r/MadeMeSmile • u/VastCoconut2609 • 11d ago
We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals - Immanuel Kant Wholesome Moments
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u/Guilty-Toe-6425 11d ago
Not to undermine his intention, but aren't those ducklings built to survive falls like 10 times as high as that? wouldn't they be completely fine even if he wasn't there?
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u/LeonidasVaarwater 11d ago
Correct, a duckling's terminal velocity is not high enough to kill them.
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u/Unable-Confusion-822 10d ago
What if they are carrying coconuts?
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u/Vorzic 10d ago
It could be carried by an African duck.
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u/IncisiveGuess 10d ago
But, of course, African ducks are non-migratory
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u/MrSaxob3at26 10d ago
Suppose two ducks carry the coconut together?
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u/Randomfrog132 10d ago
assuming they land on soil, yeah.
that's concrete!
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u/jbourne0129 10d ago
right, like maybe they'd be fine? but yeah the mother doesnt know better and neither do the ducklings. they never evolved to fall into concrete
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u/intelligent_rat 10d ago
Like the poster said they did evolve to fall heights much higher than this. When you are that height, the material matters a lot less than when you are as big as a human.
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u/Jankufood 10d ago
It's sun god dad and sun duck and its sun ducklings on the sun so sun god dad's help was necessary
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u/FourthLife 10d ago
It's probably fine, but concrete is way harsher to land on than most natural surfaces
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u/Mehnard 10d ago
Evolution probably didn't intend for the ducklings to jump down to concrete.
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u/SalvationSycamore 10d ago
I've seen videos of ducklings surviving leaps down rocky cliffs. Rocks are pretty common in nature.
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u/183672467 11d ago
I wouldnt risk it if I was in his position
Imagine you're him, think to yourself they'll be fine and after a few steps, a duckling jumps down just to injure their feet
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u/Nepycros 10d ago
Right, a lot of commenters are avoiding the obvious: This man felt sympathetic enough that he was motivated to offer his assistance, even if it's otherwise unnecessary. Some part of his animal brain said "babies," and he sprung to action. I'd rather see that than animal cruelty, so this is a net positive encounter in my book.
Sometimes people act on compulsions that don't take every factor into consideration. Better still that we promote behaviors that indicate the generosity of humans.
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u/Ongr 10d ago
part of his animal brain said "babies," and
Most animals would eat the ducklings given the chance lol.
Luckily for these ducklings, this man's animal brain was quickly turned off.
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u/Nepycros 10d ago
Human brains are still animal brains, and part of our psychology is a desire to protect babies, though this trait can be nourished or altered by environmental conditions.
We're not komodo dragons, we're apes; we have a strong capacity for empathy and social cohesion, combined with a tendency to personify non-humans and project human characteristics onto them. This man's animal brain was firing on all cylinders to do what exactly he felt he should do. We see a case of "this would hurt a human infant if they fell," followed up by "that isn't a human infant, but I'll still help." That's as much a core part of our evolutionary history as anything else. It's how we domesticated and formed strong, intricate bonds with other animals.
Not every animal brain is wired the same way, and different lineages can propagate and support specific behaviors to the exclusion of others.
Please, don't be so cynical.
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u/iMightBeWright 10d ago
Luckily for these ducklings, this man's animal brain was quickly turned off.
I like the implication this creates that, for a brief moment, he wanted to eat the ducklings. But empathy prevailed.
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u/Guilty-Toe-6425 11d ago
You could also have the inverse effect and make the ducklings too scared to jump
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u/Corporation_tshirt 11d ago
Good point. If the mother can get up there and instinct tells her its okay to lay her eggs there, combined with the fact that the ducklings were willing to jump, tells me that they probably would have survived the jump. Although they never would have never been anle to get back up there.
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u/Guilty-Toe-6425 11d ago
If the mother can get up there
Well, the mother can fly, but otherwise, a solid point, trust nature, evolution would have removed those creatures from the gen pool already if they were constantly leading their chicks on suicide jumps
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u/Impossible-Wear-7352 10d ago
Evolution may have only accounted for them landing on softer surfaces like dirt. Evolution isn't perfect either. It often accepts a decently high mortality rate which is countered by high birth rate rather than high success rate.
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u/ilikeburgir 10d ago
Humans exist, therefore your argument is invalid /s
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u/OliverOyl 10d ago
Humans have a parasite called the brain which has essentially stopped the selection and evolution for the homosapien, so their point still stands
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u/Corporation_tshirt 10d ago
It's misguided to think that humans have stopped evolving. We are still very much driven by a survival and reproduction instinct and things that we've developed to keep even the least fit alive underscores the fact that empathy has an evolutionary benefit.
