The world can be unfair and cruel—often more than we realize or care to admit.
But even in the midst of all the heartbreak and injustice, there’s still plenty of good, and that’s worth holding onto. So we’ve gathered some of the most wholesome facts people have shared on Reddit to remind you that kindness, joy, and hope still exist. Hopefully, they’ll bring a little warmth to your day and lift your spirits. Enjoy!
#1
Hundreds of retired Japanese engineers volunteered to fix the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima power station so young people wouldn’t have to be subjected to the radiation.
Image credits: -LifeOnHardMode-
#2
The Netherlands sends Canada 20,000 tulip bulbs every year to thank them for their help during WWII.
Image credits: charpenette
#3
Pandas aren't on the endangered species list anymore.
Image credits: JSkywalkerr
#4
Humpback Whales instinctively protect other small sea creatures from Orcas. Apparently it's a mechanism that originates from wanting to keep their babies safe but this means they will also rush over and protect Seals and even fish from the scary predators.
Image credits: KindledAF
#5
All of Mr Rogers sweaters were knit by his mother.
Image credits: stringthing87
#6
Volvo created the three point seatbelt, but specifically gave away the patent and information so that it could save as many lives as possible.
> The reason the three-point seatbelt is so widely adopted is actually because Volvo opened up the patent so that any car manufacturer could use it in their design. They decided that the invention was so significant, it had more value as a free life saving tool than something to profit from.
> Volvo’s managing director Alan Dessell is quoted as saying: “The decision to release the three-point seat belt patent was visionary and in line with Volvo’s guiding principle of safety.”.
Image credits: soulreaverdan
#7
J M Barrie gave all the rights to Peter Pan to Great Ormond Street Hospital, a hospital dedicated towards the intensive care for children, in 1929, and this was later confirmed when he died in 1937.
Since then the hospital has received royalties every time a production of the play is put on, as well as from the sale of Peter Pan books and other products.
While the copyright of the Peter Pan has expired in the United Kingdom, it was granted a special exception under the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988 that requires royalties to be paid for commercial performances, publications and broadcasts of the story of Peter Pan within the UK, as long as Great Ormond Street Hospital.
Image credits: Assassinsaj
#8
The Mars rover sings happy birthday to itself every year.
Image credits: xtcloser
#9
Studies show that cats love people more than food.
Image credits: Pool_With_No_Ladder
#10
There is a waiting list for Belgian families to adopt graves in the US military cemeteries in Belgium. Families have taken care of the same graves for decades.
Image credits: NoWrongthinkAllowed
#11
Whales will bring their whale babi0es to visit heir grandparent whales. So like a whale will have a baby, and that whale will have a baby, and the first whale will help care for the youngest whale.
Image credits: anon
#12
People are training rats to detect landmines. The rats are too light to set the mines off and can small the explosive compound extremely well. The rats detect and mark each mine for a reward treat. The rats are very fast and can clear an area 3 times faster then use of electronic mine sweepers and with higher accuracy.
Image credits: Tiger_of_the_Skies
#13
Otters hold hands while asleep to stop drifting away from each other.
Image credits: Statscollector
#14
Rabbits will jump and dance when happy. It's called a binky. They also gently grind their teeth when they like how you pet them. Oh! If a rabbit throws itself onto one side, feet kicked out, it feels safe around you.
That's three facts, but, like rabbits, these things multiply.
Also, rabbits can be litter trained! They can also learn simple tricks, like coming when called, hopping in a circle, and jumping over obstacles!
Image credits: evilblackbunny
#15
The number of public libraries in the US is far greater than the number of McDonald's.
Image credits: frequencity
#16
Dogs have learned to understand laughter.
Image credits: EpLiSoN
#17
When cats rub their little face against you, they're claiming you as their property. They also have specific meows for humans (they create this on their own and is specific to their human). They also bring their owners dead animals because they don't think we know how to hunt.
Image credits: KermitTheFrorg
#18
Beavers are *incredible*. They're not just huge, adorable rodents with log cabins. Their tree-chomping and dam-building alters whole ecologies, effecting animal migrations and plant life for miles around. They're environmental engineers, architects, and look at those tails!
