Testing123
6mo ago
Beautifully written.
Testing123
7mo ago
House M.D. as a time capsule.
House was on the air from 2004-2012. I watched it when it came out and then almost never since. Now I'm rewatching it (or rebinging it) and House has turned out to be an amusing time capsule of some culture war drift over the past decade. I get that House (the show and Character) was supposed to be kind of edgy, and an anti-hero, and straddle the line between likable and unlikeable, but I still think there were a lot of plotlines and Gregory House behavior that wouldn't fly in a modern tv show. For instance:
- House finds out that Dr. Wilson (his best friend) has an asexual female patient with an asexual husband. House says that asexuality isn't real because it doesn't make sense from an evolutionary standpoint. House bets Wilson $100 he can prove that the patient's asexuality is the result of a medical disorder. House eventually finds that the patient's husband has a tumor near his pituitary gland which crushes his libido, and that the patient has been lying about her asexuality since they met because she's in love with him.
- There's an episode where House and his team ogle and drool over a 15 year old model. In the same episode, House discovers that the girl has some rare disease where she actually has testicles in her body, at which point House insists on calling the patient "he" even though the patient hates it.
- House is casually racist towards Foreman (a black doctor that works under him) constantly. House never actually drops the N-bomb but he threatens to do so. It's clear that House isn't actually racist but he still says racist things to get under Foreman's skin. Even still, I don't think a modern tv protagonist could get away with this.
- Likewise, House sexually harasses Cuddy (his female boss) constantly. He makes lewd comments toward her and behind her back with colleagues. In one episode, House has a team of doctors competing with each other for job openings, and House tells them to try to steal Cuddy's panties as a game.
- There's a scene where Wilson gossips to House about a guy in the hospital dating a transwoman. House calls her a "tranny."
- There's an episode where House treats a dwarf, and House mocks the dwarf and her mother for being dwarfs (typical short people jokes).
- There's a character named "Thirteen" who is revealed to be bisexual. House and his colleagues act like this is a stunningly salacious detail at a level of like... if she was a hardcore swinger. Today, I don't think anyone would be surprised that someone of Thirteen's demographics - a highly-educated, white, early 30s, liberal female - was bisexual.
- Especially weird one: there's an episode where Dr. Chase (one of House's employees) goes to a party and ends up taking two girls home for a threesome. The next day, Chase's Facebook account is hacked and the hacker posts nude photos of Chase taken the night before with photoshop to make his penis look smaller. Chase runs around trying to figure out who the hacker is and eventually discovers it's the sister of one of the girls from the threesome. Chase confronts her, and she basically calls him a man whore and says he should stop having so much casual sex. Chase feels embarrassed and agrees with her, and then instead of calling the cops on her for posting revenge porn and hacking and maybe defamation, he asks her on a date. Note that the narrative of the episode frames this as a good outcome and a moment of growth for Chase (rather than a further extension of his man whoreness).
- On the opposite end of "House is too edgy for modern tv" is the way the show deals with religion. There are maybe a dozen episodes were House gets a religious patient and House mercilessly mocks them. When the show came out in the mid-2000s, this was probably par for the course amidst the online religion v. atheist wars, but watching it today, House comes off as a hilariously 2edgy4 me high school atheist.
Testing123
8mo ago
I bought Disco Elysium in 2019, immediately loved it, thought it was the funniest game I've ever played with fantastic writing. After about eight hours, the second area opened up, and I hit a wall. I was very fatigued by all the tangents and inner monologuing and not super interesting politicking, and so I got bored and stopped.
Two weeks ago, I gave DE another shot, and the exact same thing happened. I played slightly longer, but yet again hit a point where it was all too much and felt like a chore.
Is it worth me pushing through? Or should I just read a summary online?
Testing123
10mo ago
I very randomly watched A Time to Kill, a now mostly forgotten film that had some super-hot takes on the culture war back when it came out in 1996. Overall, I liked it a lot and thought it threw out some genuinely interesting moral considerations, but I also found the tone and message... wonky.
The premise - In the Deep South of Alabama (presumably in 1996), two drunk red neck good old boys who liberally say "nigger" and have a Confederate flag on their truck are trawling around town harassing random people. On a whim, they kidnap, rape, torture, and try to murder a 10 year old black girl. She survives, but is left with lots of injuries, including being unable to ever have children.
The rednecks are quickly arrested and everyone in town hopes they'll receive swift justice, but some people aren't so sure they will. Alabama is still considered deeply racist, and apparently a similar case a few years ago saw different perpetrators escape punishment. So the father (Samuel L. Jackson) takes matters into his own hands. While the two suspects are being marched through the local court house on the way to their trial, the father guns them down with an assault rifle, and accidentally wounds a police officer in the process.
