Nerd
I had sex with a vacuum, it sucked.
User ID: 1024
Nerd
3mo ago
For a regular man, this implies that becoming marriageable now requires clearing exceptional bars: a degree (with the debt that comes attached) and an income well above the male median (also — 6ft, muscular physique, etc. etc.). Likewise social media has raised the expectations against which men are measured to make-believe levels. A working man in 1965 was marriageable by default in a way that his grandson is not. Again, all of this leverages tremendous economic pressure on men to overperform.
I will say this as a man, it really sucks ass having to compete with other men for stuff like good jobs, girls, etc. I'm in the gym 4 days out of the week, calorie deficit, I just got out of another 2nd round job interview, gonna do another tomorrow, hoping to get something high paying with the degree i got (in my lucky case, for free) and the certs. I've done damn near 4 -5 internships and a part time job. Thankfully i live in a city that actually builds housing so its not horribly bad, but I'm not anywhere near where I'd like to be in my life. I got lucky with a girl Im seeing by complete accident. Its just better to date as a man when you have your own place and a decent paying job, and those things are insane amounts of work to get your hands on. Im glad someone's validating my (and others) experience, instead being told about how "good" we have it now compared to the past.
Nerd
3mo ago
One thing that annoys me about the term "adapt" here is that its assumed that the adaptation is gonna be gleeful, or wont involve any kind of major societal shift in a major direction that would be negative. I can adapt to diabetes by taking insulin, i can adapt to blindness by reading brail, but its a lot better for me if I avoid getting those in the first place, and said adaptations i can do while still being alive in those instances suck ass!
Nerd
3mo ago
Women, when given the choice, do not choose children, and so by allowing them to support themselves and choose whether to have kids, they choose not to.
Meh, its not that, most data shows people not even pairing, despite evidence for the desire to do so.
Nerd
3mo ago
Numbers don't back that story though, Gen Z is the least sexually active generation ever.
Nerd
3mo ago
It even lets you find a mate far away who is a great match, basically for free, which was impossible before.
Very few people end up finding matches on dating apps, or through instagram and facebook, if thats what your referring too. Dating is far superior if you go and talk to the girls in person. The people that arent pairing up via the phone arent cursed - the medium itself is flawed.
Meh, smartphones may be contributing somewhat. But the more likely factor is the fall of earlier marriage due to the pursuit of education and jobs, collapse of socialization & communities (predates smartphones: read Bowling Alone) & the rise in single-hood that follows, rising secularism, and a decline in education and well paying employment in the (non college degree having) male population. The whole decline is multi-factorial and isnt really just one thing.
Nerd
4mo ago
This isnt exactly a slam dunk argument, though? Bringing it into the light arguably legitimizes the industry and the harms it brings.
Nerd
4mo ago
There is something that bothers me about watching progressive/feminist content on youtube, especially regarding the topic of objectification, and its particularly emphasized in this video, as follows:
So if something doesn't serve a purpose (nudity and sex scenes), it's clear the only purpose it serves is to scratch an itch of the artists. This is something called Chekhov's gun, which is a storytelling principle that says if a gun is shown on screen, it must be fired later in the story. And if it isn't, the filmmaker made a promise to the audience that they didn't keep.
It's absolutely the same with female nudity and violence on screen. If it serves no artistic purpose, then the sole purpose becomes the objectification of women and the normalization of violence.
You know, like that scene where Cassie (Refering to the show euphoria) turns into a giant. Absolutely unnecessary. And it's completely inconsistent with the show's genre, which has no magical elements up until that point. We already got the point that Cassie is defined by her breasts from the 15-minute montage leading up to that scene and the other 200 shots of her naked throughout the show. Like, we got it, right? We got that point.
We actually didn't need you to bend the genre of the show in order to show her boobs in a giant form. In general, the amount of unnecessary nudity and the way that the camera lingers on women's naked bodies, or bodies in general, is beyond what is needed to make the point that they're in a lurid, exploitative industry.
