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FiveHourMarathon

Wawa Nationalist

17 followers   follows 6 users  
joined 2022 September 04 22:02:26 UTC

And every gimmick hungry yob

Digging gold from rock n roll

Grabs the mic to tell us

he'll die before he's sold

But I believe in this

And it's been tested by research

He who fucks nuns

Will later join the church


				
User ID: 195


				
				
				

			

		

	














	


		


			



	

		

			

			

				

					

						

							
						

						

							
							

								
FiveHourMarathon


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
Wawa Nationalist

				
				
				

				

					17 followers  

					follows 6 users  

					joined 2022 September 04 22:02:26 UTC
				


				
					

					
And every gimmick hungry yob


Digging gold from rock n roll


Grabs the mic to tell us


he'll die before he's sold


But I believe in this


And it's been tested by research


He who fucks nuns


Will later join the church



				

				

				

				

				

					

					

					
					
					

					
User ID: 195


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


BRING BACK DUELING.




I think it should be legal to punch someone who is filming you without your consent. It's a similar violation of bodily integrity.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				The Motte infidelity survey
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm now very excited for you to post the results.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Sure if you had an infinite budget and ability to recruit, you could counterfeit Aella.


But I think the (5) on your list that is being underemphasized in most discussions of prostitution is: Able to mentally and physically endure and survive the ordeal of sex work while maintaining (2) and (3). Most strippers, porn stars, prostitutes flame out on drugs or alcohol or other self destructive behaviors; both because that kind of impulsivity is what lead them to the trade, and because of the pressures and traumas thereof. They have a short shelf life because of that.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't think it's moddable, but I do think that mottizens should avoid using the "we" word, unless we're talking about weirdoes who frequent internet discussion boards.


FWIW I think the average normie laborer would find the idea of $10k/night hooker more intelligible than the idea of a $1000/hr lawyer or a $1,000,000,000 CEO or a $200k/yr HR director.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I think acting is a good example of what I'm talking about, where from an audience perspective utility is produced by marketing efforts. Wine and other Veblen goods function similarly.


Tom Cruise's fame and value is not produced purely or even primarily by Tom Cruise's talent, but by the combined effort of an industry, by agents and publicists and studios, and by Tom Cruise's own decisions to manage his image and fame to produce his stardom. He is a product of that system. ((Though Cruise is also a really good actor, in a lot of great films)) That used to be more true in old Hollywood than it is today, Tab Hunter is a good example, there's a great documentary on his career; Tab was made famous by the studio system that both made him big and protected him from the public consequences of his homosexuality, realized that the studio was making a lot of money off of him and tried to break out of the studio system, and his career immediately tanked because he no longer had the studio to make him big.


The audience watching Tom Cruise in a mediocre movie, say Jack Reacher, gets more utils out of watching the movie than they would watching the same movie with a no-name actor, because they like Tom Cruise. The person drinking a fancy rare bottle of wine from a fancy French vineyard is experiencing more utils in that moment than I get drinking two buck chuck, because of the marketing that convinces them that this is a great and rare bottle of wine. That kind of marketing genius is the talent and the labor and commitment that produces the utility for the customer.


A good example, more common to most experiences, is that fight fans get more out of watching the Heavyweight Championship of the world and pay more to watch it, than they do out of watching a smoker bout on the undercard of a local brawl, even if the latter is the more exciting fight. Most people get more out of watching the NBA finals than a great high school game. This is not the result of the players on the court, it is the result of the whole infrastructure of the league and the understanding that this is an important high level game. Donc...




Any vintner deciding to make fifty millions by just producing 100 bottles of a wine which is worth 500k$ a bottle will fail miserably, because the very fact that there are 100 bottles on the market will cap the price.




Any random vintner can't just decide to do that. They need to work through decades of building industry credibility, making contacts, getting good reviews, building audience goodwill, and building a story of exclusivity that makes people think the bottles are worth a lot of money. It's not just a decision to charge more, it's a conscious project that takes a great deal of time and effort and talent. Most who set off down that path fail.


We can say that the customer is being defrauded because the literal product is the same, but that is to decide that the vast majority of people and huge portion of the economy is fake, and we should have strong priors that when we decide that everyone is an idiot we're engaging in an act of arrogance.


If Aella was stupid and lacked the cunning to build herself up, she wouldn't be a usable byword on this website, Tommy would have brought her up in the OP and we would have collectively gone "who?"


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Not really. "We" here is a reference to the kind of blue-collar worker @Goodguy was talking about (i.e. someone who puts a lot of their identity into being the kind of person who works hard in a physically demanding job), a demographic which is underrepresented here. If @hydroacetylene's "we" is accurate and he is indeed a regular blue-collar guy, he is providing the Motte with useful information we wouldn't otherwise have access to.




I mean, I think the objection holds because speaking for a hundred million people, of whom my learned friend @hydroacetylene is an atypical example, is pretty rich.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				The Motte infidelity survey
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If they outright said they feel jealous that I do X with another woman (provided it wasn’t an overt demand as a way to control my behavior in general), then I would simply stop doing it to preserve their feelings; and likewise I would expect the same with them.




