faceh
27m ago
Basically what I'm saying. If the big national races are close, semi-coinflip outcomes should ultimately come down for the GOP in the end. You have to believe in a serious blue wave to expect a flip of the Senate, especially a flip that actually gives them 'control' vs. just a nominal majority.
faceh
32m ago
Yes.
Very literally yes.
If he didn't think they were within distance, why even bother? At this point, I suspect they view it as a simple matter of goosing turnout.
faceh
32m ago
Compared to Trump 1 this has been a positively stoic 2 years, with plenty of policy wins racked up.
I simply disagree.
The War is baked in, but as stated, gas prices have actually been on the downward trend, which is the main day-to-day reminder of the war.
I am genuinely surprised that the polls insist on a Democrat sweep at this stage.
Aside from Gas prices (which are trending down?) and a few bad candidates in races, the GOP is pretty well situated and the base seems motivated!
So I actually have some bets on some Prediction markets that there's a likely stronger Republican showing than expected, especially in Texas. Regardless of how 'bad' Paxton is, its just truly hard to imagine a Dem waltzing to victory there.
Which... we've already seen that the polls can have such a bias. As you're suggesting, if the polls have a bias AND any theoretical electoral fraud machine is crippled, we should honestly expect a narrow Republican victory rather than the certain blowout they allege is brewing.
Trump and Co. sure seem to be acting like they expect a good outcome.
So yeah. I will slightly update my priors on 'electoral fraud is a systemic problem and it impacts national elections' in favor of "true" if the Dems have an underwhelming night.
I AM bought in on the idea that the crushing of funding for various NGOs and similar government agencies that controlled the flow of 100's of millions of dollars with minimal accountability has resulted in the collapse of the overall lefty network of professional activists and organizers, and thus reduced their capability of shifting outcomes in various countries.
The amounts of rampant fraud that has come out in the last couple years is convincing me that there are well-oiled grift machines out there that convert tax dollars into either Mansions, Range Rovers, and Crab legs for some particular class of people, OR converts them into protests, election influence, and propaganda for particular candidates or causes. And STILL DOES, but has to be more judicious with its spending. Nudging a lefty candidate over the line in Bolivia, thus, would be less of a priority than, say, making one of your guys the Mayor of New York or Los Angeles.
And these flows were HIGHLY dependent on the U.S. government acting as a rich but absent-minded benefactor who hears a nice sounding cause or title and keeps writing checks because nobody told them what the money actually went to. Then you've got your George Soros' and Meckenzie Bezos supplementing these efforts, and funds being directed towards keeping those funds flowing, and it becomes a perfect parasitic organism.
So it is completely believable to me that organizations doing the work on the ground and sloshing money around to various causes in-country got dismantled due to lack of funding and these close elections are now slipping back towards the less-well-funded side.
I would want to see the actual money flows traced, however.
faceh
2hr ago
I am absurdly happy to hear that.
From what I can tell if you somehow manage to be one of the first 10 guys she talks to and one of the first 3 or 4 she goes on dates with, you can maybe have a shot at getting her locked down before she either becomes embittered by the process or realizes she can exploit said process. It amounts to luck of the draw to both find a good one AND be one of the first to get her attention. There's no way to strategize intentionally to this end that I can see.
Its this kind of gamification I despise.
faceh
2hr ago
lol, I know a guy who specifically went to China to find a wife. He's also divorced like 4 times so maybe not a great example. But his recounting of it is that she was basically going overboard to be appealing and supplicate his affections... and that as SOON as the airplane they were riding on entered U.S. airspace she swapped to cold semi-indifference and never went back. And, yeah, I can see that. Foreign women knowing precisely how to appeal to American men to get transported over to the grand utopia, and THEN knowing exactly how much they can get away with once they're there.
I have no reason to think Singaporean women would be better, but I think I'd enjoy Singapore more as a country.
The whole other issue with passport bro-ing is that once you've brought them here and they get situated, NOTHING stops them from absorbing the overculture and becoming an even nastier version of the women you were trying to avoid all along.
See @100ProofTollBooth and his insightful point here. You need a community to plug them into that will keep them on the straight and narrow!
faceh
2hr ago
The absolutely untenable problem that men have to contend with is that they can't just "marry a good one" - they then have to plug into a social circle and larger community that is predominantly "good ones."
Yes. It seems also necessary to "unplug" them from the screeching hivemind that will try to spike their anxiety 24/7 and feed her self-sabotaging advice to assuage that anxiety. This can also include her normal circle of friends. I keep hearing accounts that divorces are 'contagious' in social circles, as the first one to pull the trigger on divorce will get a lot of sympathy from the others... and will immediately start trying to sell the other on the idea of divorce so she's not the only one in this embarrassing social situation.