To rehash for someone not familiar, objectification is defined as: the act of treating a person as an object, a commodity, or a tool, rather than as a whole human being with their own agency, feelings, and rights. The most common form, (sexual) occurs when a person is reduced to a mere object of sexual desire. It often involves judging someone solely based on their physical attributes or breaking their body into separate, "consumable" parts (e.g., focusing only on legs or a torso).
The main issue here is that this idea, at least on the surface is that it seems to be fundamentally in conflict with the the sexual revolution and sex positivity of many previous & current progressive movements. Pornography, prostitution, and strip clubs all fit the objectification bill quite neatly, and the data seems to support the authors argument that "sexual objectification" leads to or plays some role in many of these harms:
Sex workers are a vulnerable group of individuals that experience sexual violence on the job, but it is difficult and limiting for workers to report their assault (Sex Workers Project, 2020). Sex workers are adults who receive money or goods in exchange for consensual sexual acts. According to research, globally, sex workers have a 45% to 75% chance of experiencing sexual violence on the job (Sex Workers Project, 2020).
I struggle to see how these individuals may square this perspective that sex work is valid, despite fitting the bill of objectification. Perhaps there is something I'm missing?
Nerd
4mo ago
Yeah, that's the plan. I will say this though: I don't want to have children, then have them deal with poverty or a bad mothers. I'd need to find: 1) A good job (working on that, almost there hopefully) 2) finding a women who'd be a good mom (I'll do that once I find the job).
Reproduce, yes. But it should be done responsibly.
Nerd
4mo ago
Meh, kind of. But its not like not being able to find someone is all that bad either. Single and non married are a significant and rising portion of the population. At this point, its fairly normal, even if it doesn't give the same social brownie points.
Nerd
4mo ago
Why avoid relationships for this? You can just get the tubes tied or snipped in that case.
Nerd
4mo ago
I agree with this for those who actually dont want to have children, however as far as a childless world goes - the main reason for this is because people are not getting into relationships or having sex in the first place. So any policy that tackles childlessness needs to tackle why people arent pairing up to begin with. Perhaps thats an aside, but still something worth pointing out.
Nerd
5mo ago
This actually a really good write up, and not something I thought about. I dont think mothers get a worse deal, but they are definitely under appreciated!
Nerd
5mo ago
that it would be unclean and abominable for anyone to invade or modify your body without your consent
And yet, fascinatingly enough, female genital mutilation is considered evil and immoral, but circumcision is regularly practiced. Tells me all I need to know about the "body is a temple" argument.
Nerd
5mo ago
If a maniac demanded that you rape your preteen daughter or else he'd kill your family, what would you choose?
Its intresting, because I think rape (particularly child rape) might just be a special case. If it was "let me harvest your daughters lung and kidney" or "let me chop off your sons leg", you might get greyer results. And in most cases, as far as I'm aware, murder is punished more severly than organ harvesting, and its about equal to rape in terms of maximum sentencing. The psychological effects of rape are probably what make it really bad, not necessarily the violation of bodily autonomy.
Nerd
5mo ago
And weirdly enough, their logic is looking to actually become true in the near future if AGI and full automation actually happens. Each new person really does just become someone else to share the robots with in that scenario. Why would you ever want to encourage the population to grow if that just means you have to share more?
Would having to share even be relevant at that point? You could probably produce enough resources to satisfy pretty much everyone. We already produce enough food to solve world hunger several times over. The pie isn't some limited resource.
"The Russians are coming right now to destroy our country" is an obvious immediate direct threat. If we don't fight right now, it's over as a nation.
Meanwhile "in the next few generations we'll have the same population we did a few decades ago" both isn't obvious or immediate, and to many people isn't even seen as a threat.
Those individuals are wrong in my eyes. South Korea is on track to lose 85% of its population. This is pretty catastrophic, and has negative implications going forward primarily with civilizational downscaling like @professorgerm & @gattsuru has explained. And there isn't much reason to believe that not gonna keep going down the toilet.
