Mansi Parikh

..When a lifetime isn't enough, you want to rely on a few words..

[Phantom @effoff1988]

Caitríona Balfe is about have the most exciting month of her film career with 3 prestige supporting roles.

A Long Winter world premiere in Telluride tomorrow, Tenzing on Saturday, Sense & Sensibility UK opening day on the 25th.

Her Oscar campaign starts in earnest this weekend!

[Phantom @effoff1988]

Caitríona Balfe is about to deliver a generational post-Outlander era; having already wrapped on 4 (!) prestige films, wrapping soon on a beloved IP film & next shooting a prestige series with an auteur who has 4 (!) Oscars (2 for directing, 1 for cinematography & 1 for editing).

[Brian Rowe @ TIFF26 @mrbrianrowe]

One of the most egregious examples of the wrong person from the same movie being Oscar-nominated has to be Judi Dench taking Caitriona Balfe’s spot for Belfast

[Orihime @Orihime_chan0]

There is something magical and nostalgic about this, I’m obsessed 🥹

[Federico Italiano @FedeItaliano76]

A photograph by Félix Thiollier (c. 1899)—quite possibly my favourite photograph of all time

[J.K. Rowling @jk_rowling]

You’ve asked me several questions on this thread and accused me of avoiding answering, so here goes.

I believe a woman is a human being who belongs to the sex class that produces large gametes. It’s irrelevant whether or not her gametes have ever been fertilised, whether or not she’s carried a baby to term, irrelevant if she was born with a rare difference of sexual development that makes neither of the above possible, or if she’s aged beyond being able to produce viable eggs. She is a woman and just as much a woman as the others.

I don’t believe a woman is more or less of a woman for having sex with men, women, both or not wanting sex at all. I don’t think a woman is more or less of a woman for having a buzz cut and liking suits and ties, or wearing stilettos and mini dresses, for being black, white or brown, for being six feet tall or a little person, for being kind or cruel, angry or sad, loud or retiring. She isn't more of a woman for featuring in Playboy or being a surrendered wife, nor less of a woman for designing space rockets or taking up boxing. What makes her a woman is the fact of being born in a body that, assuming nothing has gone wrong in her physical development (which, as stated above, still doesn't stop her being a woman), is geared towards producing eggs as opposed to sperm, towards bearing as opposed to begetting children, and irrespective of whether she's done either of those things, or ever wants to.

Womanhood isn't a mystical state of being, nor is it measured by how well one apes sex stereotypes. We are not the creatures either porn or the Bible tell you we are. Femaleness is not, as trans woman Andrea Chu Long wrote, ‘an open mouth, an expectant asshole, blank, blank eyes,’ nor are we God’s afterthought, sprung from Adam’s rib.

Women are provably subject to certain experiences because of our female bodies, including different forms of oppression, depending on the cultures in which we live. When trans activists say 'I thought you didn't want to be defined by your biology,' it’s a feeble and transparent attempt at linguistic sleight of hand. Women don't want to be limited, exploited, punished, or subject to other unjust treatment because of their biology, but our being female is indeed defined by our biology. It's one material fact about us, like having freckles or disliking beetroot, neither of which are representative of our entire beings, either. Women have billions of different personalities and life stories, which have nothing to do with our bodies, although we are likely to have had experiences men don't and can't, because we belong to our sex class.

Some people feel strongly that they should have been, or wish to be seen as, the sex class into which they weren't born. Gender dysphoria is a real and very painful condition and I feel nothing but sympathy for anyone who suffers from it. I want them to be free to dress and present themselves however they like and I want them to have exactly the same rights as every other citizen regarding housing, employment and personal safety. I do not, however, believe that surgeries and cross-sex hormones literally turn a person into the opposite sex, nor do I believe in the idea that each of us has a nebulous ‘gender identity’ that may or might not match our sexed bodies. I believe the ideology that preaches those tenets has caused, and continues to cause, very real harm to vulnerable people.

I am strongly against women's and girls' rights and protections being dismantled to accommodate trans-identified men, for the very simple reason that no study has ever demonstrated that trans-identified men don't have exactly the same pattern of criminality as other men, and because, however they identify, men retain their advantages of speed and strength. In other words, I think the safety and rights of girls and women are more important than those men's desire for validation.

I sincerely hope that answers your questions. You may still disagree, but as I hope this shows, I’m more than happy to have this debate.

[anand mahindra @anandmahindra]

Really?? The truth is that, in large part, our poverty was a result of decades of colonial rule which systematically plundered the wealth of an entire subcontinent. Yet the most valuable possession we were robbed of was not the Kohinoor Diamond but our pride & belief in our own capabilities. Because the goal of colonisation—its most insidious impact—is to convince its victims of their inferiority. Which is why investing in BOTH toilets AND space exploration is not a contradiction. Sir, what going to the moon does for us is that it helps restore our pride & self-confidence. It creates belief in progress through science. It gives us the aspiration to lift ourselves out of poverty. The greatest poverty is the poverty of aspiration…

[Aabhas Maldahiyar 🇮🇳 @Aabhas24]

Creation of world:
Islam— in 6 days by Allah (Qur'an 7:54)
Christianity— in 6 days by God (Genesis chapter 1 &2), works is around 6000 years old.