But if it comes out "oh my husband doesn't want me to use social media" that same hivemind will probably label him an abuser and redouble efforts to 'rescue' her from his influence.
You need other women - preferably high social status as possible - to "hold the line" on family and motherhood being the ultimate supreme good for women.
And this is why I fear its a downward spiral of feedback effects. The women who do this have to be HIGH STATUS for other women to follow suit. And 'they' have made 'girlbossing' and 'free spirit' women the pinnacle in the media lens, and shunted motherhood and being a pillar of one's community to second-class status in the majority of womens' minds, so there's no corrective mechanism arising!
You've kind of nailed the point, actually. I'm not saying all the biases 'cancel out' into the ground truth, but if you're following an account with a seeming Israel bias, and an account lacking one, and the one that lacks that bias is calling out/refuting a post by the biased one, and/or you're seeing that ONLY the Israel-biased account is posting about a given event, you can and should probably disbelieve the Israel-biased account unless they corroborate further.
You want a network that values shutting down falsehoods rapidly rather than propagating them. The holy grail is an account that will proactively correct themselves when they make errors.
The type you want to look for (ime) is a curmudgeonly 'autistic' type with deep subject matter knowledge on a given topic. And you should give them extra credence within that topic, and extra doubt on those topics they seem to have a chip on their shoulder about.
High disagreeability is a somewhat double-edged sword, but necessary to counter popular untruths.
There's a lot of Alpha up front in simply muting accounts you encounter often that spout falsehoods/mislead with regularity.
This place is one of the best spots for getting nuance on the news, and I follow a few, like @morlockp, our own TracingWoodgrains, and @hradzka that are willing to voice disagreement with a community, AND accept criticism of their position.
@St_Rev is a HUGE value add follow, the guy is capable of pointing out a misleading narrative or a missing variable from 1000 yards away
I don't think its as mine-fieldy as all that.
There used to be a time when resistance to the attempted assault was a precondition to criminal liability.
It was probably reasonable to revise this requirement for the reasons you point out: physical incapacitation can occur without needing an actual physical confrontation or restraint, drugs or other methods can be used.
BUT: the requirement that the victim resists physically has two handy features:
A) Removes ambiguity as to the attacker's 'knowledge.' If they were fighting back then they can't just say "well she seemed to be okay with it/didn't say no."
B) Creates evidence of the lack of consent in terms of injuries and DNA exchange and, if there happen to be any witnesses, they can hopefully describe what appeared to be a fight vs. voluntary public indecency.
But the mere fact that one becomes incapacitated on drugs or similar is probably not enough to prove consent was lacking. After all, you can consent to going into surgery even though you'll be under general anesthesia the whole time. Someone who is interested in sex with you can say, well in advance, "unless I tell you no directly I'm okay with us hooking up while I'm drunk." (most women will not do this, of course. They WILL hit a point of "teehee I'm going to order another drink even though I'm SOOOOOO drunk now...").
End of the day, even with your proposed high tech solutions, there will always be a 'mind reading' element b/c men are extremely motivated to seek out sexual contact and initiate the encounter whilst women, when their desire is inflamed, are ALSO motivated to seek sexual contact but to never, ever make that overt, or at least to rarely actually initiate it and always maintain some plausible deniability as to whether she wanted it or not right up until the event horizon is crossed.
Incidentally this is why I can't accept full consent-based morality without both a harm requirement and some social guardrails for individuals of 'reduced capacity.'
I've mentioned before about requiring young people to take actual tests that prove their comprehension of the activity they want to engage in (Note we already do this for driver's licenses) and any person who engages in an activity with another who lacks such a license is then strictly liable for any harms that result on that person.
I get increasingly convinced this is the only 'technological' solution that can replace the lost social fabric that might have patched over this problem. If you have a license that clearly states you know the actual consequences of using drugs and alcohol and you're aware of the risks of sexual contact of various types, someone can assume that when you agree to take drugs and do sex, you're legally (if not morally) down to clown and can't/won't come back later blaming them for the consequences/outcomes of the act.
And yes, that includes the reputational/social consequences.
Its been an insane blessing that I have spent the last ~10 years cultivating a deep skepticism filter for information sourced from the mainstream and from the normie social media, WHILE also cultivating high-signal/low noise channels that are reliable individually and trustworthy in the aggregate (i.e. if one of them disproves or refutes a given story this propagates to the others very quickly).
Epistemic hygiene is important, but one can't give in completely to germophobia.