For an analogy, here is how i see this. The draft is like getting a seizure, birth rates are like a being obese & eating unhealthy. Obviously, you need to treat a seizure right then there to save the person. But being obese, even if it doesn't end you immediately, is still something you ought to curve because obesity will catch up to you eventually.
But even besides the negative consequences, its just a net bad to see humans and families dwindle, in the same way many mourn and are sad about extinct animals.
Nerd
5mo ago
To me this reads like another of those situations where a hypothetical burden on men, regardless of its actualization, is used to justify oppressing women in a way that does not seem, to me, very justifiable.
According to pew research, Men do feel the pressures of masculinity as mentioned, and they are punished more by society for stepping out the gender expectations. (And yes, women do have the whole "expectations to an involved parent" situation, but I'd wager thats more for a person already in the parenthood position - not having the kids itself.)
The primary point of what bothers me here is this: If you want to remove gendered roles and expectations, ok, we can discuss that (not something I'd agree with but still). But it seems to me that many don't want to be rid of the "patriarchy" and gender norms in reality. Switzerland, for example, had an opportunity to remove the draft via ballot measure, it failed. People like gender norms when it benefits them (or when they benefit women), and actively dislike them when they hurt them (or women). It basically ends in a situation where mens rights are up for grabs, while womens are off limits, because reasons.
Its "justifiable" if you look at it from a fairness standpoint. Either everyone has gendered roles and expectations or no one does.
And for the record here, I'm not in agreement with any crazy islamic style patriarchy, if thats your primary concern.
Nerd
5mo ago
Meh, I kinda see what you’re saying. But going to war and fighting is probably a lot worse morally and on the psyche compared to raising a child.
Nerd
5mo ago
I've been really thinking about this tweet.
Forcibly draft men to die for their country and no one bats an eye
Suggest that women have children for their country and suddenly everyone starts freaking out
We can force men to die, but can't even ask women to become mothers
This point is interesting, and I think rather noteworthy. There were many protests over the Vietnam conscription, Muhammad Ali's being the most famous example, so perhaps saying no backlash at all is a bit hastey. And who could forget our poor friends in Ukraine.
Still, I think she raises an interesting point. Most men still, (both legally and socially). Have to abide by the traditional man script. And this pressure is more on them then womens end of the social contract, which (from what I can see) is basically non existent.
Now the easiest explanation for this double standard is probably just gender bias: we simply have less empathy for men as a whole.
The way I see it, there are a couple of plausible solutions to make things for fair or consistent(any additional ones are welcome):
-
Gender "Equality". Extend "bodily autonomy" rights (for those who are actually consistent and believe in the concept, as a side note, I believe this is just a silly excuse) to men and end the draft, eliminate male disposability. Both men and women ask each other out. Stop valueing men as pure economic units. Men aren't wallets or soldiers, their people! Ect. Basically "Masculism" or some variation of MRA movement.
-
Extend the social contract obligations to women, and all that entails. Basically bring back some (or all) of the "patriarchy".
From what I can tell, 1 has kinda been tried, and has basically failed, probably due to the gender bias mentioned. I imagine Lauren favors the 2nd option, (& I kinda do). Implementing it may be unrealistic, however, due to various political and environmental constraints. I think realistically though, we are probably gonna have take a hard examination at the female end of the social contract at some-point, when birth rates and their implications become more severe and un-ignorable. Maybe we get lucky technology bails us out, but fundementally, I find the prospect of a society with no children, no families, etc, to be deeply dystopian.
I think one thing conscription shows (and the fact that many societies have it) is that, no society really wants to cease to exist. Nor should we. There is something valuable about societies existing, and continuing on into the future, even if we have to make some sacrifices for it. I think one can make a case (and many indeed do!) for extending some modified version of the social contract/roles to women. I've been deep thought about if societies might attempt this in the future, or what a modified variation of feminine roles/obilgations would look like. What do you think?
But why shouldn't you ban weapons that are easily concealable, much more destructive or have some other bad property that doesn't increase their productive use?