The rest of the movie is a courtroom drama where a white lawyer (Matthew McConaughey) defends the father while the local DA (Kevin Spacey) tries to charge him with double first-degree murder. Meanwhile, the brother of one of the suspects tries to get the literal KKK to terrorize the lawyer to sabotage the defense. He's told that there is no KKK in town, but through some contacts, the brother finds the nearest Grand Wizard who then commands the brother to set up a local chapter. Throughout the trial, the KKK launches various terrorist attacks on the town and amasses 100+ members to march through the streets, and gets into violent encounters with pro-father protesters.
To get to the most interesting culture war-y part, I need to SPOIL the plot, so don't read on if you don't want to know what happens in a 25 year old movie.
The Defense mostly fucks up in the trial and it looks like the father is going to be convicted. The biggest problem for the Defense is that the jury is all white and presumed to be racist/unsympathetic. In one scene, the jurors are shown talking about the trial (illegally) the night before its conclusion, and all 12 jurors admit that they will vote guilty (one of whom even refers to the defendant as a "nigger").
Cut to the climactic closing statements of the trial. The DA gives a rousing speech about how he feels sorry for the father given what his daughter went through, but the law is the law, and you can't just murder two men in cold blood because they wronged you. Then McConaughey gives his closing statement: he recounts in gruesome detail every step of the 10 year old girl's kidnapping, torture, and rape, and concludes with... "now imagine if she was white."
The Defense wins the trial. The father is cleared of all charges and goes free. The film's narrative portrays this as an unambiguously good thing.
There's a lot to unpack here, but a few prompts:
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Was 1996 Alabama really THAT racist? Would the random average white person in Alabama at that time be considered racist enough by default that they would automatically side against any black defendant? Were there enough real, true, hardcore racists that the KKK could field 100+ protesters at a big racial trial?
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How differently, if at all, would such a trial be perceived today?
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What is a proper punishment for the father, if any? If I had to give a verdict, I'd say he should be found guilty and sentenced to 10 years in prison, which is an extremely short sentence for a double murder and maiming of a cop, but warranted given the context. I most certainly wouldn't be comfortable with finding him not guilty, not if we want to have a functional society.
Non-culture war addendum - the movie has an insane amount of contemporary and future movie stars. There's Matthew McConaughey, Samuel L. Jackson, Kevin Spacey, Sandra Bullock, Ashley Judd, Donald Sutherland, Kiefer Sutherland, Kurtwood Smith, Oliver Platt, Chris Cooper, Charles Dutton, and I'm proud of myself for spotting Octavia Spencer as a literal extra.
Testing123
10mo ago
Maybe this has been brought up in one of your other dating posts, but have you considered going abroad? I guarantee that you can find better women than who you're talking about here in the Philippines or Thailand, and if you're white, it honestly doesn't matter how ugly you are.
Testing123
11mo ago
I haven’t seen the movie but that was my sense just from the trailer. I don’t know if that’s because Howerton just doesn’t have much range, or if it’s because I’ve only seen him as Dennis for 15 years.
Red Letter Media just did a review of Guardians of the Galaxy 3. In their usual tangent at the beginning of the video, Mike read off an online article of the 34 biggest movies coming out this year. Of the 34, 28 are sequels/remakes/reimaginings of existing properties. Of the remaining 6, 3 are based on real-life people (ex. Oppenheimer). That leaves three major movies in all of 2023 based entirely on original ideas, and all three are made by big, established filmmakers with lots of studio clout. This is a trend people have been recognizing for at least the last 5 years, if not the last decade.
EDIT - the RLM guys actually got a few of these wrong and the numbers are even worse than they thought. At least one of the 6 supposedly original films are based on a book (Scorcese's next project) and another is based on a true story (Taika Waititi's next film).
My question is -
Is there any historical precedence for this? Has there been a time and place where popular culture so heavily converged on recycling products that the flow of new products was stymied.
I don't want to be too doomer about this. There are still new, original, interesting movies being made, but they have been shuttled off to low-budget indie and streaming avenues. These days, if a movie is big enough to get a wide release, it is almost certainly not original. It's hard to imagine a new Star Wars (the original) or anything like it coming out today - a big, bold, truly original vision with a budget.
(Alternatively, maybe most of the cinematic creativity is flowing into television where for a variety of technical and cost reasons, interesting stuff can still be made on a big budget (ie. HBO).
Testing123
1yr ago
You’re making an important point but overstating it. Both Singapore and Hong Kong have robust, complex economies beneath their trade routes. Both have major international financial institutions which have found success competing against the world (as well as some manufacturing and other industries). Qatar and the rest of the oil baron states have virtually no other competitive companies outside of oil.
Testing123
1yr ago
I agree that relationships have an anti-inductive component (even a significant one), but:
You ask why it's considered cold and demeaning to want something from someone without making an offer in exchange and I reply that the answer is in the question.
The answer is... sex. The girl gets sex in exchange for sex. I think most people, or at least most men, see that as a fair trade as long as both parties are attracted to one another.
The obvious, but often unstated retort is that men and women value sex differently. Both enjoy it on a physical level, but women tend to attach more emotional significance to the act, while men generally take a more casual approach and seem to desire the purely physical aspect more.