Image credits: Enty_Jay
#19
Astronomer here! I always get a warm and fuzzy feeling remembering that all the elements in us and in everything around us, save hydrogen and a little helium, were forged billions of years ago in a star. Carl Sagan said it best when he said this meant "we are all star stuff.".
Image credits: Andromeda321
#20
Dogs look at you when they poop because they're in a defenseless position thus trusting you to protect them if a dangerous situation occurs.
Image credits: silverrainz
#21
Choctaw Native Americans raised $170 to send to Ireland in 1847 to help provide relief during the Irish famine. This was only 15 years after they lost their land and 50% of their population died on the Trail of Years.
Image credits: Wakebrite
#22
Last time Liechtenstein went to war, they sent 80 soldiers to Italy to fight against Prussia. 81 came back, since none of the soldiers died and they brought an Italian "friend" with them.
Image credits: Regretful_Bastard
#23
When the shooting happened at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, so many people were signing up to donate blood that the blood bank phone service was unusable, and the lines to donate blood at buses were hours long. I literally could not find a way to donate blood. This made me feel a lot better about people, especially after having someone do such a horrible thing the same night I moved to Orlando.
Image credits: question_assumptions
#24
I've seen a lot of fireflies lately. Haven't seen them since I was a kid in the 70s.
Image credits: HankyLanky2
#25
Baby porcupines are called porcupettes. Omfg.
Image credits: tanyanubin
#26
Waaay late to the party, but children who are deaf, and raised by deaf parents will sign repetitive sounds and words at about the same rate hearing babies acquire language. Deaf babies basically sign goo-goo ga-ga the same way hearing children babble when developing language.
Image credits: FiveFingersandaNub
#27
Sometimes when they're out gathering, bees will fall asleep in flowers.
Image credits: KasperAura
#28
After Heath Ledger's death, who was still filming The Imaginariam of Doctor Parnassus, Terry Gilliam (writer and director of the film) thought the film was over. That was until he had the idea to for Jude Law, Colin Farrell, and Johnny Depp (all close friends with Ledger) to be brought in to play Ledger's character after transformations. They all said yes with out hesitation, opted to redirect their wages to Ledger's family.
Bonus fact, Tom Cruise showed interest in playing one of these character transformations, but was turned down as he had never been a close friend of Ledger's. Gilliam is quoted saying "I just wanted to keep this [in the] family—it's as simple as that [...] There were people even offering to come and help, they didn't know Heath. It had to be in the family somehow, I don't know why; it was my attitude".
#29
I always liked the story of Leo Messi and his wife. He is probably one of the most famous and richest stars in the world (he is a big footballer/soccer player). He had to leave his home country, Argentina, as a young teenager because he had pretty severe medical problems and a Spanish club offered to pay the treatments if he joined. He always was in love with the cousin of his best friend from home, and as soon as he was old enough to be able to afford to go back to Argentina regularly he went back to woo her and they fell for each other.
They kept the relationship secret for a long time, so nobody knows how long they have really been together, but it's at least ten years (since they were 19 or 20). He never wanted some super model or big star, just her. They seem to have a really happy, peaceful life together with two little boys. He almost completely shields them from public life, insisting they live just as a normal family. Part of this means that he doesn't reveal much in interviews, but it's clear that for all his professional success, being a husband and a father is what he cares about most.
EDIT: Added wholesomeness, after ten official years together, they finally got officially (or at least publically) married, [with their 5-year-old standing up for them](https://www.instagram.com/p/BWYLqnyB60x/?taken-by=antoroccuzzo88).
Image credits: editedfortypo
#30
I was on vacation in Germany over spring break. They have these "frog fences". These fences keep the frogs from crossing the roads and getting run over. At the end of the day somebody comes by and gathers the frogs and helps them cross the road.
Image credits: anon
#31
When babies first start to smile, they do it because they notice it makes their caregivers smile back. They do their best to make you happy.
Babies cry in their native language. That is, babies born to French speaking parents cry with different tonal patterns than babies born to parents that speak English or Arabic or German.
Image credits: anon
#32
Even though they're mostly seen as an annoyance, Pigeons are extremely faithful.
They mate for life and if their mate dies, they don't take another.
Almost makes me want to feel respectful of them when they build their nest on my balcony. Almost.
Then they s**t all over my patio furniture.
Image credits: anon
#33
The nation of Bhutan doesn't report GDP but instead Gross Happiness.