Many of these weapons can also be used for self defense. My ex girlfriend has a revolver at home that she actually had to use once to protect herself from sexual assault. I think if one lives in a dangerous area or is particularly vulnerable having a concealed weapon is beneficial.
Nerd
5mo ago
I mean, if you take a look at the evidence, far more people die of handguns than the big bad rifles you see used in those shootings. Even if someone could mow down 100's of people hypothetically, thats not really something that happens statistically. 5 guys killing 2 or 3 with a revolver every now and again happens way more often than one dude mowing down 25 people and you'd be saving far more if you just banned hand guns.
Nerd
5mo ago
A simple argument against gun control.
For context here, they are playing chess.
Mr. Terrific: I’m trying to map the multiverse. There are infinite Earths, each with their own history based on choices our other selves have made.
Mr. Terrific: So what do you need?
Superman: More of your T-Spheres.
Mr. Terrific: May I ask why?
Superman: I want to get rid of guns.
Mr. Terrific: For use around the world 24×7, you’d need to replicate the T-Spheres on a massive scale.
Superman: I’m only concerned about one. Actually, while we designate our Earth “Earth One,” it stands to reason that our other selves would do the same. Interesting, don’t you think?
Mr. Terrific: Still, you could never get rid of all the guns.
Superman: But most. You know we could.
Mr. Terrific: Just because we can doesn’t mean we should. People would resent us.
Superman: And they’d be alive to do that. Check. Think of the lives we’d save.
Mr. Terrific: Check. Smoking.
Superman: What?
Mr. Terrific: Cigarettes kill far more people. People keep smoking even though they know what’s killing them. Their families can only watch them die, and you want to save lives?
Jail everyone who smokes. Check.
And imprison anyone who speeds. Traffic fatalities are huge. Check.
Lock up everyone who leaves a dangerous dog unchained. Check.
Finally, we kill anyone who doesn’t recycle. Checkmate.
Superman: You’re not going to help me, are you?
Mr. Terrific: No sir, I am not.
I find this reasoning really interesting, because Mr.Terrific points out how selective much of the things that are being banned for killing people actually is.
Here are some other weapons that are banned or restricted in certain states in the US, and some countries:
Switchblades, butterfly knives are banned in places like the UK, and in some states like Minnesota & Massachusetts.
Brass Knuckles are banned in about 20 states, also in the UK and Canada.
The real issue I have with these bans and restrictions on guns, and even brass knuckles or knives, is that, the outrage seems to be selective. You can probably find pocket knives that'll do the job stabbing someone to death fairly easily, you could do it with a hunting knife or a kitchen knife. You could beat someone to death with a baseball bat, (or hell, you could make brass knuckles out of some nuts from Home Depot). And as stated, some of these kill far more people than other things, that are actually meant to harm, per the fbi, a kitchen knife has likely killed more people than brass knuckles have (for this, we'll say brass knuckles would probably fall into the "blunt objects" category). And as stated by Terrific, smoking kills far more than guns.
Perhaps the argument here is just to say: Look, bro, hunting knives - tobacco - cars, etc, aren't meant to kill people, so we aren't as interested in targeting them, but thats not personally how I judge (or others) would judge these situations. If I have a psychopath, who stabs someone to death with a kitchen knife vs one who does it with a switchblade. I'm not looking to judge them off the murder weapon in a trial. The dead person before me is what actually matters. Why should we care about the means of death? Its the ends that we are passing judgment for.
Nerd
5mo ago
Intresting, so what are the actually "races" genetically speaking? Is it just, black people, whites, than asians? How is it classified?
Nerd
5mo ago
For those with knowledge/believers of HBD, what does it have to say about Indians (East Asia), Arabs, & Hispanics (IQ wise)? I've been living in my city and I've noticed Indians tend to live in the nicer neighborhoods. Perhaps just selection effects from immigration? Hispanics have similar problems as black people, what does HBD say about them? Arabs?
I think we need to continue giving Ukraine money in the long run. For the sole fact that saving the innocent people in the country is a good for its own sake.
More options
Context Copy link