ControlsFreak
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User ID: 1422
ControlsFreak
12d ago
It's pretty hard to beat, "I left some fruit (that I'm legally allowed to buy and have) in the cabinet for too long."
ControlsFreak
16d ago
The only historical precedent which has to do with natural children is the legal presumption that a woman's husband is the father of her children, absent other evidence.
What do you make of prohibitions on marriage between sufficiently close relatives? ...what do you make of exceptions to those prohibitions when one of the two individuals could demonstrate that they were sterile?
ControlsFreak
16d ago
Can I say the line? I kinda want to say the line. Ok, I'm going to try saying the line now.
What did you think 'let's destroy marriage and the family' meant? Vibes? Papers? Essays?
The solution that allows women to set a “price floor” for relationships, in spite of both those factors, is to use social technology to align their interests. In this case, that technology would be “slut-shaming”.
"The" is an incorrect use of the definite article. There is another solution, another technology. Even Beyoncé knows of this technology, though she, like the author you cite, clearly lacks comprehension of what it's for and how it is to be used. It is the humble ring. It goes on a finger. There are many others which superficially look like it, but one is a special piece of social technology.
ControlsFreak
17d ago
Society doesn't seem to be paying attention to the claimed harms
We conveniently got a new top-level comment a couple hours ago.
ControlsFreak
17d ago
I wrote here:
It just so happens to be that we don't see a world where the lack of slavery is causing all sorts of real world problems for individuals and societies. Plus all the good moral arguments and everything. Funny that, both those factors cut the other way for the instant question.
Perhaps see also this chain of comments by @FCfromSSC. He focused on porn in the last comment, but also:
...Conservative Christians no longer need to argue what might happen if the other side gets their way, but rather what has happened, and what results the other side is accountable for. Christians can now operate as a genuine counter-culture, offering a cogent critique of the conditions we are all living in every minute of every day. We can offer meaningful answers to the myriad discontents created by our present society, and through those answers coordinate the systematic withdrawal from and dismantling of that society.
But instead, you seem to want some specific predictions of specific mechanisms that are headline-style events. Things like:
If I wanted to argue that America could become communist, maybe I predict that AOC will finally wrest control of the rudderless Democratic Party.
These are kind of silly. "I predict that [POLITICIAN] will ascend and promote [THING]." Like, okay? Swap someone/something in there. I'm again not particularly interested in playing that silly game.
ControlsFreak
17d ago
Scalia's concurrence in that case, relying on the Necessary and Proper Clause, made a lot more sense than the majority opinion.
ControlsFreak
18d ago
I mean, if we had a clean EPC opinion, you might have a case. (Of course, Skrmetti is already casting doubt on whether there's support to push the (often claimed dubious) Bostock reasoning in Title VII into EPC.) But we didn't get that opinion. We got the cluster that is Obergefell. It should be pretty high on the list of people who are pro-SSM-from-a-policy-perspective for "opinions where I agree with the outcome, but disagree with the reasoning".
ControlsFreak
18d ago
1855? 1850? 1845? ... 1776, when the Constitutional compromises were made? This seems like a silly exercise with only faux numerical justification.
ControlsFreak
18d ago
Sure. Obviously, that's a challenge. But it's sort of irrelevant to the original discussion? Unless you view this as a fully-general argument against any sort of minority view? Like, sure, any minority view on any topic has a hurdle of convincing enough of the public to join you in lobbying for it. That's not particularly novel or useful to discuss. Communists and libertarians and trans activists and neoluddites and... and... are all aware that they have minority views that they would like to promote more widely.
and
Duly noted and agreed that the predominant swing for several decades has been pro-premarital sex (and a variety of related issues). That was actually my point.
I think the biggest thing you've added is that, indeed, you do think that it's just a fully-general argument, including that you would have used it against slavery abolitionists in 1000 BC, 1000 AD, and in 1864. But yeah, I do listen to/read some libertarians, and I imagine if someone just kept popping up to say, "You're a minority opinion; you haven't convinced everyone yet; it's hard to convince people of things," they'd probably respond with, "No shit, Sherlock." But if you kept popping up to interrupt them to say that, I'd probably get tired of the annoyance pretty quickly.
ControlsFreak
19d ago
You cherry picked historical examples of cultural shifts to prove the possibility.
No. I just went through a wide variety of things, some which shifted, some which then didn't shift. We could keep generating a very very very long list, but I figured it was better to not have a 5k word comment that is just a silly list.
"Sometimes it's hard to tell" is a way to frame the discussion to throw out the need to discuss. It's similar to consensus-gathering but for an argument.
Frankly, this is bullshit. As evidenced by your statements:
People did argue that slavery was a societal good (if only because no one wants to be the villain). They argued that back in Africa black tribesman were either lazy or fighting each other, and over here they are productive and safe (so long as they don't provoke the master of course). If you could bring a southern man from the past here he'd probably look at urban black culture and tell you they were better off slaves.
