5434a
2yr ago
Is/ought, plus game theory. Women will always have an unfair advantage in this arena because men will always gain an advantage by handing this advantage to women. The man who boycotts the ladies night at the bar, or any other low stakes garden variety simpery, out of offence to his high-minded egalitarian principles will lose out to the pragmatic man who accepts the phenomenon and potentially uses it as a pivot to open a conversation and flirt with those women. ("You women get half price drinks? Nice, that means you can buy me two! No? Ah, so you're a hashtag trad wife. Cool, I'm more of an equal rights feminist. A very thirsty equal rights feminist with an empty glass. Oh okay I get it, maybe those dodgy pick up guys were right about women after all. Hold on a second, are you a pick up artist girl? No? So where did you learn your undeniable skills? In that case I guess it must have come to you naturally. Naturally blessed with half price drinks. Imagine that." Or something significantly smoother and less terminally online, I don't know).
5434a
2yr ago
It's not over until they take down the perspex wagie cages in the supermarket. Even banks and the other traditionally physically secured service counters are back to being wide open in the way they were already becoming pre-pandemic.
5434a
2yr ago
The main thing to remember is the 30-45 minute delay between drinking a drink and feeling its full effect. The risk is that you get drunk, the drunkenness makes it feel like drinking more is a brilliant idea, so you do, and then all the previous drinks catch up and you get so drunk that you start pretending to be a stuntman, a street fighter (sometimes literally), a master orator and god's gift to womankind. The proper thing to do when you get that feeling is to stop drinking for at least an hour, but that's the total opposite of what it feels like you should do, so you probably won't and then wish that you had. It's a lot easier to avoid the myriad of bad consequences if you can avoid reaching the level where bad decisions seemed sensible in the first place.
Definitely don't text anyone who you're not out drinking with. You know who.
Set your phone up with a phone tracking app and test it works before you lose it.
5434a
2yr ago
I think so.
In short: Assuming I subscribe to this variety of gender theory, what am I looking at when I see a pregnant person decorating a cupcake?
5434a
2yr ago
Empirical reality is cool but the point is that putting it to one side and taking modern/woke/trans gender theory on its own merits can demonstrate that either their logic fails by its own standard or their logic doesn't have any standards to fail by.
Either there will always be some asymptotic essence of otherness that upholds the delineation between man and woman with their respective qualities and qualifiers and renders the idea of switching from one to the other impossible, or there's no difference to functionally separate the two meaning there's no other to contrast against and so no position to move away from or towards. At that point the only thing left is a subjectivity of aesthetics, which amounts to the label-claiming we observe where we might see a woman who feels like the kind of woman who has a penis and wants to have sex with women but doesn't feel like the kind of woman who might get pregnant by having sex with a man (pronouns: yak/sax).
This is without touching on the unwelcome and unintended implications of these theories, such as how they would account for people who over-identify with their gender (boob jobs and steroids, trans rights are cis rights), male/female neurotypology that would necessarily disqualify otherwise typical men and women from belonging to their pre-existing category, and the plain old basic feminist argument that women are capable of more than housekeeping and looking pretty.
Taking it seriously leads to the conclusion that it's unserious, and by extension that it shouldn't be taken seriously. The regressive absurdity of it would be tragic if it wasn't so funny [reverse according to personal taste].
So what do we call a masculine woman? Call her a masculine woman. There's nothing to be gained by doing otherwise, and much to be lost. Whether we redefine reality or redefine words it necessitates the loss of the prior definition.
5434a
2yr ago
No, because that obscures more than it reveals. Using a description of "a masculine woman" provides a more useful and accurate description than "man", especially if "man" also now includes masculine women.
Modern gender theory is inconsistent, contradictory and circular. Trying to reason with it is pointless. It by turns enforces then conflates distinctions between sex and gender and within sex and gender to suit its ends. Under this theory your question of whether it's appropriate to label a person a man can only be answered by whether that person wants to be labelled a man or not, which ignores that by advancing this theory the label has become an empty signifier that reduces to "is this person a person with person-like qualities". There is no there there.
5434a
2yr ago
It's entirely a pragmatic choice (in short piracy suits my self-interested ends better), but if I had to frame it as a matter of ethics I would say I have been presented with a choice of a) free as in speech plus as in beer, versus b) paying to conform and suffering artificial restrictions for the privilege.
The second order effect is that I have spent money on creative works that I absolutely would not have bought when I was buying other media. It could be argued that provides some justification for pirating but it's a hollow claim to virtue.
