Not in a great spot. My material needs are met, so don't worry about that. Just want to break out of the cycle I'm in of "oh hey, you have only a few hundred from this paycheck before you're negative again."

  • SerLava [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Much as I hate to say it, selling plasma. It won't get you all that money but if you're marginal it'll be significant

    • neroiscariot [none/use name]
      ·
      2 years ago

      To piggyback this, most donation centers offer sign up discounts where you'll get about $1000 the first month.

    • NewAcctWhoDis [any]
      ·
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      For what it's worth, blood plasma is actually super important for some people and you're helping them by "donating".

    • InternetLefty [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      This is however not a very pleasant experience (source someone close to me). You will get shot full of drugs for 2-3 weeks and it will make you feel very poopy. Not to mention the injections can be quite painful.

    • TyMan210 [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      I know a couple who built up a whole aquatics business off the back of breeding and selling ramshorn snails at the beginning. They don't go for much individually (depends on the variety), but they breed so prodigiously that it doesn't take long before you have more than you can easily sell lol. And they have basically no care requirements lol.

      I wish my neos would breed though. :sadness: I'm not even wanting to sell them, I just want more lol. I think I just don't do enough water changes, but unfortunately I don't always have the time to

      • MerryChristmas [any]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        If we can get enough interest to start a c/aquariums, I swear I will be the number one power poster on this site.

        I've found a few things that really help with keeping your neo colony going: lots of java moss, diffused lighting and a decent calcium source. Aquarium Coop sells these calcium blocks called "Wonder Shells" that seem consistently trigger spawning behaviors in all of my inverts.

        Edit: Holy shit I'm reading this thread and nevermind on c/aquariums.

        • spectre [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          If we can get enough interest to start a c/aquariums

          Do a regular "aquariums" thread to start out with

        • TyMan210 [he/him, comrade/them]
          ·
          2 years ago

          I would 100% be down with that. I think it's pretty easy to get a new community to be made, there just has to be people willing to be mods beforehand.

          Good to know, thanks! I'll have to spend some time and see if I can't get them going better. About a third of the tank is a big patch of rotala that gives them a lot of space to hide that's out of direct light, but I've had bad luck with moss growing string algae that I can't get rid of without removing the moss. Probably also to do with the water changes lol. I hadn't heard about the calcium thing though, I'll definitely try that when I can!

      • MerryChristmas [any]
        ·
        2 years ago

        This has always been my plan if I ever end up in prison! From what I have been told, the animal tamer niche sort of let's you bypass some of the tribalism. Everybody loves pets.

    • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Animal exploitation and murder are horrible and disgusting and you should deleted this comment.

      Shrimp and fish are sentient creatures, and you should feel ashamed that you're proposing torturing others as chattel slaves and commodities for a quick buck.

      https://www.shrimpwelfareproject.org/are-shrimps-sentient

      https://viva.org.uk/blog/do-prawns-and-shrimp-feel-pain/

      https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/16/science/depressed-fish.html

      https://aeon.co/essays/fish-are-nothing-like-us-except-that-they-are-sentient-beings

      • MerryChristmas [any]
        ·
        2 years ago

        I absolutely understand why this wouldn't be an "agree to disagree" sort of thing for you, but I'm not having this argument right now. I'll read and consider the links you shared, though.

          • MerryChristmas [any]
            ·
            2 years ago

            If I saw someone's actions as tantamount to genocide then I wouldn't simply agree to disagree. That's what I understand and that's why I'm not asking her to hear me out.

            • Maaskarpone [they/them]
              ·
              2 years ago

              Not good enough. You clearly don't view the animal holocaust as genocide. You don't have the right to simply disengage when the facts don't suit your material interests. Your actions have real-life harmful consequences on the lived experience of subjective, animal people.

              Three questions:

              1. How do you define sentience?
              2. What is the base value of humans?
              3. What do you call systemic killing?

              I'll give you the answers now to save time:

              1. capability of feeling
              2. capability of feeling. Therefore, you should extend the base value of humans to other animals, who are also capable of feeling.
              3. genocide
                • Maaskarpone [they/them]
                  ·
                  2 years ago

                  I did say:

                  You don’t have the right to simply disengage when the facts don’t suit your material interests.

                  So... ...engaaage and stop ignoring / avoiding the issue vegans raise?

                  • MerryChristmas [any]
                    ·
                    edit-2
                    2 years ago

                    You're right, you did say that.

                    I've already said that I'm going to read the articles that were suggested to me and consider whether they support the idea that breeding pet shrimp is a form of genocide. I don't know what else you expect to get out of this interaction.

                • Maaskarpone [they/them]
                  ·
                  edit-2
                  2 years ago

                  The insult doesn't bother me. I had to actually google that term because I didn't know what it meant, and I'm actually quite impressed I gave the impression of a philosopher, as much as I find them as a general rule of thumb revolting people.

                  Your insult does beg the question, though: Are values unimportant to you? I focus a lot on values in the points I make. I value human life, for example, and that's why I became anticapitalist. My value for them means I believe shelter should be a human right, and therefore I'm against capitalist private property, like landlordism, for example.

