100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
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User ID: 2039
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
1hr ago
Super high value comment. Rec'd for an AAQC.
A couple points.
Postmodernism is primarily a critique of the cult of progress, which was born from the Enlightenment and the Reformation and is without a doubt destroying our world.
Okay, that legitimately helps. I will admit I was hung up on the hyper-stylistic nature of this writing and, I guess, missed the point (score one for the "ToolBooth is too dumb to get it" clique). I'll still retain the point, however, that the highly stlytistic nature of PoMo writing undermines its mission. If I can't even tell who's talking, I sure as hell can't parse their "critique" of modernism.
Which leads me to;
Rather, postmodernism exposes real flaws that need to be addressed in order for those institutions to survive.
Then offer potential solutions! I remember when DFW killed himself. I was in college at the time and sort of adjacent to literary circles. His death was received as a Big Deal and a Major Loss. From time to time, I find myself re-googling DFW to look back at his suicide. The two thoughts I always come away with are 1) If only he had been a Catholic and 2) I think one cause of his permanent despair was that he was so problem oriented in his critiques of the current world and had failed to find a way to attempt to drive towards a solution. Yes, I am aware that many, many people (including quite a few here on the Motte) think that It's All Too Fucked Up To Save (TM) and that any effort to try is doomed to failure. I'll even acknowledge they could be right - but that doesn't mean you shouldn't try because, at the very, very least, it gives you a reason to get out of bed, a sense of pride and purpose, and stops you from over-intellectualizing yourself to death .... literally (DFW).
Finally, I think the curt dismissal of post-modernism fails to acknowledge the complicated nature of traditional faiths.
Hard, but respectful, disagree. I'm a practicing traditional catholic. I make fun of myself on here for being a n00b at it, but the truth is I work at it; I know all of The Most Necessary Prayers in English and Latin, I say the rosary daily, read The Imitation of Christ along with other devotionals and newer academic Theological Books. I'm currently working my way through the 700+ page Catechsim of Fr. Spirago. I can follow Low and High mass without a Missal. I'm considering taking some voice lessons so I could participate in chant and polyphony.
The Catholic faith is, by far, the most complex thing I have ever approached. I already know that I will spend my entire life trying to figure it out spiritually, intellectually, mentally, and emotionally and will utterly, utterly fail. To mix some metaphors; the Catholic faith makes a kubernetes deployment across availability zones look like a game of tic tac toe. It makes matrix algebra look like finger counting.
But I find all of this complexity legible.
I know what various theological points are trying to do, even if they haven't migrated fully into my mind and heart. I know what even the more mystical devotionals are getting at, even if takes time parse. I can read canon law and think, "This is above my paygrade, but I'm following the nouns and verbs and basic structure."
With PoMoLit, it's so esoteric at times (really thinking of Gravity's Rainbow here) that it loses meaning at the basic sentence level. I remember reading one passage and saying to myself, "Pynchon, I think, is using some sort of double nested reference to an event outside of the book as metaphor for the internal thoughts of one of the brand new characters he's just introduced ... and is also wrapping it in tounge-in-cheek irony." Being deliberately obtuse is often a feature of pretentious academics trying to hide their fundamentally ineptitude. I'm still not convince many or several PoMoLit authors suffer the same fate.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
2hr ago
I don't know why your comment was the reason, but it made me remember that I did really enjoy Sadly, Porn by The Last Psychiatrist / Edward Teach.
It is drastically non-linear and starts with several dozen pages of footnotes that are longer than the primary text. I think you could call it something like "postmodern meta-psychology analysis" or something. And yet, I did find it good, readable, and deep.
Maybe that's the whole point of postermodernist literature? Different elements of it are highly resonant with a reader while others are not. It's less a bellcurve (like, say, 18th century American literature) and more of a stochastic matching algorithm.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
2hr ago
St. Anthony of the Desert couldn't even read.
You are so far beyond most Mottizens, we can't even see you. Please remember us when you ascend.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
5hr ago
Honestly it's a Skill Issue if you don't get it if you ask me.
Dude, you literally just became the imagined antagonist from my original post.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
7hr ago
Specifically thanking you for this comment.
I wish people would dive to a deeper level of analysis rather than posting variations on "No, actually, I liked that book" - which is most of the other comments in thread.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
7hr ago
Generally agree, but with a bit of a branching split.
The suit.
Suits were originally for men conducting business to meet each other in a way to demonstrate the exact kind of respect that you and OP discuss. I like those kind of suits.
Suits, today, in companies that require them or strongly suggest them, are far more about a corporate conformity and "putting on airs" of Doing Big Business. I spent three years wearing a suit everyday to my job as a .... data scientist. I was rarely in meetings with non-technical staff. I made zero "deals". I was slightly uncomfortable all day long and I paid thousands of dollars in dry cleaning.