An exception big enough to park a Mack truck. The list of irrational and impossible demands a woman, or a man, can put on you because it makes them jealous rapidly limits your life in ways that are incompatible with modernity. The harem and the chador are stable equilibria, everything else requires that someone eat some jealousy on occasion.


My point isn't that polyamory is built on jealousy, it's that the polyamorous (and I include in this category those pursuing a lifestyle of serial monogamy) are trading off the possibility of feeling jealous for things that they want.


The executive's wife who accepts her philandering husband is trading off her jealousy against having a stable marriage, husband who provides for her, her kids having a father. The husband in an open relationship is trading off his jealousy of his wife for his own opportunity to sleep with other women.


And most men and women, post sexual revolution in an environment of serial monogamy, trade the jealousy of knowing that their partner had lovers before marriage, for the opportunity to take their own lovers before marriage. Premarital sex is exactly this kind of tradeoff, it's merely temporal separation rather than physical.


Where polyamorous relationships typically fail is that it's really hard for people to get enough out of them to balance against their jealousy.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Death, Taxes, @HereAndGone2 hopping in to tell us that it's totally inexplicable that people value things she doesn't personally like. Said with all love and affection.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


The funny thing about those bottles of wine is I believe there have been a few cases of counterfeiter just mixing cheap stuff and labeling it different.




In the actual case you're probably thinking of it was a fairly elaborate mixing operation, utilizing bottles of very good wine mixed with a variety of wines to match the flavor profile, and based on an experienced oenophile's knowledge of the expensive wines. Most of the cheap mixing wines were still wines I would consider very expensive to drink at my own table!


But regardless, marketing is part of the good from a supply and demand perspective, for both the wine and the gash. Sure, it all feels the same in the dark, but actually making the sale for that kind of money requires a sales effort. And if the kind of marketing in the pornography/escort space that Aella achieves were easy for many thousands of women in the pornography space to do, we wouldn't know who Aella was and be discussing and referencing her constantly on this website.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Those bottles of wine are in short supply. If you can't comprehend of being in the market for those bottles of wine or those escorts, then you probably just don't understand the market in question. "Weird things happen when people engage in bidding wars" isn't an explanation, why is there a bidding war if there is infinite supply?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				The Motte infidelity survey
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Huh, interesting, guess I've been wrong all this time.




IMHO it even works well with unrequited love; other than the "alibis" bit the lyrics could be about someone realizing he probably missed his chance with a girl he never had the guts to make a move on.




I always took that as a girl saying so and so was "just a friend." Which works regardless.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 7, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Compare Before He Cheats. Excellent cheating song, but no man is really going to sing it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				The Motte infidelity survey
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


((I don't think jealousy is strictly universal, but its absence is closer to a form of damage than a strength; even in poly relationships, people like the underlying relationship claim that it represents. The extent cuckolding as a kink tends to be a marmite -- normal people either absolutely hate it or really like it -- suggests at least the fear of infidelity is extremely common.))




The great myth of polyamory (broadly defined) is that it is the lack of jealousy, rather than the negotiation of jealousy against other goods and utilities.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 1, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Typically in old melodrama, which is light on intellectual depth if not on topic, the uniting factor was the evil back alley abortionist. This was the skeleton key to the story, the poor innocent girl who got into trouble was understandable, but look at the results! Dirty Dancing is a good reference point here. The net result can be either pro or anti abortion: either we need to legalize it to make it safe, or we need to keep girls chaste so they don't end up here.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
And I think the market situation tells us, clearly, that women with high enough IQ to comprehend and execute that plan, while also being willing to be prostitutes and prostitutes to nerds, are in short supply.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I am going to assume the very best girls don’t even become whores. Steve Jobs wife would never become a whore because Stanford MBA and attractive makes it trivially easy for her to marry well. So I feel the supply side of the whore market can’t be power law because the far right tail just does marriage. Depending on your taste the far right tail of females are Tom Brady or Steve Jobs wives.






And then you have Miami. Where the strip clubs are basically brothels and like $500 gets you a girl hotter than these SF escorts. The price in Miami really is 5-10% of San Francisco. If you believe these girls and their $4k/hour claims.






So my guess is this is much more a story of market inefficiency. Some girls probably did find a magic marketing technique and location. And few hot girls want to live in San Francisco. So the high price is a lack of knowledge by other whores on marketing and a huge premium for having to live in San Francisco.






I believe a lot of this is just search costs. Whores don’t know how to market to tech nerds. Tech nerds don’t know how to find whores. The ones that know how to connect the two make a lot.




Listen I get all this, this all makes sense to me. What I'm saying is that the subset of women who are likely to become escorts don't get this and it doesn't make sense to them. Start talking to them about arbitrage and they'll fall asleep before you finish, in either sense.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 8, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


aella, the famous rationalist whorelord, popularized this niche of pseudo-intellectual prostitutes appealing to rationalists and other tech nerds for extreme amounts of money.