                  • a_blanqui_slate [none/use name, any]
                    ·
                    2 years ago

                    Don't worry, you didn't give the impression of a philosopher.

                    And values are ethics, not ontology. Both metaphysics, but not the same. Ontology is the study of "being" and of the attributes that make a "thing" that particular thing.

                • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
                  ·
                  2 years ago

                  Why the fuck are you even bringing up genocide, the Holocaust, and Judaism as a response to me telling you to stop hurting animals? You're very obviously using us as a prop and it's fucking gross and antisemitic. Your very mature response of "no u" when I said you're using Jews as a prop is belied by the fact that it has absolutely nothing to do with carnists like you mocking vegans for saying we shouldn't breed and murder shrimp and fish for money because they're sentient beings who deserve consideration and don't want to die.

            • Maaskarpone [they/them]
              ·
              2 years ago

              Your tone indicates you're not taking me seriously, when I expect a serious response requiring proper engagement from you on the issue of animal abuse. Why aren't you vegan? Please read on the principle of charity. Unironically, though, there is an animal holocaust; you are right. :)

                    • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
                      ·
                      edit-2
                      2 years ago

                      Why do you care? You're clearly not asking in good faith. It's wrong to hurt nonhumans, and you should stop trying to justify it by using Jewish people like me as a prop

                        • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
                          ·
                          edit-2
                          2 years ago

                          It's called a loaded question. So have you, yes or no? If you don't say yes, I'll assume you're still beating your wife

                          • Dingdangdog [he/him,comrade/them]
                            ·
                            edit-2
                            2 years ago

                            This is just right wing deflection tactics. Defend your theory, I'm asking a basic question and you're just avoiding it.

                            I'll ask it again and explain my reasoning for asking it:

                            Do vegan beliefs in sentience go so far as to include arthropods, such as wasps, AND if so does that mean to you that the destruction of their nests count as genocide?

                            I am not trolling you. I am literally following on how this thread started, wherein you all told me arthropods were sentient.

                            This is engaging your theory, based on exactly what you said. Give me an answer to this and I'll leave it alone. Not some reddit post. Tell me, in your words, what your theory says about this question.

                            • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
                              ·
                              2 years ago

                              This is just right wing deflection tactics.

                              You think me mockingly doing the thing you've continued to do to me even after I pointed it out repeatedly is right wing? Interesting

                              • Dingdangdog [he/him,comrade/them]
                                ·
                                2 years ago

                                I'm not mocking you. I'm literally asking you the same question on repeat. Either way I'm done, one of your comrades responded with an actual answer.

                • Maaskarpone [they/them]
                  ·
                  2 years ago

                  I think the systemic killing of all animals is genocide. The animal kingdom includes wasps, so yes, killing wasps is genocide.

                  They are the same thing in terms of genocide. However, as clarification, would I more broadly call the oppressions the same thing in an imprecise way? Yes and no. Yes, because of the co-constitution between animal and human oppression, whose context, values, ideologies, socialised/codified social behaviours and social structure/material conditions are full of continuities. No, because they still have different contexts and have unique oppressions in their own ways. An imprecise answer to that question is analogous to someone saying racism and queerphobia are the same things, which is something I wouldn't claim. Everything needs to be looked at and explored in its unique entirety. We need to acknowledge both the similarities and the differences of the oppressions and consider their unique entireties in order to uproot their evils to our best extent.

                    • Maaskarpone [they/them]
                      ·
                      2 years ago

                      No problem. You're welcome.

                      Though, you do realise one of the reasons why the other person wasn't answering your question is because it's offensive to tokenise groups of people with a bad-faith question. At least, I wouldn't answer in their shoes. The user provided the perspectives of holocaust survivors or their family members. Please read the compiled perspectives, but more crucially please urgently change your behaviour to the animals according to vegan ethics. You don't need to know theory to know that killing innocent beings, our animal cousins, is wrong. You only need empathy and an empathetic (empathic?) response. You understand they suffer like us and want to live? And that their suffering at our hands and their desire to live are valuable for our decision-making? Then, we can act on that. The theory is an added treat, helping us to develop our understanding, but it is not crucial to make this change in behaviour. The theory can come after the switch, and can help develop your praxis.

        • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
          ·
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          It's not a comparison, they're literally chattel. They're literally sentient. Stop being a slavery apologist, human supremacist

            • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
              ·
              2 years ago

              You exclude nonhumans from personhood so you can excuse forcing them to labor and die for your own profit. You don't want to call it slavery because you're a human supremacist

                • pocket_tofu [she/her,fae/faer]
                  ·
                  2 years ago

                  Perhaps the social schematism of perception in anti-Semites is so altered, that they cannot even see Jews as human beings. The ceaselessly recurrent expression that savages, blacks, Japanese resemble animals, or something like apes, already contains the key to the pogrom. The possibility of this latter is contained in the moment that a mortally wounded animal looks at a human being in the eye. The defiance with which they push away this gaze – 'it’s after all only an animal' – is repeated irresistibly in atrocities to human beings, in which the perpetrators must constantly reconfirm this “only an animal,” because they never entirely believed it even with animals https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/adorno/1951/mm/ch02.htm

    • Maaskarpone [they/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Ew, how disgusting, vile and unethical. Have some dignity as someone that calls themselves a leftist, and show some dignifying behaviour towards animals who have continuities with humans, like feeling pain. Your behaviour towards living beings falls short of basic, bare-minimum standards.