Hinduism— doubts if even God created it or even if he knows who created it. It believes in unending cycle of time. Let’s elaborate.

Prakriti (primal matter) remains mixed for a maha-kalpa (life of Brahma) of 311.04 trillion years, and is followed by a maha-pralaya of equal length. The universe (matter) remains manifested for a kalpa (day of Brahma) of 4.32 billion years, where the universe is created at the start and destroyed at the end, only to be recreated at the start of the next kalpa.

A kalpa is followed by a pralaya (partial dissolution = night of Brahma) of equal length, when Brahma and the universe are in an unmanifested state. Each kalpa has 15 manvantara-sandhyas (junctures of great flooding) and 14 manvantaras (age of Manu), with each manvantara lasting for 306.72 million years.

Each kalpa has 1,000 and each manvantara has 71 chatur-yugas (epoch, ie maha-yuga), with each chatur-yuga lasting for 4.32 million years and divided into four yugas:
1)Sat Yuga (1,728,000 years)
2)Treta Yuga (1,296,000 years)
3) Dvapara Yuga (864,000 years)
4) Kali Yuga (432,000 years) <current Yuga>

The Nasadiya Sukta (Rigveda 10.129) is agnostic about the creation of the primordial beings (such as the gods who performed the sacrifice of the Purusha). It states that the gods came into being after the world's creation, and nobody knows when the world first came into being.

The sukta poses a question for who created the universe, & if anyone really know, and if it can ever be known.

The Devi Sukta of RigVeda (10.125) states Devi is the creator. Who is Devi? Shakti, the power.

The skepticism and questioning is core of Hindu Civilisation. Not to forget how it recounts the creation of gods, by almost affirming creation out of nothing.

The RigVeda 10.72 states:

1) Now amid acclaim we will proclaim the births of the gods,
so that one in a later generation will see (them) as the hymns are recited.

2)The Lord of the Sacred Formulation [=Bhṛaspati] smelted these (births) like a smith
In the ancient generation of the gods, what exists was born from what does not exist.

3)In the first generation of the gods, what exists was born from what does not exist.
The regions of space were born following that (which exists)—that(which exists) was born from the one whose feet were opened up.

The RigVeda 1.24 goes more inquisitive posing question as below:

“these stars, which are set on high, and appear at night, whither do they go in the daytime?”

RigVeda 10.88 asks:

“how many fires are there, how many suns, how many dawns, how many waters? I am not posing an awkward question for you fathers; I ask you, poets, only to find out?"

Surely Hindu Notion is not grabbed by the idea of a god sitting up there is sky who commands it all. In fact metaphorical and allegorical treatments in Puranas too align with way more progressive ideas of creation than counterparts.

[#WOMENSART @womensart1]

“As a woman I have no country. As a woman I want no country. As a woman, my country is the whole world.” - Virginia Woolf.

Portrait of the writer by her sister, artist Vanessa Bell (c.1912).

[stop_using_chatgpt @jjma77]

@moorehn As a Californian who has been through this too many times to count, mask outside, limit physical activity (pets too), keep windows closed, use air purifiers, take steaming showers before bed, wash your hair if you can. And when the air clears give your lungs a few days to recover

[World Child Cancer @WChildCancer]

Exciting news! ​

Our Patron, @caitrionambalfe, has recorded a special appeal for us with BBC Radio 4 to share our mission to help children with cancer around the world.

On Sunday 4th of June, tune into our BBC Radio 4 appeal and support World Child Cancer. #TogetherForChildren

[Neil deGrasse Tyson @neiltyson]

March 20, 2023

Happy Equinox to all residents of Planet Earth.

On this day, the whole planet -- pole to pole -- gets equal daylight and nighttime. One of four days in our orbit that mark the change of seasons: Two equinoxes (March &amp; Sept) &amp; two Solstices (June &amp; Dec).

[Calvin and Hobbes Fan Account @Calvinn_Hobbes]

🪐🔭🌌 #CalvinandHobbes

[Josh Horowitz @joshuahorowitz]

Your reminder of the day that Kate Winslet rules for so many reasons.

Our full chat is here: https://t.co/A6DV77H4cc

[Gabbar @GabbbarSingh]

Winter mornings are best lived in a family home built 100 yrs ago, with everyone slowly waking up &amp; incrementally adding to the morning chaos, a devotional bhajan leaking from somewhere, steel utensils clanking &amp; a guy in a lungi talking with their mouth full of Toothpaste lather

[#WOMENSART @womensart1]

More of artist Helga Stentzel's 'clothesline animals' #WomensArt

[Calvin and Hobbes Fan Account @Calvinn_Hobbes]

Who else is having a lazy weekend? #CalvinandHobbes