow moving. Sometimes I grow impatient, but today I am grateful for the extra time and space that I’ve had to prepare for what today would be like.
I am grateful. I am proud of the work that I did and the lessons that I learned today.
Now let’s dive in to what’s happening in the world that I’ve found interesting and wish to share with you.
The NC General Assembly will attempt to override Gov. Cooper’s Veto on the Free the Smiles Act, SB 173.
This is the type of action we need to be working toward: not letting mandates just stop and moving back to “normal,” but ensuring that asinine and unhelpful measures cannot be forced upon us by our government officials, regardless of circumstance.
Remember how Pfizer had to release 10,000 pages of data by March 1 (coincidentally the day of the first-ever Biden SOTU)? Well they did. You can view it here. Paid subscribers will get my take on what I find there, but I’m not about to pour through 10K pages of data for free, yo.
As the data drips out or as I find time, I’ll sift through and share that info with paid subs at the end of my newsletter. You are free to sift through the data on your own and I won’t withhold important things from you, but the more detailed stuff is going to paid subscribers.
By “not withholding important things” I mean I’m gonna show you stuff like this when I find it:
Nearly half of the adverse events that happened in the trial were “serious.”
I’ll also share info like 4.6% of people enrolled in the trial got covid. There were Adverse Events of Special Interest involving an autoimmune reaction in 2.5% of participants. Seven people died of medication errors during the trial. There are 9 pages, single spaced and lacking spacing between each semicolon, of Adverse Events of Special Interest.
Also, as it turns out, 274 cases of pregnancy were actually studied in this initial trial. More on that for paid subs, but I hate to report that it didn’t go well for those babies.
Nor did it go well for the babies whose mothers were breastfeeding during the trial.
One of my patients told me last year that she was appalled that the milk bank wanted her milk immediately after getting vaccinated. She called to ask them how long she should wait after getting vaccinated to donate her milk and they said there was no wait and she could continue to donate as normal. Based on this research we actually had done (but Pfizer hadn’t made available until forced to do so over a year later), it seems like that was in poor judgment.
So I’ll still share plenty with you that I find; the extended version going to paid subscribers will just have more details.
The only reason I’m putting anything behind a paywall is because I don’t know who else is doing this. I oftentimes do a lot of piggy-backing to get the information I share with you - I read something on multiple different sites in order to get some version of what the likely truth is, then share it. But I don’t know where to find multiple sources who are combing through this data and offering bite sized pieces of the relevant info, so this is a bit of an undertaking for me. I want to know what information is in the Pfizer data dump, and if you do, too, then you can access it as a paid subscriber.
I did just see this Tea Time with Dr. Meryl Nass on CHD, but I haven’t watched it yet (it’s live as I type this, so it’s not possible for me to go through it and sift, nor to listen at 2x speed ;-) ), but this may be a good option for those of you who are not paid subs but want someone to go through data with you!
Media companies (see the infographic from my last post) say they NEED your personal data to deliver the news. Ummm? According to an article by The Intercept posted on February 1:
In a filing last week, the Interactive Advertising Bureau, a trade group, reported it was lobbying against a push at the Federal Trade Commission to restrict the collection and sale of personal data for the purpose of delivering advertisements. The IAB represents both data brokers and online media outlets that depend on digital advertising, such as CNN, the New York Times, MSNBC, Time, U.S. News and World Report, the Washington Post, Vox, the Orlando Sentinel, Fox News, and dozens of other media companies.
Interesting how those companies are all listed as if they’re separate entities. But you know better, of course.
The article goes on to say:
In a letter, IAB called for the FTC to oppose a ban on data-driven advertising networks, claiming the modern media cannot exist without mass data collection. “Data-driven advertising has actually help preserve, and grow, news outlets since its inception over twenty years ago,” the letter said. “The thousands of media companies and news outlets that rely on data-driven advertising would be irreparably harmed by the Petition’s suggested rules.”
The media would be harmed if they couldn’t collect all of your data all the time. Wouldn’t that be horrible? How could they report the news if they didn’t know when your last menstrual cycle was?
Since we’re talking about media companies, I think it’s important to recognize that Russia banned misinformation and therefore CNN is going to stop reporting there.
So strange: wasn’t CNN part of helping us combat misinformation with covid? Aren’t they a beacon of truth? (Can you see the sarcasm dripping off of these letters on your screen?)
I think banning information is a travesty. Modern day book-burning is just as bad as physical book burning ever was.
But it sure is interesting that the past two years, the media has tried to sell us tell us that we need to trust only them and not any fringe sources for information because everything that’s not airing on their networks or platforms is “misinformation” and you ought to ignore it for your own health and safety. But now they’re being targeted for airing misinformation to the point that they’re no longer going to have a presence in Russia.
But along the same lines, Putin’s address from February 24th (which you likely haven’t heard yet and I recommend watching it below with subtitles or reading it here) was apparently removed from Russian sites for it being flagged as misinformation.
Who wins when the only thing you see is what someone else has deemed appropriate? Why not allow information to freely flow and allow the public the ability to discern for themselves?
Will some people get hoodwinked or even harmed by the free flow of information? Yes.
Freedom does not equate to safety. It never has. But the benefits of freedom outweigh the constraints of any amount of imposed or enforced “safety” that can be derived from its absence.
Do I believe what Putin says? No. But I also don’t believe what any other politician says.
Putin said some pretty incriminating things about America:
Overall, it appears that nearly everywhere, in many regions of the world where the United States brought its law and order, this created bloody, non-healing wounds and the curse of international terrorism and extremism.
Is he wrong? Is he right? How do you know? How could you know?
I won’t simply determine what I am in favor of based on what a talking head on a show that’s bought and paid for by companies whose interests do not reflect my own is parroting about what I should know and how I should feel about it. Remember Project Mockingbird? (If not, search my past posts.) Yeah. No thanks.
I still have no clear idea what’s happening in Ukraine. And I truly think only a small number of people *actually* know the full story. I think most of us are only getting the crumbs right now, and they’re all leading us in one direction. I’m skeptical that things are as cut and dry as they are being made to seem.
There are plenty of details coming up, but this is where I leave you if you’re a free subscriber. I appreciate all of my readers, so as I said, I’m just getting into the details of the stuff I’m finding in the raw data. And maybe that CHD Tea Time will pan out and I’ll get a few more sources that I trust and can lean on for help sifting.
If you’re local, don’t forget that this is happening Friday and I’d love to see you there:
Before I move into the paywall, this message is specifically for my reader Kim N.: You signed up to get a Beautycounter bag from me, but there’s a Venmo glitch. Please send me a message so I can get you your bag!