5434a
2yr ago
Dipping into Montaigne's essays. I definitely won't read the entire ~2500 pages, and I'm not getting much out of it, but I'll plod through a few more before I switch for something lower brow.
5434a
2yr ago
The closest I can think of to Indian fast food in the UK is the widely available pre-packaged chicken tikka sandwich which can be found in most petrol stations or the vegetable samosas and onion bhajis in the chilled cabinet at a convenience shop. I suppose a successful Indian restaurant might open a second branch if the local market can support it and the kitchen is getting too crowded and competitive. There are a lot of places using the name Balti King but I don't think they have any connection beyond choosing the same name.
Other than that there are self-styled "food trucks" that offer various ethnic street foods but they're much more like an Instagram trap than a place that regular people will stop at to grab a cheap fast meal. The authentic British street food is the burger/kebab van that can be found in market squares, fairgounds, festivals, industrial estates and dual carriageway lay-bys across the land. They might provide a bottle of curry flavoured sauce to squirt on your chips but I don't think that counts.
5434a
2yr ago
Any recommendations for good books or articles about stupidity? I can only think of McNamara's Folly. While that one works on both the object level of low IQ soldiers and also the higher level stupidity of advancing the policy for actively recruiting them I'm more interested in the object level stuff.
Darwin Awards is another good source. Also any Erowid trip report for datura.
5434a
2yr ago
Just started The Tunnels of Cu Chi after seeing it mentioned in the Reddit comments when somebody posted the classic viet cong tunnels infographic.
Using firsthand accounts from men and women on both sides who fought and killed in these underground battles, authors Tom Mangold and John Penycate provide a gripping inside look at this fearsome combat. The Tunnels of Cu Chi is a war classic of unbearable tension and unforgettable heroes.
5434a
2yr ago
The openly intentional result of what you're calling her sexism is that biological men are excluded from using the services of the rape crisis centre that she funds despite those men calling themselves women, ie trans, and so is plainly Trans Exclusionary. More accurate would be to say that she doesn't believe a biological man can be a woman, which is to say that she is a trans denialist. She doesn't hate transwomen (the transphobia charge), she simply doesn't recognise "transwoman" as a meaningful category.
Calling it sexism is similarly trans denialist as it casts the question solely in terms of objective biological sex, which trans ideology takes great efforts to escape from by introducing the subjective frame of gender.
One major reason radical feminists and other trans denialists deny transgenderism is because it requires not only that women identify with and express their gender but that doing so is what makes them women, and by extension not doing so diminishes their womanhood. A woman who becomes a radical feminist because she's been treated like shit by men, often in part for not being very feminine, while also being vulnerable to all the disadvantages that women suffer will rightly bristle at the implication that she's less of a woman, particularly when it's coming from men.
5434a
2yr ago
Keisha's not a smart cookie, at least long term, because she'll get the same treatment only worse and faster. She'll have ten years of running the show, possibly less, and then lose control when she is ousted by a more nominally oppressed group, probably queer black transgenders, or a more radical counter-oppressive group who accept her premise that "the harm is urgent" and "can't be fixed" with civil discussion and so turn towards fedposting IRL.
She sees the grift but ignores the consequences of its iterations: a Cornell Autonomous Zone. And if by some miracle such a zone succeeded in establishing its sovereignty they would be faced with the perennial problems that face all territories of how to a) govern and b) relate to neighbouring territories. Of course there's more than two thousand years of existing scholarship on those matters, and institutions that exist to both study and apply their lessons, but that baby washes in the bathwater of inequity.
5434a
2yr ago
I can't find it now but somebody wrote a reasoned defence of the film at the old subreddit. It's fine for popcorn viewing but while the premise is based around artifical intelligence the plot pivots on crushing organic stupidity.
I'd recommend almost any other AI/cyborg film first other than maybe Her, which funnily is increasingly looking like the more believable future.
5434a
2yr ago
If this is added can we include an option to hide it? I like upvoting the things I like and feel it has its uses on the backend but the inherent potential for pandering to the implicit popularity contests of having directly viewable counters has always rubbed me the wrong way, so it would be nice to have an opt out.
5434a
2yr ago
Agreed. Without the TV the bracket has no purpose and no business on the wall and so the colour makes more sense to match the purpose rather than the context.
Next question. Whether to swap out the power cable for a white one?
5434a
2yr ago
This TV will be at roughly eye level when seated. It's not an issue here but a lot of TVs now are so big that often it's only elevated positions that are practical.