Image credits: anon
#34
There's a post office at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, because there's people who live down there, and the post office is required to deliver the mail to every citizen in the U.S.
They have to hike the mail in using people or mules. Apparently they get Amazon packages and junk mail, just like all the rest of us.
Image credits: Qubeye
#35
Central Park Zoo had a bonded gay pair of male chinstrap penguins, Roy and Silo. They carried around and attempted to hatch a rock like an egg, so the zookeepers gave them an abandoned egg to care for. They had a baby called Tango!
Goats will learn the name humans give to them and will respond to it.
Gentoo penguins make their intent known to their beloved by giving them the nicest pebble they can find, and then they mate for life.
Seahorses mate for life, travel with their mate by entwining tails, and the male seahorse carries and labors the baby seahorses.
Male puppies will let female puppies win during play fighting so that they can spend more time with her.
Worms like to snuggle each other.
Female elephants dig a pit when they're in heat, line up tasty fruits and leaves around the border of the pit, then lay in it and trumpet softly to attract their mate. They breed over a period of a few days, and eat the fruit to keep up their energy.
Dolphins have "names", which is a specific whistle pattern that is unique to the dolphin. Other dolphins will mimic these patterns to get the attention of the dolphin they want.
Baby chimpanzees make dolls out of sticks, and have been recorded playing make-believe with the poppets: scolding them, rocking them, pretending to bathe and feed them, and putting them to bed.
Sheep recognize human facial expressions and will exhibit happiness if they're smiled at by their caretaker.
Polar bears will share their meal with other polar bears, but only if the other bears ask politely by touching nose-to-nose.
Baby elephants suck on the tip of their trunk as a comfort stim, similar to how babies and children will suck their thumb or fingers.
Giraffe moms will travel all the way back to their own birthplace to give birth to their babies.
Macaque monkeys have snowball fights!
Mayor Stubbs has been the mayor in a town in Alaska for the past fifteen years! He is also a marmalade tabby cat.
Grizzly bears, upon setting out on their own as adults, will mark territory as close to their mother's territory as possible. Grizzlies just love they mamas!
Unborn chicks are able to communicate to their mother and siblings while still in the egg.
There are dedicated babysitters in wolf packs. They stay in a group and protect the pups of the pack while the parents hunt.
#36
Giraffes are very curious animals. If you lie down near one they will wlak over and check you out.
Image credits: Putin-the-fabulous
#37
Alfred Nobel made the Nobel Peace Prize because he wanted to make up for dynamite, an invention he hoped would make war impossible.
#38
Prairie dogs have a extremely complex language, not just nouns like most people think.
Image credits: stay-bold
#39
The man who voiced Mickey Mouse married the woman who voice Minnie Mouse, I think it's adorable.
#40
The probablity of you even existing is extremely low, iirc it was 1 out of 10^2,600,000 .... This takes into account all of your ancestors being in the same place, meeting, then liking eachother enough to giggity, up until your parents were born, grew up, met, fell in love, desired to have child, then you as a s***m beat millions of other s***m to fertilize an egg to then create you. And here you are, x amount of years later, reading this post of a piece of technology that is built from a rock found in the crust of the earth, wondering what is the most wholesome fact you know, when in reality, your existence itself is probably the most wholesome.
Image credits: IgneousFalcon
#41
If someone truly loves you, they tend to hug you for at least 5 seconds or more.
The more you talk about that person to others, the more you fall in love with that person.
#42
If your dog is running away from you, pretend to fall down. It will think you're hurt and come back to you.
#43
A quote from a Bollywood movie that I'm going to translate and paraphrase:
Joy increases when shared; grief reduces.
#44
Otters have a favourite stone they find when they're young and keep for life. They also mate for life.
#45
Wolves are one of the few mammals that mate for life with one partner.
#46
Blind people smile even though they have never seen someone smile before.
#47
Racing horses would get really nervous and anxious before races. The solution was to get the horse a goat partner, which would calm them down really well.
This is where the phrase 'gets your goat' comes from. It means to rile someone up, and people would go and try to steal the goats of horses they bet against to sabotage them.
Image credits: anon
#48
Gentoo penguins use pebble to propose to their life mates.
#49
Yellowstone didn't go off still.
