@SubstantialFrivolity's banner p

SubstantialFrivolity

I'm not even supposed to be here today

5 followers   follows 0 users  
joined 2022 September 04 22:41:30 UTC
Verified Email 

				
User ID: 225


				
				
				

			

		

	














	


		


			



	

		

			

			

				

					

						

							
						

						

							
							

								
SubstantialFrivolity


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
I'm not even supposed to be here today

				
				
				

				

					5 followers  

					follows 0 users  

					joined 2022 September 04 22:41:30 UTC
				


				
					

					
No bio...

				

				

				

				

				

					

					

					
					
					

					
User ID: 225


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
							
								Verified Email
							
						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
‎

			

				
				

					Hour
					Day
					Week
					Month
					
					All
				

			


			
‎

			

	
	

	 Hot Bump Bottom New Old Controversial Comments
	



		

	






	

		
		

		
		
	

	

  







		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 5, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Kind of off-topic, but what the hell is that columnist smoking!? No, a boy who goes "don't worry, I have pads just in case my friends need one" would not be drowning in prom invites. He would be relentlessly mocked and ostracized for that behavior. The only scenario in which it would perhaps go the boy's way is if he was hot, in which case he doesn't need to do that to attract girls anyway. Just an absolutely bizarre take that makes me wonder what the heck the writer is even thinking.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 22, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


It used to be okay for something to not be for you.




It pains me that this is such a lost thing nowadays. There's nothing wrong with things that don't appeal to everybody! In fact, I would go so far as to say that's what makes life interesting - we can each be into different things that others would find unbearable, and we are better off for it because each of us is happier than with something that tried to appeal to everyone at once. But for some reason, that's now treated like it's morally abhorrent.


Also, maybe it's just my skewed perspective but it seems like the actual rule is even worse than "we must water everything down for everyone". It seems to be only the things that nerdy men enjoy which get this treatment. Board games have to be PC, video games must remove any trace of sex appeal because that scares off women, programming must be packed full of diversity statements and codes of conduct, etc. But nobody expects the local crochet club to change to appeal to men, etc. Basically, it feels like society kicked nerds out in the 80s, we went "ok whatever we're going to do our own thing", and now 40 years later the bullies are back to kick us out of the communities we built as a refuge from them in the first place. It really grates.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 31, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


How can people trust with this level of malfeasance? How do we get the trust back?




The same way you get trust back in a normal human relationship: you apologize unreservedly, make concrete steps to prevent the issue happening again, and accept that it will be a long time (if ever!) before the trust is rebuilt to what it used to be.


In this case, that means that first, everyone who repeated this false evidence needs to retract it, and apologize for their error in repeating it. No holding back because they think that fighting racism is a noble goal, no minimizing to try to avoid reputation damage, nothing. Full on admit the fault and apologize. Second, this man himself needs to be banned from ever doing research again without supervision from someone more trustworthy. Third, publications which repeated this falsified research need to brainstorm a plan for how they will catch future problems like this, and that should include a good honest look at how their own biases helped it to happen (because I have very little doubt they didn't check too closely because this research confirmed some editors' biases).


The medical profession needs to do that not only for this case, but for any other cases that come to light. And then wait. They will no doubt be beaten up in the short term by people who are angry at having been betrayed. They will get this thrown back in their faces from time to time. But eventually, if they are patient and keep acting with integrity, the wound will (probably) heal and the trust will be back. It's not an easy or fast process though.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


For a young woman that has any sex life, the possibility and consequences of getting pregnant loom large.




Indeed. That is why one should not have sex unless they are prepared to face the potential consequences. It's not like women simply wake up pregnant and had nothing to do with it.


I consider abortion to be infanticide. I know you probably don't, and we don't have to try to argue with each other on it because it won't be productive. But I imagine you can understand how thoroughly unpersuasive your argument is for someone who thinks as I do, right?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 23, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Is it too much to say the Democratic Party is a criminal enterprise at this point?




Yes. Mainly because that is too broad of a brush, and captures many, many people who weren't complicit in this. I think it's fair to say that the current administration staff are guilty of willfully defrauding the American people; whether that makes them criminals or not I'm not sure. But if you call the entire Democratic Party a criminal enterprise that implicates every politician, every staffer, at every level across the entire country. That is too far.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 22, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I mean, yes, there has been social change, but the vast majority of that has been positive in my view, and in the view of the vast majority of people.