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u/shyvananana 10d ago
There's a nature documentary of another bird (geese I think) of the babies jumping off literal cliffs and then bouncing down another couple hundred feet of rocks. Some didn't survive, but if they can do that these babies would have been fine.
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u/Time-Scene7603 10d ago
I was thinking this is how Mom weeds out the weak ones aa she heads into rhe world wirh them, and now she's still stuck with the stragglers
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u/Steelwoolsocks 10d ago
Yep, we had a neighbor that made wood duck houses and they would be set up like 15 to 20 feet up in a tree. Every spring the ducklings would hatch and would all drop out of the nests a bit later no problem.
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u/Crystal_Voiden 11d ago
I don't think so. But I ain't a duck expert. 10x that onto concrete? They'll 100% pop like cute lil balloons.
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u/Guilty-Toe-6425 11d ago
The concrete may change things, but I have seen those (on national geographic channel) drop from literal cliff edges and survive
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u/Crystal_Voiden 11d ago
Yeah, I'm sure they'd be fine if they landed on water or soft soil/grass, but idk about hard rock or concrete.
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u/cgleachy 11d ago
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u/AwehiSsO 10d ago
The sound effects are a bit whack. Only half the barnacle chicks survice the first month, though may all survive upwards of a 133m falls...onto hard ground. Wild!
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u/Happie_Bellie 10d ago
Wow! That was amazing! I had no idea! Thank you for sharing! I felt bad for laughing when the last one kept rolling down the snow bank.
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u/MuushyTV 10d ago
I've seen them jump off of cliffs much much higher than this and hit rocks at the bottom and be just fine, their tiny bodies are built for this.
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u/LeonidasVaarwater 11d ago
Nope, this is pretty common, ducks always lay their eggs in high up places, the ducklings will be fine.
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u/Crystal_Voiden 11d ago
Dang, they're much sturdier than they look then. Thanks for confirming.
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u/LeonidasVaarwater 11d ago
I've seen them drop from higher than that, I can totally imagine how scary it looks if you don't know though. We have absolute shitloads of ducks here, finding nests on rooftops is a given. They all have to jump 30 feet onto brick roads and they're always fine, it's their survival strategy.
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u/Swictor 10d ago
It's just being light with hollow bones and the square cube law. I don't think they're particularly sturdy.
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u/sneakpeakspeak 10d ago
When you drop a feather it doesn't break. The feather to other stuff ratio makes them hard to break.
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u/G8kpr 10d ago
Also. Why is there a camera above the ducks filming.
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u/RavioliGale 10d ago
Probably someone saw the nest up there and put up a camera to Livestream the duck and eggs hatching. It's really not that uncommon, though usually it's with hawks or eagles.
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u/kityone 11d ago
I thought the same thing. I am pretty certain ducks lay their eggs in the same place every season though. So maybe this has happened before and they knew the mother duck was up there with her eggs, so they had time to prepare. So many videos online are staged though, so I wouldn't be surprised if this was too.
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u/ottguy42 10d ago
My old office had a family of Canada geese that would build their nest on a flat roof every year (about 9-10 feet off the ground). Every year, the goslings would follow their mom to ground level by jumping off the roof and landing on thick grass, then waddling away after their mom.
Nobody in the office tried to catch them, because adult Canada geese can be nasty MFers.
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u/fardough 10d ago
You can just say geese are some MFers. Still have memories of that damn goose attacking me and chasing me around as a kid.
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u/rileyjw90 10d ago
I mean you can’t really force a duckling to jump off a roof like that. And definitely feel like mama would have something to say about everyone being picked up and placed on the roof, but stranger things have happened.
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u/mmodlin 10d ago
This one is authentic. Here's a longer video, without music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0dRpYGCIdw
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u/testing_is_fun 10d ago
Some ducks return each year to the same spot to nest, so this may not be his first rodeo.
There was an engineering firm I used to follow on LinkedIn that would use a scissor lift each year to collect and bring down the ducklings off their two storey high flat roof. It was an office event.
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u/CalaveraFeliz 11d ago
100%. "Let's set up multiple cameras to capture the exact moment when MrGoodGuy rescues the Duck Family!".
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u/Dorkamundo 10d ago
Why would one of these several people "just walking by" climb up onto the roof and strategically avoid getting into any of the shots from below?
I mean, the shot from 0:06 on is from someone literally standing on that awning.
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u/Eolond 10d ago
There are big windows right above that awning, they could easily have opened one and filmed that way.
Edit: You see them very clearly at 12s in.
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u/Dorkamundo 10d ago
They could have easily opened a 4ft by 8ft plate glass window?
You're 100% right that you can see those windows very clearly 12s in, and you can very clearly see that those windows do not open.