The suit, in that context, is functionally pointless and is a kind of weird aspirational gesture to a form of business that 90%+ of non-sales professionals really will never engage in.
What I'm saying here is that blindly aping the forms of respect (dress, appearance, etc.) can, if done without intent, actually create a kind of personal disrespect. The "corporate soulness drone" meme is, in part, a nod to the fact that trying to blend together old world savoir-faire with post-ww2 industrial capitalism fails in a non-linear way; there's no charm of a classic British firm and the efficiency of Space Age MegaCompanies gets slowed down and neutered. You get InnaTech instead of Lloyd's and instead of SpaceX.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
8hr ago
I'm interested into getting into some deep NPR level culture war.
No geopolitics, no woke-vs-not debates, no (not) Trusting The Science.
I want to talk about books.
Let me NPR whisperspeak overanunciate that: mmmmbbbboooOOOOkksszzzz
Is postmodern literature
- real? and
- actually any good?
To throw up some examples of what I mean;
- Slaughterhouse-Five (1969) by Kurt Vonnegut
- Gravity’s Rainbow (1973) by Thomas Pynchon
- Infinite Jest (1996) by David Foster Wallace
- Catch-22 (1961) by Joseph Heller
- White Noise (1985) by Don DeLillo
I've never read Vonnegut, Heller, or DeLillo at all, but I know they are "canonical" in the postmodern genre.
I made it 100 pages through Gravity's Rainbow and was earnest convincing myself I was "getting it" before literally slamming the books shut and verbalizing "This is fucking unreadable."
Back in college, I did the thing and carried around the Big Blue copy of Infinite Jest so people could see I was reading it and I stuck pens in various places to show I was capital-R Reading it. I think I made it a little further than 100 pages, but I can't be sure because I can't remember a damn thing about it.
In my opinion, I think postmodernism pretends to be this ultra-layered "commentary" on a bunch of intersecting meta-themes. Something like socio-political philosophy but explained through dense plots and idiosyncratic characters.
But ... it isn't? Nothing actually holds together. The plot becomes a non-plot or endless branches of a single plot. The characters become weird disposable mouthpieces for the author talking to himself. The commentary, such as it is, gets so jumbled that you lose the point.
And so postemodernism reveals what it actually is; a heavily stylistic exercise, much like jazz, where unnecessary complexity is treated as "skill." Additionally, it's a pure signalling mechanism. People get to do that think when you bring up Infinite Jest or Gravity's Rainbow; "Dude, there's like SO MUCH in that book, right? Crazy, yeah, no, I loved it" Which isn't saying anything at all, but inviting you to be the one who makes a fool of himself by venturing something like, "I'm not sure I got it though" to which the other person gets to puff themselves up and retort with, "Hahaha, yeah, it's not for everyone! Definitely pretty dense, haha." With the snide implication being "But me and my big ole brain totally got it".
This is why I ask, first, "is it real?" The serpentine prose in postmodern literature seems to me to be a kind of forer statement; a reader can (literally) read anything into what's being written and arguments trying to pin down essential meaning are pointless because the point is there is no essential meaning.
I like books about ideas and can deal with density. But I think a novelist has the duty to respect his readers and put together a cohesive narrative. Blood Meridian is an Epic in the classic Homeric sense. You can re-read it 10 times and pick up new strands of thinking on the biggest of The Big Questions; life, death, judgement, heaven, hell.
And it's also a sick western. So you can read it at the level of "fuck yeah, they killed those comanches" and get a lot out of it. You do not need to (although you may want to) keep a notebook next to you while reading. You can just read and get a lot out of it.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
8d ago
This is probably better for the Friday fun thread, but 1) I can't wait and 2) we can culture war(game) this.
A dude was accused for shooting someone and then driving away.
The plot twist is that he is a quadruple amputee. Legs amputated above the knee, arms just below the elbow but including both hands. He also happens to be a semi-pro cornhole player. Well that's interesting, I guess. It seems kind of far fetched that he'd be shooting anyon---
There's a video of him loading and firing a handgun
It also appears that the victim in the shooting was in the passenger seat of the vehicle that the amputee was driving. And there were two more people in the back who, when asked, refused to help move the victim's body.
Something-something not-the-onion.jpeg
The culture war angle is that people will always find ways to kill each other even when genetics / misfortune has tried to bring one's lethality index to zero. Is it a sign of the times that our most bizarrely handicapped are still stacking bodies?
As a pro-gun person, I'm somewhat confused on how to feel. On the one hand (sorry) I think any non-felonious and non-mentaly-incompetent adult should be able to own whatever firearms they want (drawing a line at crew serviced weapons). On the other hand (okay, it's getting old now) I can't imagine actually selling a gun to this individual because I would be very hard pressed to think "Yes, this individual can responsibly and safely operate a firearm."