If I had told a pro-slavery person, back when being pro-slavery was ascendant, that mayyyyyyybe they should be sliiiiiiightly open to the idea that it's poooossible that slavery won't stay ascendant forever, would you be there saying:
"Sometimes it's hard to tell" is a way to frame the discussion to throw out the need to discuss. It's similar to consensus-gathering but for an argument.
Would you be there saying:
You cherry picked historical examples of cultural shifts to prove the possibility. The theoretical possibility was never in doubt, the question was over whether the odds are high enough to be worth discussing. It's theoretically possible that in the future society decriminalizes murder, but I'm not about to make a writeup exploring the possibility.
?
no-fault divorce
???
Thinking that an argument by assigned terminology ("magic") is remotely persuasive is a delusion. You're also deluded as to what you think "religious people" "admit". Your bare, unquestioning faith in bad metaphysics probably also rises to the level of being a delusion.
ControlsFreak
22d ago
I think there should be some restrictions on politicians being anti-religiously motivated. In the same way that people objected to Biden being in office with cognitive impairments, I think it's a problem to let government officials base their decision making on anti-religious delusions.
ControlsFreak
22d ago
and the one proposing it again doesn't seem to have any actionable ideas to make it more palatable this time
This is where I'm just going to bow out and say, "Not playing this silly game." As I wrote:
This sort of demand is basically trying to set up an impossible task, as no one here is going to be able to just apply magic to accomplish intermediate steps, and any proposed intermediate steps will be responded to with, "...then why haven't you already done that?"
But yeah, "genies" have "gone back into bottles" before (what a shitty, loaded metaphor). I made a long list in my last comment and everything.
Yes, views rise and fall with the era but not all are equal. If someone wanted to bring slavery back they are going to have a very uphill battle.
True enough. It just so happens to be that we don't see a world where the lack of slavery is causing all sorts of real world problems for individuals and societies. Plus all the good moral arguments and everything. Funny that, both those factors cut the other way for the instant question. As I wrote:
Sometimes it's hard to tell whether it's an issue that will shift, won't shift, will stay perpetually divisive (e.g. abortion), or whatever.
ControlsFreak
22d ago
Right, so the opposite is currently being pursued by the majority, as I was saying.
The argument, as I understand it, was originally some form of:
- Abstinence is currently being heavily pushed by society. (This assumption was hidden and turns out to be wrong.)
- This heavy push is failing for reasons. ("How's that going?")
- Therefore, the idea is conceptually flawed, for reasons.
You and I seem to agree that the first premise is false. I'm not really sure what other point you have. Perhaps it's this bit:
The first hurdle is convincing enough of the public to join you in lobbying for it.
Sure. Obviously, that's a challenge. But it's sort of irrelevant to the original discussion? Unless you view this as a fully-general argument against any sort of minority view? Like, sure, any minority view on any topic has a hurdle of convincing enough of the public to join you in lobbying for it. That's not particularly novel or useful to discuss. Communists and libertarians and trans activists and neoluddites and... and... are all aware that they have minority views that they would like to promote more widely.
Evangelical Christians have tried promoting abstinence since more or less forever, but over time they've largely lost relevance socially and politically. Their failure to gain support is some amount of evidence that that abstinence is truly the unfavored social position.
Various minority views have had upswings and downswings. The slavery abolitionists, the anti-alcohol folks, the pro-alcohol folks, the anti-smoking folks, the eugenics folks, the pro/anti-police/surveillance folks, the free marketers and the regulators, etc. Sometimes it's hard to tell whether it's an issue that will shift, won't shift, will stay perpetually divisive (e.g. abortion), or whatever. Duly noted and agreed that the predominant swing for several decades has been pro-premarital sex (and a variety of related issues). That was actually my point.
ControlsFreak
22d ago
Which is rather the point here.
Sorry, I don't get what is rather the point here. Can you spell it out?
ControlsFreak
23d ago
I think we are nearly agreeing? The push against smoking included much more than anti-smoking education in schools: bans in many public and private spaces that are enforced, taxes, fees, inconvenience for selling and marketing tobacco, varied media campaigns not limited to the equivalent of odd sex ed class. School health education about harms of smoking hopefully contributes to anti-smoking, but wasn't decisive on its own.
So reiteration of my point: if the intention is a society of no premarital sex, then abstinence-only sex ed in schools will be much easier time having an effect if there are other policies in place that make the abstinence-until-marriage lifestyle sound more enticing, realistic and attainable than other lifestyles.
Sure. I think we are mostly agreeing. The only thing I'd add is that the only person who has posited that the only strategy available, the only strategy that we can consider when determining a chance of success, is just trying to have mostly left-leaning schoolteachers officially say that abstinence is a thing that exists... is you.
Honestly, I'm getting shades of the perennial weight loss discussion, where certain factions strawman the science of caloric balance as, "The only way this can be tried is to just suggest to people that they consume fewer calories." Naw dawg. You're strawmanning hard.
ControlsFreak
23d ago
I think this comment assumes that banning is the only mechanism in question. Indeed, some forms of banning were used with smoking, but it certainly wasn't the only tool. Nor was it actually just a general ban. Moreover, while folks could quibble with an externality analysis, externalities are certainly not the only things that societies make "pushes" about.