5434a
2yr ago
The recurring themes seem to be about being desirable and being desired (in the way that they desire best). The countervailing horror, beyond being undesirable, is that they're being desired in all the ways they desire least.
5434a
2yr ago
Miniscule level question of philosophical aesthetics: Is a television wall-mounting bracket more part of the wall, or part of the television?
I have a black TV set and a white wall, and I'm shopping for a bracket. The one I've chosen comes in black or white. In my mind the true-to-itself colour would be unpainted metal. I've flip-flopped a couple of times but I think I've made my choice. I'm interested to hear others' opinions and reasoning.
5434a
2yr ago
Extra question, and one that might prompt another story or two: What's the - ettiquette probably isn't the right word - concerning involuntary erections? Take a closed position dance style, add an attractive woman, lower the lights and top off with sustained synchronised rhythmic movement... You don't need to be a rocket scientist to predict where that can land.
And vice versa women. Natural physical responses don't discriminate.
5434a
2yr ago
I notice you've put curvy in scare quotes, lol. Meeting women is a secondary but admittedly conscious goal. Nonetheless dancing is fun for its own sake. As I said it's mostly to find events that have the more structured socialising, structured steps and the different expectations that follow from that - you can't dance for a minute with a new partner and not meet them, but you can dance in a crowd for an hour and meet nobody but the barman. The gender imbalance is another drawback of all of the music-first scenes I've been around. I've lost count of the amount of times I've done a quick head count and found an 8-1 men to women ratio.
I'd be happy to try out most styles just for fun, the only ones I'd avoid are the high tempo, highly athletic ones that reward lifts and dives and suchlike.
5434a
2yr ago
Competing for female attention in latin dance totally fits my model. Here's my completely uninformed stereotypes of open classes (I assume the competitive level acts as a filter), please correct or confirm.
Rock'n'roll/Ceroc/Lindyhop: High metabolism neurodivergents with that weird blend of woke politics and retro aesthetics.
Salsa/swing: Casual singles. Divorcees dancing with unmarried tech workers and suave manlets.
Kizomba: As above but the divorcees are older, hornier and outnumber the men who are scared off by the more direct sensuality.
Tango: Trad types who like rules and following them. Etiquettists.
Ballroom: More stable relationshippers, enjoy the glamour, inclined to take the activity seriously and with all the conflicts that follow.
Street: DDR variety Asians, retired b-boys, female actual-dance-students polishing their moves.
Not sneering, I could probably fit in with nearly all of them to some degree.
Given that the activity involves dancing all night how pervasive are drugs? What's the drinking culture like? I guess the need to both be coordinated and coordinate with another person puts a natural ceiling on that aspect.
5434a
2yr ago
I've got a plan to dip my toe into salsa classes and other non-formal partner dances. What's holding me back is I'm making a concerted effort to clear out the backlog of loose ends accumulated from sub-diligent general living before I take up new projects and hobbies.
The primary reason I want to try partner dancing is that I've spent years going to clubs, parties, raves, festivals and other gigs and I'm fed up of the atomisation and informality. No matter the size of the crowd or the style of the music the audience were 99% locked in to focusing on the performer over the music or the other attendees, and any dancing that did happen was either self-conscious freestyling, lesser or greater degrees of going berserk, or thinly veiled dry humping.
Since you're here and it sounds like you've got some breadth of experience, how would you describe the differences in the type of people who are involved with the different styles? Any hobby drama or other funny/memorable stories?
Slavoj Zizek travels the world speaking to paying audiences of intellectuals, has been married four times and he has two children. According to wikipedia his third wife was an Argentinian model. His current wife is thirty years younger than him. The precondition for how he did it was in not dismissing it as impossible or insurmountable. He achieved those outcomes despite being a flabby book-nerd who can't get six words into a sentence without twitching, stimming and flecking his t-shirt with spittle.
Stephen Hawking had three children and his wife married him despite his being diagnosed with a condition that would condemn him to life in a motorised wheelchair. Later he divorced his wife in order to marry one of his full-time carers. He spoke through a computer and his most graceful gesture would look like a mild spasm if anyone else did it.
I'm not saying you'll get married to a model if you ""just be yourself"". All I'm saying is that there are normal average women out there who don't need you to be an impeccably dressed millionaire bodybuilder before they'll give you a chance.
That's all you need. Achieve the same outcome enough times and eventually things begin to go well.
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