    • HugeRudeTalkingPenis [he/him,any]
      ·
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      Also whey protein powder is highly overrated. Check how much sugar it has. Grocery stores are PRICEY compared to online.

      Vegan protein powders or just Walmart powdered peanut butter (it actually has no sugar added and 83% of oil removed, 50% protein by weight it's a nutritionally perfect product, potassium is high like a dairy product, lots of fiber, it's delicious) are actually not more expensive than whey if you shop well.

  • MerryChristmas [any]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Do you have anything you can pawn? My buddy had to pawn his rifle recently because he was between jobs. It sucked to lose the gun and he got back way less than he'd spent on it, but he was able to eat until he found work.

    If you can cut back on expenses in any way, the easiest way to build a nest egg is to do it slowly. I'm sure you've read similar advice outside of leftist spaces, but take some time to do your research, find a few safe ETFs and then just set it to autodraft. It should be such a small amount that you don't really notice it, because let's be honest: you are gambling in this scenario and there's always the chance that you'll lose your entire investment. You will feel sort of dirty at first and you won't get to $3,000 fast, but you will get to $3,000 eventually.

    I started doing this the last time I got a raise. I just put the additional pay into a brokerage account and tried to ignore the rising cost of living. Even though the market isn't doing great, I still feel more secure knowing I have something to sell off, and if things truly collapse then I'll have bigger problems to deal with. I know myself and if I'd put that cash into a savings account, I would have taken it right back out at the end of the month when things got tight. Making the money a little more difficult to withdraw actually has some benefits if you struggle with impulse control and saving.

    • CantaloupeAss [comrade/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      I think there is a critical piece of common advice to add here which is, "Don't invest anything you can't afford to lose." The market can tank for years at a time, you need to be prepared to hold your investments through multiple down years to avoid actually losing your money.

      Typically investment in the stock market is only recommended after you have a cushion of like ~6mo living expenses in cash savings.

      I agree with this for people who are looking to save intelligently, but for someone who is living month-to-month, I don't think the stock market is a good idea, because you can't eat it.

      (then again, it's all contingent on what corgi means by "negative". Like, lost money on the month and dipped into savings, or is literally overdrafting their checking account?)

  • Tankiedesantski [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Start with $10k and invest it in crypto.

    Jokes aside, I have a friend who does transcription work on Fiver. Could be worth a look if you type fast.

      • Tankiedesantski [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        In the long term, probably. In the medium term, it'll probably just replace demand for transcribers with demand for AI transcription checkers.

  • flowernet [none/use name]
    ·
    2 years ago

    There are some cash advance apps you can take money from and not give back. This is legal and wont affect your credit, the TOS explicitly say this because they want to exist in a space with less regulation. I think most apps are around $500 max, so you can probably get close to $3k doing it several times. make sure though you disconnect your bank and stuff after you get the money, they will try to recover the money that way before they close your account.

  • xXthrowawayXx [none/use name]
    ·
    2 years ago

    It’s work as fuck, but any working tape deck from a thrift store is $50 on eBay and often times much more. Vcrs are almost always $20 and sometimes much more.

    eBay isn’t great, but here are some things you can do to protect yourself from ways it’s horrible:

    Make videos of everything you list demonstrating it’s condition and function. Make a proof of life video before you ship it and take pictures of how it was packed. Spend the $5 on shipping insurance.don’t spend any money you get from a sale until a month goes by.

    Buyers know that eBay will refund them (at you the sellers expense) for any reason for 30 days. They will absolutely take advantage of it, so document everything and don’t spend money that could get hoovered out of your account.

    Save broken down boxes and packing materials, they don’t take up much space. Put in your listings that you employ eco friendly practices to reduce waste.

    • xXthrowawayXx [none/use name]
      ·
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      Oh yeah, if you use that hell website, set your “if ordered by x, I will ship by x” times and days of the week up and stick to them. If you go on a trip or take a holiday, put eBay on pause in the settings.

      It’s inevitable that you’ll come back from vacation with ten people all pissed that their useless doodad is gonna be two days late if you don’t.

    • corgiwithalaptop [any, love/loves]
      hexagon
      ·
      2 years ago

      Any tips on what to steal? I've been applying for loans all fucking day, even those scammy looking websites arent able to help me. Trying some local credit unions, but I just drank a Monster and feel like crime now.

      What do?

      • WoofWoof91 [comrade/them]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        you'll need somewhere to offload the stuff, and bear in mind you won't get what the items are worth

        but what i used to go for (in descending order) was:
        cash (obviously)
        laptops
        jewelry
        phones
        games consoles
        blu-ray/dvd players (not worth much anymore)
        other electronics like tablets, cameras, etc.
        games/blu-rays/dvds (barely worth anything, but they add up)
        spirits
        cigarettes

        bear in mind burglary is a pretty serious crime, but you know, if you need the cash