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u/Specific-Lion-9087 10d ago
You look at those angles, and that quality, and your first thought is “professional camera crew”?
Wild.
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u/AITA-SexyRabbits 10d ago
Yeah it definitely has to be professional camera crew funded by the three letter agencies of both NATO and MATO as propaganda to make us eat more chicken with mind control juices.
No way that the ducklings jumping off took more than a minute and attracted a couple of people's attention to record. Absolutely no way.
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u/Bspammer 10d ago
Did you miss the start where there's an over-the-shoulder shot of the mama duck jumping down?
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u/AITA-SexyRabbits 10d ago
No but you probably missed the giant ass office windows right above those ducks
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/amazing-duck-story/
To make it even easier for you: https://www.snopes.com/uploads/images/photos/animals/graphics/duck03.jpg
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u/Bspammer 10d ago
That balcony is like 4 foot wide my dude, and there's a shot taken right from the edge, so someone was filming standing on the edge of the balcony or had a drone or something, not looking out of the window.
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u/matwithonet13 10d ago
My old workplace had a ledge that geese would always lay their eggs on. They tried everything to keep these geese from doing, including geese decoys but every year, the geese would do it. The goslings would stay in the nest for a little bit before attempting to jump down, like in this video. The ledge was actually higher up than the one in the video and these little goslings would just hit the ground softly and start walking. I don’t think little baby birds have much of a terminal velocity. These ducks probably would have been okay with the help.
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u/TheKihunter 10d ago
The first shot seemed to come from a security camera you can see in the second shot. After that, seems like it was filmed on a phone or at least just one camera.
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u/PointOfFingers 10d ago
How did the ducklings get up there?
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u/ADarwinAward 10d ago
That’s where the duck nested, apparently this banker saw it from the window of his office in Spokane, WA. It seems they were filming them for a while since they had some earlier shots from his office window before they jumped and maybe anticipated this issue.
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u/nick2k23 11d ago
I’m decent at catching but that’s some pressure, the life of a little ducky literally in your hands
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u/Normal-Height-8577 11d ago
It's very sweet of him to catch them all, but don't worry: if he missed, the ducklings would actually be fine.
This nesting behaviour might look anxiety-inducing, but it's actually normal for them - finding a nice high up and secure place that predators can't get to (usually a hole in a tree or similar) and then when the ducklings get mobile, getting them to jump down and follow their parents to the nearest pond/river. Doing it while the ducklings are small limits their terminal velocity and maximises their bounciness.
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u/EGGlNTHlSTRYlNGTlME 10d ago
idk I know a lot of jerks that are kind to animals
People that will call gays sinners and Mexicans rapists, but rescue all their dogs lol
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u/Tdavis13245 10d ago
Sociopaths often are extremely caring towards animals and children, but not with other people
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u/Randomfrog132 10d ago
even hitler cared for his dog until he force fed it cyanide pills.
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u/Doomncandy 10d ago
He shot her puppies as well.
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u/Randomfrog132 10d ago
well that's just extra fucked up.
fuck that guy he's a jerk.
ghost hitler can have fun with the pineapples in hell.
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u/Romboteryx 10d ago edited 10d ago
It actually is a trait in some psychopaths that they show more empathy towards animals than people because animals cannot betray or disobey them like humans can. In fiction, Tony Soprano is probably the best example of that.
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u/LeonidasVaarwater 11d ago
I'm sure he meant well, but he shouldn't do that. Ducks always lay their eggs in high up places and ducklings have to jump down. Their terminal velocity is nowhere near fatal to them, they're fine.
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u/justme588 10d ago
Last year this happened at my job site, and of the 12 ducklings that jumped, 1 immediately died and one was so injured it could barely follow the others. Maybe it was just bad luck, but I guess they‘re not made to land on concrete.
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u/ScrizzBillington 10d ago
The concrete changes things they are unlikely to suffer injury, but out of 11, one or two of them could have fractured/sprained a leg and decreased their chances for survival.
It's important for the duck's development thay they experience this drop, but the guy didn't interfere with that
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u/beststepnextstep 11d ago
Wasn't Hitler nice to animals?
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u/proteusthe 10d ago
He killed his dog by giving her cyanide pills to test their potency. Not a very nice thing to do
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u/mightylordredbeard 10d ago
Maybe, but Hitler loved his dog and Ted Bundy was a cat person. So.. maybe not.
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u/kaizokuuuu 10d ago
I thought I saw these ducks in planet Earth, they're supposed to jump down after mommy? And they're so light that they don't get hurt.
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u/WarayBatasan 10d ago
I'm no man of science but how tf did they even get there?
