this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2025
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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago* (last edited 59 minutes ago) (1 children)

Pillsbury pie crusts - the kind that come rolled up, 2 in a box, come in a very standard box with the typical two big flaps at the end, one glued over the other, with two little side flaps inside. Safeway store brand pie crusts seem identical but have a slightly more complicated box. One flap peels open easily but the other flap is sort of latched into the little side tabs with little slots, making it hard to peel open. You have to rip the corners apart. It's totally unnecessary. The simpler Pillsbury box works fine.

Until just now my low-stakes conspiracy theory was that the store brand box was deliberately designed to create the disadvantage of being a slight pain in the ass to open. I figured Safeway pie crusts, like most store-brand products, are made by a major manufacturer - probably Pillsbury - and that Pillsbury probably made them under the condition that the package be harder to open, to create a tangible difference between the products.

However, when I started typing this I casually googled and found that Safeway buys their OEM pie crusts from Albertsons. This blows my conspiracy theory but now I wonder even more why the box design is so stupid.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 52 minutes ago (1 children)

I'm assuming it's a patent problem.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 40 minutes ago

I srsly doubt that the Pillsbury box design is still under patent, because it's been used in hundreds or even thousands of products I've opened over a span of decades - for example, pretty much every breakfast cereal box works that way. Two main flaps, two little tabs under them at the ends. The store-brand box is something I've never even seen before. Could be that it's designed to be opened along one side, with the "front" of the box opening as a lid. Then the structure would actually make sense. I dunno, next time I make pie I'll have a closer look.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

The majority of brands are involved in a scheme where their products lead to more consumption of another product.

Deodorant makes your armpits smell worse, needing to use more soap and continue to use deodorant.

Shampoo makes your hair need conditioner, and needs more products to look nice again needing to wash more frequently...

Soda makes you hungry and don't rehydrate, snacks make you thirsty and aren't satiating.

Food isn't nourishing, take these vitamins.

Clothing is getting made from materials that hold onto smells and wear more from washing, needing to be washed more often and washer needing repairs and buying new clothes.

Apps need more resources so you need the new phone to run them.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 59 minutes ago* (last edited 59 minutes ago) (1 children)

this is neither low-stakes nor harmless, it is also not a conspiracy😆

[–] [email protected] 1 points 42 minutes ago

Whoops 🤭

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago

Joy murdered Bing Bong in Disney's Inside Out (2015).

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 hours ago

Racial carbohydrate diet. You should eat the carbs that match your ancestors DNA.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

I think something cataclysmic happened during the Younger Dryas period and we may never know what but it's not coincidence there are multiple flood myths that evolved independently. Also, I think humans have been around longer than we realize and we're in another iteration of the same course of evolution waiting to get out of our Fermi loop.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 hour ago

Well, concerning the floods: flooding is still really bad and usually affects a huge area. Normally it is not like one village floods and everybody dies and the next village is completely fine. So, for people who do not get around a lot it might feel like the whole world was flooded. Then maybe they hit a few bad years in a row, and BAM, God or somebody wants to punish humanity story confirmed.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 hours ago

Radon is fake

[–] [email protected] 12 points 11 hours ago

Paul McCartney died in a car crash in 1964 and was replaced by someone who turned out to be a way better song writer.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (2 children)

The way literature is taught in school is designed deliberately to make people hate reading + studying the subtext and paratext.

By forcing kids to read books that aren't just old, but were written by 40 year olds for other 40 year olds, and then mandating them write reports about the symbolism of a book they didn't even want to read in the first place, you ensure that like 80% of people will inherently associate reading and interpreting media with every negative emotion at once.

Meanwhile you look at fandom dorks on every site and you see how invested on themes and subtext they are, and you realise people kinda naturally want to overthink media... Provided they like that media.

But people who can read subtext and understand it are less susceptible to propaganda. So.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 7 hours ago

This one resonates with me. I fucking love science fiction, and when they forced me to read The Giver, the closest they every got to science fiction, I actually enjoyed it. And then the rest of the time I hated it all.