ControlsFreak
23d ago
which are all now reasons for any random individual to stay in the current cultural equilibrium
I sort of don't believe you. Game theory is hard in general, and it's extra difficult for complicated cultural games. It's easy to ipse dixit some into existence; it's much harder to actually show with a reasonable model.
If you want to push them and together with them whole of society to other equilibrium, you need to a path from here to there.
I mean, no? Most social engineering projects fail, and many cultural changes have occurred without someone planning out a specific step-by-step path. This sort of demand is basically trying to set up an impossible task, as no one here is going to be able to just apply magic to accomplish intermediate steps, and any proposed intermediate steps will be responded to with, "...then why haven't you already done that?" I'm feeling the FConSCC/Hlynka flowing that you're just working from a completely flawed conceptual framework for the base of a discussion.
ControlsFreak
23d ago
Do you think it was unlikely for rates of smoking to decline after society had shifted HARD toward embracing it? ...with a side of "don't tell me what to do"?
My point is that saying something like "our society should push not having premarital sex" is stupid because it doesn't work.
I'm not sure how I would analyze that. Someone in the past might have said that it was similarly stupid to push not smoking. Yet, we did, and major changes occurred. There are all sorts of mechanisms by which a society could push such a thing. Those various mechanisms might have different effects. It's pretty strange to me to lump them all together carelessly. It seems to be actively missing the point to lump them all under "we should simply tell them to not have sex", as if they're all actually equivalent to that. I think it would have been similarly stupid to say that all methods of pushing to reduce smoking are equivalent to "simply telling people to not smoke".
My main point is that it's doubly difficult to analyze how effective various methods could be, given a society that has been pushing for ubiquitous premarital sex for decades. It's just seriously difficult to reason about, and flippant takes like yours are not even really serious attempts at doing so.
EDIT: I will note that my original response was with respect to your statement:
How is convincing western populations not to do this going?
Again, this makes it sound like this is a thing that is actively being pursued. That's sort of the opposite of reality.
ControlsFreak
23d ago
anyone who says "we should simply tell them to not have sex"
Good thing I'm not doing that. Perhaps I need to repeat my claims?
ControlsFreak
23d ago
You might have the causality reversed. Average age of first marriage rose significantly after a societal push to embrace ubiquitous premarital sex.
ControlsFreak
23d ago
Notably, this was not part of the original violinist argument. It was pretty clear from the original violinist argument that they were positing a cabal of music fans kidnapping someone in the middle of the night and attaching them without consent. This version is getting close to my preferred analogy - rock climbing.
When two people go rock climbing, they intend to have a little fun. They 'hook up', using the best safety equipment possible, intending to make the probability of an issue be as low as possible. But Murphy's law happens, snake eyes come up, and your partner ends up dangling at the end of a rope attached to you. Maybe that rope is causing you a little discomfort; maybe it's threatening minor rope burn; maybe it's threatening one of your limbs; maybe it's threatening your life. Lots of possible variations to handle a variety of scenarios people want for abortion. I don't think people are nearly as likely to say that you can choose to pull out your pocket knife and intentionally cut the rope, knowing that it will surely lead to your partner's death, completely regardless of what the danger is, all the way to the case where there is literally no real danger, just that they are relying on you to not cut the rope.
More generally, the idea of prospective consent exists elsewhere in the consent literature. The classic example is Odysseus asking to be tied to the mast. It would normally be objectionable for his men to tie him to the mast (or to keep him tied) against his objection. He had reason to believe that his future self would protest profusely, demanding to be untied, but we respect his original consent to overcome his later objections. A related example is the skydiver example. A new skydiver might know that they have a fear reaction to actually jumping out of a plane. It is normally not allowed for someone to just strap their bodies together and throw them out of the plane. But the new skydiver can prospectively consent, saying, "I know that I'm going to protest when we're standing on the edge, but I still want you to pull me off the plane with you."
Nearly all of contract law is an attempt to enforce prospective consent to things that you might not want to do at a future time. Even the most basic, "You give me stuff now, and I'll pay you money later," when at a later time, after having received the stuff, one might protest and want to withdraw their consent to paying the money. But there are clear responsibility laws/rules/norms in gobs of different situations. Commercial passenger pilots, for example, are known to have taken on a responsibility to stay in their airplane and try to save it and the lives of their passengers, even when they might want to just grab a parachute and leave the passengers to somehow save themselves. I think many people would also consider that to be literal murder.
ControlsFreak
23d ago
How is convincing western populations not to do this going?
You say this as if there is some consensus effort to try to convince them of this. The reality is that for quite a while now, the dominant consensus has been trying to accomplish the opposite. Unless you think this is just a fully-general argument against any sort of minority view. Like, communism must be wrong, not because it's conceptually wrong or anything, but because it hasn't convinced enough westerners to be communist, for example. This seems like a very strange claim.
This seems like the opposite of a fair response. If we put a guy on the fry station at McDonald's, and he just constantly screws it up over and over again, in the dumbest ways possible, it doesn't seem like a reasonable response to say, "How about we just put this guy in charge of the entire store?"
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