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
10d ago
where national churches are granted a degree of autonomy in local matters
In the Catholic Church, this effectively exists at the sub-national level in Bishops. The autonomy of Bishops pertaining to the matters of their own (arch)diocese is quite broad.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
10d ago
I would even like the Catholic Church to split into different denominations so that the one with the best spirit and art can triumph.
Schism is generally frowned upon.
But the SSPX might run it up the flagpole to see who looks on July 1st.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
10d ago
That’s also why I like Theo Von more than Rogan.
Agreed. Theo in the 2021 - 2023 era was consistently outstanding. It seems since then he's had some personal mental health issues and is now fully onboard the Bro-Science Antisemitism train. He's a recovering addict (of many flavors) and I sincerely wish him the best, but I i'm not sure he was ever built for as big as he got. Shame. I'm UPSTAIRS!
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
10d ago
"No smoking gun" doesn't mean something didn't happen,
Dude what?
Russell's Teapot for reference.
In looking at your string of comments in this thread, I'm starting to think you have a particularly nasty case of TDS or are doing a kind of slow-boil trolling that will eventually blossom reveal itself for what it actually is.
You're more than free to be an anti-Trumper here. Hell, I'm one. But claims like this one;
It's harder to show guilt, but it's also harder to suggest innocence.
Are the kind of equivocating nonsense that lead TheMotte to split from Reddit in the first place (and also, like, censorship and stuff). If you think that the Trump-Russia collusion story is valid, that's fine as well and I'd encourage you to highlight some evidence you find impressive or just do some good ole schizoposting. But, again, a lot of your argumentation is the kind of bad faith and literal Motte and Bailey style sophistry that is frowned upon around here regardless of your subjective beliefs.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
12d ago
Thanks for the effortful writeup.
Ball is in my court and I'll get to working.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
12d ago
A decade after losing my virginity
Sir, this isn't the bragging about how cool you are thread.
Chuck Norris just died. I now have zero male role models. Yesterday, I looked at a girl and today my left arm is numb and tingling. Claude Code told me I'm a handsome boy, so that helps, but it helps less when you're spamming the forum with these kind of CHAD PUSSYSLAYER 5000 posts left and right.
We get it, you're cool!
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
12d ago
a female officer cries on the stand as "Licc'em Low Lisa" plays.
18:30 in clip is about when the crying starts. The whole thing is bizarre. They play an Afroman song on YouTube in court. There's a stripper and implied cunnilingus involved. In the actual courtroom, Afroman is wearing an American Flag suit.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
14d ago
Just such a strange response. I make an admittedly slightly uncharitable "boo outgroup" argument that literally gets a nasty gram comment from the mods (appropriate, however).
And then you swoop in and become a living breathing caricature of my outgroup.
I don't really know what to do here except sincerely thank you for your contribution.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
You're right, my recommended alternative wasn't totally airtight and perfect. I am so sorry for having voiced my tiny brain solution.
Do you have a solution? Or are you saying that the current state of affairs of relying on state employees / state subsidies to look after your children (or, you know, just do nothing and collect the checks) is better? How about when that state mandates slamming a vaccine into yourself and your child as a hard requirement?
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
LEE A life I gotta feed and defend until it grows up and feeds me.
The other problem is that this is also just horrendous bullshit.
Cowboys are not the world-wise stewards of the land that a lot of romance novels and tropes make them out to be. Most share a lot more in common with oil rig workers (often their literal cousins).
The cowboy absolutely sees the calf as walking cash. Cowboys today are not dependent on their stock for their own personal food because that was never the case. The original large scale stock moves from Texas/Kansas northward were because of rising beef prices in the east and England which enabled the economics of cattle drives to work out. Most cowboys, in the latter half of the 19th century - made only one cattle drive in their entire life and then found blue collar style work around the various cattle towns of Wyoming / Montana etc.
The only part of Yellowstone that I found to be very realistic is the revelation that the Ranch is basically underwater in debt and always has been, but that it's so much debt that the bank keeps letting Dutton roll it forward to avoid having to deal with the write-down / write-off.
That's cowboyin'
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
The resistance to Voter ID on the left is one of the best, maybe the best, example of how signaling became weaponized and how to build a Motte-And-Bailey into the very DNA of a party / movement.
No reasonable person (sorry mods, but let me finish) could really have a strong stance against valid and secure forms of identification as a requirement for voting. Maybe there's some sort of argument along the lines of "secure IDs are too expensive and too difficult to get for people who, while citizens and non-felons, don't have their shit together." But it's a stretch.