If I had actually been given the chance to read some good science fiction, I would have been reading a lot more as a kid.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 hours ago

Damn. Good one.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

When you buy crisps sometimes there's just.... hardly any seasoning on them?? I'm talking crisps like Doritos or BBQ Beef Hula Hoops. There can be a massive difference with the amount of seasoning between batches and I'm sure they do it on purpose to make you buy more of them so you can get that really well seasoned batch you loved again lol. i don't actually believe this but I'd be interested to know why

[–] [email protected] 4 points 10 hours ago
  • they also taste overly dried out
[–] [email protected] 12 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

Local parking companies are getting rid of pay machines and forcing apps and QR codes on people so that it's less convenient to pay. They know people will have trouble so then they can fine people who are "non-compliant".

[–] [email protected] 1 points 41 minutes ago

They can also make money by tracking the link or better if have an app. If they're not selling the info then they would at least use it for internal statistics which is fair but we don't have to support that.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 hours ago

Apps and web sites can also apply custom pricing based on the individual's ability to pay. Payday? The parking spot costs more.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 14 hours ago

I like this because the app would also tell them exactly where to come look for the offenders car.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 17 hours ago (2 children)

Cats have a much more complex understanding of human behaviour and just consider us harmless and boring enough to not bother.

As in your cat totally understands that your keyboard is special in a way and you don't want it disturbed, but couldn't give two shits about your wants. Or completely being aware of how unpleasant it is when they sit on you with their butthole in your face, but why not if that's what they want to do right now?

I think this is real and that most (not all) cats are smarter and more selfish than we think

[–] [email protected] 13 points 15 hours ago (4 children)

Dogs are waaaaay more aware than most people seem to think. I think it's true of most animals. We just don't like to think about it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 hours ago

This. My dog knows words that I didn’t teach him. I know people talk about pattern recognition and what not but that’s not all that different than human knowledge. I learn words by hearing them repeated too

I know how to read his body language and the tone of his barks to know what he wants. He will even show me, if I ask him.

I suspect he understands a lot more than I am capable of deciphering as well.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I stayed out later than normal one time and missed one of my dog's walks. He tore up a newspaper while staring at me. Rip, rip, rip. He knew I spent time looking at newspapers so he chose to destroy one, while heavily implying that if I fucked up his schedule again he would rip ME up.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 10 hours ago

Aw, I can't help but be on his side.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 13 hours ago

Dogs brains activate the same regions when the see human faces that activate in our brains. These same regions don't activate in dogs to anything like the same degree when they see other dogs.

Dogs are far more in tune with us that they are with their own species.

Some of the oldest human archaeological sites have dog remains among the humans. Domestication of the dog was going on far far earlier than the first evidence we have for domestication of the first food species.

We have evolved together as two mutually symbiotic species.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 14 hours ago

I agree, but that's not a conspiracy. Scientifically speaking, we know that animals are smarter than most people admit.

The conspiracy here is that cats are not just smarter than we think but actually one of the smarter animals in general and they are also very internal and just don't care about us so they don't exhibit it in ways that we recognize.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

Some cats are extremely smart and very devious (looking at you, mother's cat) and some are. Well. I love them. But I've met cats that absolutely had nothing going on upstairs, not a single thought in their little brains.

That's rare though! Most are pretty smart and know how to convince us to do everything for them! And I always will do my best for them.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 15 hours ago

I think Vince Neil of Motley Crue got a ridiculously short sentence for drunk driving manslaughter because his record company bought off the judge so that they could make money off him performing. I suspect a lot of famous people have that happen.

[–] UniversalBasicJustice 15 points 17 hours ago (2 children)

JFK's head just...did that.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 13 hours ago

I'm convinced JFK is an opsec trick. There's nothing suspicious at all but if someone says that have a secret source about info the government hides and then mentions JFK, the agents investigating can drop it there because the know this guy is yakking out his ass.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 15 hours ago

I'm not saying there was candy inside, but did you see how she scrambled?

[–] [email protected] 36 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

Back when reddit had awards, the admins would routinely award posts to make it appear like people were actually buying them.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

I thought this was common knowledge.

I got awarded gold by a mod that told me they were gifted a certain number of awards from Reddit to give out (I believe they said they got 15).

The same mod also claimed that gold-gifted responses were given prioritized visibility.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 20 hours ago (2 children)

Microsoft deliberately fucks with your video and audio drivers before a big update so you have to reboot

This isn't a conspiracy, it is a proven fact.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 hours ago

I don't disagree, but I'd like some more info and/or sources.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 13 hours ago

Does anyone have a source on this? It’s 100% believable but I’m not turning anything up and this seems like something worth knowing more about

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