Its not that I offload my own judgment to them so much as it allows me to quickly dismiss false positives: if I can't find some level of consensus that [X] happened as described then I will assume false until given further evidence. And in the age of AI videos that have an express bridge right over the uncanny valley, I'm vastly privileging events I can view with my own two eyes, physical photons bouncing off the actual atoms, or at least can observe the obvious ripple effects of such.
faceh
4d ago
But objectively most hookups are not leading to relationships or marriage.
And I can see why. It would not be DIFFICULT to maintain a roster of booty calls, and the incentive is in favor of doing so because of the aforementioned ghosting behavior. The easy solution to flighty women is to have backups.
But once you have a roster, how to choose one worth settling for?
Once again, the quality of women on offer is not promising. You HAVE to address this shortage.
faceh
4d ago
Read the actual opinions they hold.
faceh
4d ago
It's well that you're willing to dig all these details up but unfortunately the average young guy isn't. He is likely to be indoctrinated by mainstream liberal lipstick feminism, as are his parents
The current crop of Gen Z males is the least feminist of any currently-living generation.
Clavicular, in particular (hey that rhymes!) is a MAJOR public figure in their world. And he has the ability, if he wants, to publicize any particular detail of his case he wants.
faceh
4d ago
Not what I've observed from those particular pairings, but maybe just select for one with taller siblings.
You need to go somewhere where you can be in the top ten percent of men in the room.
COOL. Now which of these rooms are likely to have higher quality single women in then?
My problem is not being that guy, its finding a place where its worth the effort of being that guy.
My repeated experience is that the women are just not up to snuff. I'm not looking for hookups so I'd rather not burn effort in places where the options aren't great.
But they all THINK they deserve to get "that guy."
faceh
5d ago
Don't marry a fillipina or cambodian.
Funny enough I have met a good number of white male-filipina female pairings that seem pretty happy! The women can apparently be fiercely loyal too.
Unfortunately it'll also produce kids that are shorter than average, which might be bad for any future sons.
I might consider Singapore.
I've got an AI agent set up that is specifically designated with helping me both identify good places to go and try and meet women, AND vetting the ones I do find at least a bit.
I am at the point where I am willing to 'cheat' like crazy and pull every string to just get this process over with, but I also have to be realistic about the general odds.
faceh
5d ago
Oh yes, if they're going to an event they'll wear the outfit! But wearing it out day to day where they might meet a random guy? Much rarer in my experience.
I am glad to know that New England is still observing tradition.
faceh
5d ago
I've become a bit more strict about body count because the girl I almost married I met her during her 'hoe phase' (which she was open about) and thus I knew she had some history but was willing to take the shot anyway. She did end up cheating and leaving and to this day remains unmarried, 5 years later. She turns 31 shortly.
Its a signal that one cannot ignore, especially with how women will seek to hide it.
But you have to be flexible on that point. However, society becoming flexible on that point (thanks, sexual revolution!) is a large part of the underlying issue.
I wouldn't mail order but I would go abroad if you're in the anglosphere.
I sort of reject this solution because it exports the problem to that country. where are THEIR males supposed to go?
I mean, if I take a trip for other reasons and happen to find a wife, whatever.
Men need to sample from as many places as possible through pure online dating but other than that you especially need to sample from wherever has the women the most like you politically and intellectually.
Yes, and the political gap between young men and women is the largest its ever been. The women have flown off into la la land and nobody is correcting this trajectory.
Hence, the pool is too small.
Hopefully you will find something soon.
I have no reason to think I will.
However, that is also not a reason to quit.
But understand that I AM OTHERWISE WELL SITUATED. I own a house. I make six figures in a decently high-status job. I am extremely physically fit. I am a martial arts instructor (i.e. I can physically dominate 90% of the male population), I am well liked, I can repair stuff, I'm not bad looking. And I'm six foot two.
There is zero reason I should be struggling.
And if I'm struggling, I can only imagine how bad it is for guys not so well situated. And I think its best to help out their plight too.
What age bracket are you dating by the way? Marriage rates are down but young marriage is especially down so if you are dating under 25 it's clearly a systemic issue.
Basically anything above 21 and still in decent child-bearing shape. If I got my pick I'd aim for 25-27 (I'm most comfortable dealing with women in that bracket) but I have DIRECT EVIDENCE that I can pull 24-year-olds too.
But as to the filtering issue, finding a woman who is GENUINELY serious about getting married and is marriageable is the big one. There's no pressure on women to actually get married, and serious pressure on her to delay until she has her fun/her career is established. I don't think any individual guy can defeat this social pressure without a lot of assistance.
Dating apps, on and off (because they are psychologically corrosive).