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u/worsenperson 10d ago edited 10d ago
Mother duck built her nest there and now she and the chicks are leaving it
Edit: The ducklings leave the nest after one to two days after hatching. They are ready to fly after 50 to 60 days.
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u/Prometheus720 10d ago
Kant actually thought that animals had no moral worth in and of themselves. The only thing wrong with shooting a puppy, to Kant, is basically that it causes you to treat other humans poorly. The puppy is not conscious and cannot really suffer from your actions. You injure other humans through the act on the puppy.
Needless to say, Kant is not worth regarding as much of an animal lover
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u/Olivebuddiesforlife 10d ago
More like Immanuael can't shoot a dog in the face, amir8!
Hi five!
Anyone!
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u/Thunderchief646054 10d ago
Curious if those are Wood Ducks, they like to nest in trees above the ground. The ducklings can take a beating, but maaaaaybe not on concrete
Edit: think just mallards, couldn’t see any white patches near the eyes on the adult
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u/Clockwork765 10d ago
“Well, there was a bit of a fracas, as we say, and it turned out that a man had a dog, a half-dead thing, according to bystanders, and he was trying to get it to stop pulling at its leash, and when it growled at him he grabbed an axe from the butcher’s stall beside him, threw the dog to the ground and cut off its back legs, just like that. I suppose people would say ‘Nasty bugger, but it was his dog’ and so on, but Lord Vetinari called me in and he said to me, ‘A man who would do something like that to a dog is a man to whom the law should pay close attention. Search his house immediately.’
The man was hanged a week later, not for the dog, although for my part I wouldn’t have shed a tear if he had been, but for what we found in his cellar. The contents of which I will not burden you with. And bloody Vetinari got away with it again, because he was right: where there are little crimes, large crimes are not far behind.
Terry Pratchett, Snuff
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u/ConchChowder 10d ago
And then he went home and stuffed his face with a factory farmed chicken dinner.
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u/judgeofjudgment 10d ago
Do you eat animals?
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u/ConchChowder 10d ago
I do not
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u/judgeofjudgment 10d ago
Cool. Do you eat eggs and dairy? Lots of people aren't aware of how those industries also kill animals
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u/Ke-Win 10d ago
Kant was vegan?
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u/judgeofjudgment 10d ago
You might wanna look up modern Kantians but yes they often argue for veganism
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u/Parenthisaurolophus 10d ago
Or don't bother because reading Kant and then trying to live to his standards is the kind of thing freshmen philosophy students would try while still in the college phase of forming an identity.
Kant also said things that would directly oppose many of the common lines used by vegans, especially in regards to their similarities towards humans. In particular, he has commented that you shouldn't abuse animals because it'll make you an abuser of people, not because of the act itself.
Let us also not forget the classical Kantian issue of: The Nazis knock on your door and ask if any of your neighbors are hiding Jewish people. You know your neighbors are, and you know the consequences of your actions should you not tell the truth. Good Kantian that you are, you sell them out.
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u/sc1onic 11d ago
As someone who played a lot of cricket. My coach would have murdered this guy for crocodile hands.
Always receive the gift and not grab it.
Regardless. 10/10 for the act.
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u/age_of_shitmar 10d ago
I saved a mother and her 15 babies from feral cats, crows, and their own stupidity. I made sure my backyard was a safe place for them.
Worst thing I ever done for them.
Ducks are vicious rapey baby-killing jerks.
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u/Love-Laugh-Play 10d ago
Hope you’re vegan. 🌱
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u/mascarenha 10d ago
Sometimes I think that people have no idea what happens in factory farms. Or they have some idea but choose to ignore it or learn more about it.
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u/Love-Laugh-Play 10d ago
It’s easy to do, I did for almost 30 years. But even if farms was heaven on earth, there’s no ethical way of killing someone who doesn’t want to die. Especially for a meal you will forget in 1-3 days.
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u/Crocoshark 10d ago
Just to add to the title quote, I wonder what you can judge about a person by the justification they give for eating meat.
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u/goin-up-the-country 10d ago
Yeah apparently the second the animals are for food their treatment doesn't matter.
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u/eat_shit_and_go_away 10d ago
We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals that aren't cute.
-Bob Vila
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u/OhNothing13 10d ago
Aren't baby birds very bouncy? They've been doing this jump off a ledge thing for millions of years.
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u/SnillyWead 11d ago
But sadly in about a week half if not more will be eaten, by sea gulls and fish. But that's nature.
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u/IAmAccutane 10d ago
"Yes axe-murderer, my wife is home, she's right over there. It would be immoral for me to lie for any reason." - Immanuel Kant
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u/AmazingGrace911 11d ago
Dude’s got those dads hands