If it were an easy niche to fill, the price would be driven down. Aella is genuinely a uniquely talented person in her ability to occupy the two different niches involved at the same time. That's obvious when I listen to her on podcast appearances.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				The Motte infidelity survey
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't think it's hard data to universalize to gen-pop, but I'm curious because I'm curious about my own community.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				The Motte infidelity survey
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I said this in the original Mr. Brightside thread, but I think the theme is universal, and the feeling of jealousy is universal, because infidelity as a feeling isn't limited to "legal" infidelity as outlined in the survey.


The song is not about a girlfriend cheating on you. It's about feeling ambivalent after leaving a girl behind and knowing she is probably moving on. You have feelings for her, and in another life maybe you would end up together, but for bigger reasons you are moving on and you know she is too, and while you know you have to move on you still don't like the thought of her hooking up with someone else. That's the joke in the name: he's "Mr. Brightside" because even though he's the one who chooses to change his life and become a rock star, he's still jealous of her, he can't help but look on the "bright side" of everything.


Lyrics for analysis




Comin' out of my cage and I've been doin' just fine, Gotta, gotta be down because I want it all




He's "coming out of his cage" because "he wants it all." He's moving on, moving up, changing his life. He has to because:




it's just the price I pay, Destiny is calling me




Losing the girl he loved is the cost of the changes in his life, which he has to make, "destiny" is calling him. He knows he wants to become a rock star, he has to become a rock star, the cost is worth it. But there is a cost, he can't have the girl and his destiny, and even if he still must pursue his dreams he still has feelings for the girl.


Everyone with romantic feelings feels jealousy, even if they've never formally been cheated on by someone who had formally promised not to do that, it's a natural human emotion. Girls who get married get jealous when guys they turned down marry someone hotter. Boys who break up with their girlfriend when they go  off to college get jealous when she gets a new boyfriend. Guys who get married to women are still jealous of ex boyfriends she had twenty years ago, even if they never had sex, even if they only ever kissed. People are jealous when people they dumped move on. Men rage with jealousy when their ex finds someone better because they don't want her to have someone better; they rage with jealousy if she sleeps with every loser because it implies that he is also a loser.


Jealousy is pretty much irreducible as a feeling. Maybe when you achieve true monogamy, as opposed to serial monogamy, first kiss on the altar, it reduces somewhat. But I don't really see much active evidence of that in anecdata.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 7, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I feel like this comes down to whether you consider ethics a legal code of bare minimums, or ethical behavior is a maximal standard we all strive for and ultimately fail. I think it's reasonable to say no billionaire was also a saint.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 7, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
You shouldn't use either an AI or a listing agent in this market. What "connections" do you need to sell a house?


I haven't fired anyone, but I've probably reduced their hours while increasing the service I get. I didn't fire my mechanic, but I'm often able to diagnose problems more effectively and go into my mechanic saying "x is wrong" rather than "idk man you tell me." I haven't fired my engineer, but when I have a casual question on regulations I ask chatgpt and it points me to the relevant code section, rather than paying my engineer to do so.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 7, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The easy misdirect joke ("and they're going to bed and my stomach is sick, and it's all in my head and she's touching his CHEST now") is just dirty enough to draw a laugh from everyone, but not dirty enough to make it impossible to play on a "clean" playlist; easy enough that even the dimmest bulb can fill in the blank but checks and scans. I genuinely attribute a lot of its popularity to that execution.


It's a jealousy song, which everyone can relate to in some way, but not an infidelity song really, I always thought the song is explicitly ("but it's just the price I pay, destiny is calling me") about the mixed feeling of jealousy you get after you break up with a girl because you're moving, presumably in the song about being a rock star but also an ordinary experience around going to college or changing jobs. You still have feelings for her and get jealous at the thought of her going out and sleeping with another guy, but you had to break up with her, this is you looking on the "bright side."


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 1, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm using Soap Opera inexactitly, there were abortion plotlines on network dramas like Tales of the City much earlier than Roe.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 1, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's sad that the uproar created has raised doubts in my mind that anything about this story is real.


Influencers are largely seizing on the same stories that used to be on network TV (Paul brothers and clavicular reinventing pro wrestling from first principles, romantic and gay drama, etc). Abortion as the big controversial topical episode plot has been a soap opera staple since, what, dirty dancing or law and order?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for June 5, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't think it's really possible.


My wife is reading LOTR for the first time right now, and asked me how much of modern fantasy Tolkien invented. And I said that it's not so much that he invented a lot of things, almost everything in LOTR had some precedent either in prior sword and sandals fantasy universes or in myths both ancient and modern. ((Among other things, I think Tolkien scholars make a concerted effort to connect Numenor primarily to Plato's Atlantis and skip over the various Aryanist fantasies around Atlantis and Lemuria you see more clearly in R.E. Howard's stories.))


But Tolkien is fantasy's Most Recent Common Ancestor on essentially all questions. He settled a lot of different versions of what Elves, Orcs, Goblins, Dwarves were. Before Tolkien they could be a lot of things, after Tolkien they're mainly just the one thing, or if you change it you are in conscious conversation with Tolkien's tradition in changing it.


You just can't get that kind of juice today. The only thing comparable in influence is D&D, which will never get the same credibility.