Citation very, very badly needed. With all due respect, I think you're completely out of touch with what actual nerds (as opposed to the bullies colonizing nerd spaces) think. Apart from vocal progressives in Extremely Online forums, I have never encountered nerds who think that the invasion of politics (left wing or otherwise) into their beloved activities is a good thing.




Like, why do I want to be personally friendly with people who want to make the lives of my other friends worse?




For one thing, because you're wrong and approximately nobody wants to make the lives of your other friends worse. If you can't see that, then you need to take a step back (many steps back) and learn to view things from your opponents' perspective rather than your own.


For another thing, because that is how society works. We all have things we disagree strongly with each other on. Having a functional human civilization requires that we live and let live as much as we can. And sure, kicking people out of your hobbies based on your political disagreements does not by itself destroy that social contract. But it does undermine it, and like clockwork the illiberal attitudes of "let's kick the baddies out of our social club" turns into "let's kick the baddies out of good jobs" turns into "let's kick the baddies out of society altogether". It's important to fight this sort of toxic thinking on the small scale before people start to apply it on the larger scales.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 30, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Literally anything would've been cleaner. Wickard v Filburn is one of the most bad faith interpretations of the law in our country's entire history. There might be worse, but there aren't a lot of them.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 17, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Do you have evidence that young men compete and distinguish themselves for access to me?




No disrespect intended, but this is common knowledge to the point that it defies belief that anyone would not know this (kind of like if you asked someone to provide evidence that people die if they stop breathing). If you're young enough you may not have realized it yet, I suppose. But young men spend vast quantities of effort to try to get attention (and especially sex) from women. It's the #1 thing on their minds, and a lot of things they do can be traced back to "showing off for the girls".


Or, as Chris Rock memorably put it: "Women are offered dick every day. Every [woman] gets offered dick at least three times a week. Three times a day, shit! That’s right, every time a man’s being nice to you … all he’s doing is offering dick. That’s all it is. ‘Can I get that for you? – How about some dick?’ ‘Could I help you with that? – Could I help you to some dick? – Do you need some dick?’" Yes he's a comedian and he's playing it for laughs, but it works because both he and the audience know how true it is.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 12, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Touche. This is some excellent next level pedantry, I salute it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 6, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I definitely agree with this. I think that calling the Jan 6 riot a "coup" or similar terms is pure sensationalism. It is even worse when you have the direct contrast of other, similar riots all throughout 2020. The very same people condemning Jan 6 condoned those riots, if not outright approved of them. I try to be charitable, but I genuinely can find no charitable explanation of this double standard which seems plausibly true to me.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of May 5, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
No Pope Pizzaballa. The meme dream is dead.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


There's been a fair bit of left media labelling their actions with DOGE etc as a "coup"




Between this and the Jan 6 riot, I see people are trying to water down "coup" until it's just as meaningless as "Nazi" or "fascist".


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 24, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


As much as the right complains about this, the wound is entirely self-inflicted.




Your make a good point overall, but it is an overreach to claim that this is entirely the fault of the right. Even when things weren't as bad as they are now in academia, there was still a bias (as you yourself said). I myself saw it when I was an undergrad student: conservatives were shamelessly (if clandestinely) mocked in ways that would never fly if it happened to other groups. I remember people leaving taunting messages on the chalkboard used by the university Christian group, or vandalizing political signs for conservative candidates. Nobody cared. But I strongly believe that if, say, the black student group had someone put derogatory messages on their chalkboard, there would have been a campus outcry and investigation of it.


That is the kind of environment conservatives faced, and even though it wasn't as bad as it has become, it wasn't remotely welcoming either. Would you make your career in an environment that was tacitly hostile to your beliefs and way of life, just to try to fight the good fight? I certainly wouldn't, and I can't really blame those who wouldn't either. I think it's fair to say that the right-wing culture which is suspicious of academia and other "not real work" kind of jobs is their own fault. But there are other factors here which aren't their fault.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 2, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Could FDR ban publishing Der Stürmer by German sympathizers in 1942?




FDR wiped his ass with the Constitution. I don't think he cared one bit what it did or did not allow him to do.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


But what "rights" are we talking about? If this is the number two issue for women, I have to assume there's some sort of female-centric set of rights, right (haha)? Well, of course the thing to point to is Dobbs and abortion. What "right" was stripped remains a mystery...