Dance classes (going to one tonight, actually), referrals from friends, bars (of various types), hosted gatherings at my house, gone to speed dating events, gone to car meets, church, social media, the gym. I'm currently pursuing a random DM I got from an (apparently) real woman on twitter that I already know isn't going to work out.
I am able to get dates. But the quality of woman I find is generally lacking, and they will ghost you without any warning even if you're 3 or so dates in. The norms around appropriate behavior are in shambles. Because women will accept zero correction of their behavior.
It is very expensive to keep paying for all these whilst seeing such poor results.
I've done everything except a Matchmaker or going abroad/mail order bride, basically. And I actually DID do a consult with an AI matchmaking startup, Keeper.AI and one of the founders himself told me "check back in 3-6 months" because they had no truly viable matches (as per their system) out of the 1.25 million women in their database.
The nearest/best one was a bit overweight for me, I was told. Ozempic to the rescue?
faceh
5d ago
But if someone criticized a smoker because its bad for them, sets a bad example for kids, or its corrosive to the public good, without threatening legal consequences...
Would you feel the need to jump to their defense? Or to participate in solidarity events demanding smokers be left alone?
Quoth me:
there was a point in time where women were fighting to be able to (in theory) bare their breasts online and in public.
And yet, the vast, vast majority of women aren't pulling out their boobs on instagram. They just don't like being told they can't or shouldn't do it. And that was literally just Instagram setting their user policy! Not a legal restriction!
Women do that when anyone tries to police female behavior, anywhere.
We JUST CAME OFF THE LINDSAY CLANCY TRIAL, where tons of women, including jurors expressed solidarity with a woman who killed her own children.
Are you THAT libertarian? I assume no. So if we can't bring legal consequences down on a woman who kills children, what CAN we do?
faceh
5d ago
I more broadly wonder who one can consent to gambling if they can't even understand what the odds mean in true numerical terms.
Should one have to pass a statistics class to legally place bets? MAYBE!
Not all women's interests consistently align.
This is almost irrelevant. What is relevant is if they BELIEVE that they do.
For example a workers union does not help all employees. It generally only helps current employees. It often actively hurts prospective employees to make these gains.
Yes. My point. Do workers BELIEVE that forcing the boss to give them more pay for fewer hours is in their interests? Usually yes.
They are less likely to notice that this means more of them are fired, they get fewer breaks, the benefits get worse, etc. etc.
Status is a zero sum game, and the main competition in status for most women is other women. A couple boss ladys hoarding all the status and rewards is a fully consistent story here.
Nah, the real likely explanation is that women disregard the bottom 50% of men and see the top 10-20% of men as the actual competition. As long as they're lower status than THOSE men (read: they can't secure commitment from such men) they can easily BELIEVE they are decreasing in status, even if they continue to make more and more gains on the other 80%.
That's a consistent explanation I've yet to see refuted.
That I think there is a trad wife out there for you dear reader. Not that there is one out there for everyone
Great.
But the dear reader is still competing with everyone.
I'd suggest changing your social setting. You've no doubt already done this, at least in minor ways.
Be more specific. More actionable. What social settings are you talking about? I've tried bars (of various types), dance classes, hosted gatherings at my house, gone to speed dating events, gone to car meets, church, social media, the gym... the women are OUT there, but they aren't interested in being approached, or they are zeroing in on the top guys in the room, or they're already taken. You can automatically assume that they've got 50 matches in a dating app at any given time.
The problems I mention infest everything. And the fact is, no matter where you are, you're still competing against the options a woman thinks she has on the dating apps.
I am the true feminist, equal treatment under the law. I'd be happy to take an axe, or a can of gasoline and a lighter to a lot of the privileges women enjoy from the government. I'm not willing to go handmaidens tale or something that extreme. But many things short of that seem reasonable to me.
So what are you willing to do if we tell women "we're making it harder for you to get loans and go to college" and they all break down in tears and call you a misogynist pig and/or threaten to vote you out of office? How much of a hardass can you be when female tears are involved.
(Funny enough, the Trump admin may have found an end run around the problem)
Its unfortunate that I now assume a 50-50 shot of any given agreed upon date either ghosting me or calling off at the last minute... THEN ghosting me. And a 75% shot that they Ghost Afterwards.
Unless its someone I met through friends, so there's social consequences for doing so.
Designing your date ideas so you can salvage the night if she no-shows is... 'fun.'
I point back to the only viable solution being to have a 'roster' just so you can try to swap in another one and not completely waste your time. But that is a horrible incentive that makes the problem worse over time.
And yeah, if I were to Hinge-maxx I could maybe be lucky enough to find that girl who is new to the apps and hasn't been psychically mutilated yet, but that would require me to validate Hinge's business model, which I refuse to do.
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