Instead, the left does nice little sleight of hand card trick. It's not about the object of voter ID, it's about the real goal of those pesky rightists; disenfranchising qualified voters. This is why references to poll taxes and other Jim Crow era voting shenanigans are ubiquitous in the discourse. It's a way to hijack the object of discussion itself and redirect it into "THE RACISMS" pile.
A fun thing to do - something I've been doing more of of late - is to find your local leftist cat lady (who you've befriended, right?) and pretend to be retarded. Bring up the issue the way a retard would - "Hey, so what's like the deal with voter ids and whatever? I was just hearing about that on reddit." The immediate response is some version of "THE RACISMS" because that neurological pathway has been so well developed - anything to do with identification / documentation (oh, that's a fun word, isn't it) / registration is all "THE RACISMS" (unless we're talking about gun ownership).
To extract myself from any "boo outgroup" reporting, I'll finish by saying that this is a universal comms strategy used by all sorts of organizations, not just the political. People aren't good at holding multiple things in our heads at once and certainly not if there is complexity to them. We respond better to clean and clear associations. This is the whole psychology behind literal slogans. McDonald's' "I'm loving it" is literally the equivalent of zapping "MCDONALDS GOOD - ME LIKE MCDONALDS" to your brain. Politicians know that emotionally resonant issues are the power issues, so they want to re-route even minor ones to them whenever possible.
But the cost, aside from the real cost downstream (voting fraud), is that political communications are some of the most low signal, high noise forms of discourse. Sorting happens mostly at the tribal level (which is a close to Gospel as we have here on The Motte), and any sort of second and third order effect of a specific policy is never, ever really given consideration (again, with the exception of us internet mole people).
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
because voters want things that congress isn’t providing.
This is true. The larger point I was driving at is that voters shouldn't have to be in the position of relying on congress to provide things. Mostly, it should be done through semi-formal social networks (i.e. I hate the idea of government funded somali daycare fraud child care facilities. I'd rather see stable extended families and high trust local communities help shoulder the burden of child rearing). But this is illegal in many cases (beyond just childcare).
A lot of socially oriented programs can be described as "In order to help you, we've made you dependent upon the government. You're no longer allowed to help yourself and if you don't vote us, you and your family will suffer the consequences."
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
The government does have to govern
My entire point is that I would like this to be less and less the case.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
...I hope you're not claiming to get that view from actual Straussians.
Yeah, I wasn't. I was just being a little cheeky. I actually detest people who use terms like "Straussian" and "first principles" as attempts to signal their Big Brained-ness.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
Great!
I'm asking because I am somewhat of a business nerd. I've asked a few other commenters about their line of employ when they've shown they have some real insight into it. Lawyers, for one, endlessly fascinate me (not in the legaleese or arguments, but in the day in the life of the job. There's a AAQC somewhere in the archives about the reality of being a DUI lawyer that was phenomenal).
I look at people who understand their businesses well as very applied, high value systems thinkers. An "academic" style systems thinker might be able to talk a good game, but an actual practitioner has insights that are completely missed by those academic approaches. The classic Back To School business seminar scene is this, canonically.
Mostly, I'd say I am interested in how e-commerce actually works outside of scammy YouTube influencer takes on it. Your comment about the pareto law of your products hints at this. I'd love to understand how you go about designing a new product, testing for demand etc. Perhaps also what the elements of success in ecomm are and what "pros" do versus what "chumps" do. I think this is enough of a framework to get started?
Trade topics:
I can tell you a lot about:
- Ivy League (and other selective school) admissions
- Real deal data science in both FAANG settings and research lab settings
- Strippers, bars, hookers, nightlife industry in general
- "HickHop" or the blended sludge of traditional Redneck culture smashing into Hip Hop / urban / black culture.
And again, if there's simply a topic you've had on your mind that isn't in my list, I'll put in some real effort to research and write it up - zero AI, all human.
100ProofTollBooth
Dumber than a man, but faster than a dog.
15d ago
For this specific discussion
That's fair. Regarding immigration specifically, I generally agree with you and the other posters above.
I was trying to develop the full picture, however. I am generally hyper suspicious of "if we just did this one thing" style solutions. And so, here, I was pointing out that nuking the filibuster won't actually "fix" congress.
I didn't ask this question.
I didn't make that assertion. I asked the question is it "real"?
Amadan, I think you're a great mod. Sincerely. You've banned me a couple times for being a dickbag. I find most of your bannings and non-bannings to be as fair as is reasonable for an unpaid mod. Even though I was (just barely) on the other side of the Hylnka affair, I think the decision was a valid one.
I have no idea what point you made, if any, in your response. There's equivocation after equivocation. In your closing you state "there's something to be said" twice ... what is it, then? Say it!
This is a quality paragraph (with a final, concrete point)
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