This is not in any way a mystery and I have no idea why you say it is. Supporters of legal abortion are very clear that they think it is a woman's natural right to choose whether or not to have a child inside her, and that this right means women should be able to get an abortion. I don't agree with their analysis, but it's also not like it is hard to learn what they think.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Revolutions are very much not cool. They might be necessary, they may be beneficial in the long run (though they definitely aren't always), but they are still brutal affairs where a lot of blood gets spilled. They should be avoided unless absolutely necessary, much like drastic surgery.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 18, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


When you are forced to refer to an MTF transsexual as "she", you are being compelled, under social duress, to assert as an ontological truth that this person just is a woman (and all parties are aware that that's plainly what's going on here - otherwise it wouldn't be such a heated topic of disagreement in the first place). I can't accept being compelled to assent to such a contentious position.




This is the crux of my objection as well. I have issues with the idea of taking a healthy human and mutilating their body to make them a crude facsimile of the other sex, but at the end of the day I think adults have the right to choose self-mutilation if that's what they want. But what I will not play ball with is the attempt to try to get me to affirm a lie (that a trans person really is the sex they claim to be) as the truth.


I try to treat trans people I encounter with respect and compassion; they are my brothers and sisters just like everyone else. And Lord knows that they have enough on their plates without me disrespecting them. But "respect and compassion" does not include telling bold faced lies just because that is what they want to hear. I'll avoid the topic of gender as much as possible for their sake, but if it's unavoidable then I'm not going to lie about it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 29, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Transgender issues are very important to [some groups], but the median swing voter in Wisconsin doesn't give a damn....




As someone from Wisconsin, who knows my fair share of swing voters, they absolutely do give a damn. There are plenty of people who aren't diehard for one party or the other, but who find transgender stuff to be fairly off-putting.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 31, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Down thread, @UnopenedEnvilope said that this particular power was delegated to the president by an act of Congress. Maybe this will wake people up to the dangers of Congress abdicating their jobs and giving control to the President, but I somehow doubt it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


But a person saying “they are sorry the guy missed” is not giving a political opinion. It’s a threat.




That is by definition not a threat. A threat must communicate the intent to do something to somebody. Saying "I'm sorry the guy missed" is wishing death on someone and that's bad, but it isn't a threat either.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
That is literally what judges do though. They say "this particular military operation, or this particular use of prosecutorial discretion, is illegal". That's their only job in the US legal system. I don't really see how this law grad you speak of can say that a judge isn't allowed to do such things. Judges don't have unlimited power to control the executive, but they do have some power to do so.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 27, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
That is precisely what the motte and bailey term means. Feminism is one of the specific examples Scott Alexander cited in his essay on the term, as I recall.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 2, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


But by acting on this noble impulse, Jon critically undermines his other duty of protecting the realm from literal ice zombies that want to kill all humans. And thus the folly of trying to follow all his noble impulses: which eventually gets him killed in a mutiny.




This isn't necessarily related to your overall point, but this plot point is probably the show failure that pissed me off the most. In the books, the brothers mutiny against Jon because he broke his oath. Whether one agrees or disagrees with their actions, they had a reasonable motive for what they did. The show abandons the nuance entirely and just rounds the brothers' motive off to "hurr durr racism". It's infuriating.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 18, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


it's purpose is to be a new home for people who are upset that moderates and conservatives are being given a voice, any early adoption is going to be centered around that.




Ditto for Mastodon. It is an absolute cesspool because it's primarily used by people who couldn't stand the idea that Elon might not let them bully people with politics they didn't like (and this was before he bought Twitter no less). It is exactly as bad as you might expect based on that.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 11, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
These can both be explained by the same thing: the vocal anti-Trump "resistance" folks are part of a social group where people who fight oppressors on behalf of the little guy have a ton of status. Everyone loves a David vs Goliath story, but for this subculture that tendency is way stronger than it is for other groups. That means that these people are more likely to be overzealous in identifying tyranny (because they subconsciously want the chance to fight for freedom like the stories they were raised on), and more likely to be very conspicuous in their efforts (so that they can get the approval of their peers). If they were fighting an actual tyrant they would need to be more circumspect (as you point out), but anyone who has grown up in America is so far removed from actual tyranny that they don't even recognize how good they have it.