Ok, that's fine. It is what it is. But to wrap back around to one of the overriding aspects of my original post and many of the comments... why is the female perspective on sex not only seen as the default, but the male perspective on sex is seen as immoral, at least to the Reddit crowd? Isn't that what happened to the OP? He made a (very clumsy) sexual offer based on the male perspective of sex, but the girl had the female perspective, and shamed him for his error.
Traditional Judeo-Christian morality had an answer to this discrepancy. But I don't think modern sexual mores do. The sensible approach to me is for people to be aware of both the male and female perspectives on sex, and to exercise empathy in negotiations over sex. The Redditor perspective (which I think you are sympathetic to based on what you're saying, feel free to correct me) is that the female perspective should be privileged, and the male perspective should be punished, even if it's touted innocently and ignorantly.
Testing123
1yr ago
I think it's human nature to want to vent about injustice and annoyances. Plus I'm interested in what people here think about the many facets of OP's story, Reddit's reaction, and what it does or doesn't mean about modern culture. Two birds with one stone.
At the risk of sounding like a giga-autist, why does this standard seem to only apply to sex? If OP asked the girl to be a regular tennis partner, no one would accuse him of treating her like a "wall to bounce a ball off of." If he asked her to play video games with him, no one would accuse him of treating her like an "ally NPC."
I don't get why if a guy wants to have sex with a girl but doesn't want a relationship, it's taken to be demeaning and cold, while engaging in any other activity without some sort of grander emotional engagement is fine. Yes, I understand that sex and relationships are traditionally paired, but I also assumed that all but the most trad among us have moved on from that strict coupling in every possible circumstance, especially for college students who are still trying to figure out their dating and sex lives.
To clarify, by "literal virgin (despite being 21 years old)", I meant to convey:
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"virgin" is sometimes used colloquially and insultingly online to just mean "awkward around women", but in this case the guy is a "literal" virgin.
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I mentioned 21 years old because it is an unusual age to still be a virgin and highlights likely social awkwardness, I didn't mean to imply any moral failing on his part for that.
Time for some good old fashioned gender politics seethe:
A clearly very socially awkward nerdy literal virgin (despite being 21 years old) guy thinks a cute girl in his study group is flirting with him. He takes her aside privately after a study session and asks her… does she want to be his FWB (friends with benefits)? He reasons that he wants to have fun like many young men and isn’t looking for a relationship right now.
The girl is shocked and taken aback. She turns him down flat and appears uncomfortable. He feels uncomfortable too and apologizes to her and leaves.
Over the next few weeks, she doesn’t say anything to him at study sessions. He tries to make contact again, not to proposition her, but just to resume their friendly acquaintanceship. She tells him directly that she doesn’t want to speak to him. He is hurt but understands and leaves her be. Soon enough, he learns that she has told her friends and extended social circle what happened, and he is widely reviled as a creep. He feels hurt and violated. He laments that he has lost a friend, and now feels like he’s being lambasted for an innocent error, and he wishes the whole thing would just end and go away.
My take on OP is sympathetic. He comes off as extremely awkward and clearly isn’t well versed in the endless myriad of opaque and seemingly contradictory rules of modern dating. He wanted an FWB, and he didn’t understand that the socially acceptable way to get one is to ask a girl out on a date (usually through Tinder), then hook up with her, then either stay as vague as possible for as long as possible about your intentions while continuing to periodically fuck, or to sort of half way shrug after a fuck session and say, “yeah, I’m just really not looking for anything serious right now.” OP genuinely thought he was being upfront and honest with another person, and assumed that he was proposing something mutually beneficial.
Yes, it’s not a good idea to outright proposition a girl to be an FWB in a library. It’s awkward and weird and I can see how it made her feel uncomfortable. But all signs point to OP making an innocent error. He didn’t know any better. When he became aware of his mistake, he immediately apologized, gave the offended party space, and only later attempted to reestablish contact in a friendly, non-threatening manner. He made an innocent mistake and responded in the best possible way.
And Reddit’s response to OP is… calling him a massive piece of shit in every conceivable way.
What I find interesting about the overwhelming criticisms of OP is that they split in two completely opposite directions, but seemingly from the same critics.
On the one hand, OP is relentlessly slut shamed. He is accused of treating this woman like a “flesh light,” of feeling “entitled” to sex, of creepily trying to fuck an acquaintance, of pursuing sex with a girl instead of trying to date thine lady like a proper Victorian gentleman.
On the other hand, OP is relentlessly virgin shamed. He’s an incel, a fool, a creepy moron. He’s daring to try to have casual sex when he hasn’t even lost his virginity because he is SUCH A MASSIVE FUCKING LOSER. OP doesn’t understand that casual sex is only for chads who have fucked a bunch of girls, FWBs are an unlockable perk, not a privilege of the sexually unworthy.
Fortunately, there is a minority of Reddit commenters backing OP up, but it is a small minority. Meanwhile, many more posters are saying that OP is well on the way to becoming an incel or Andrew Tate fan, and unfortunately, they’re right, just not in the way they think they are.
I don’t have a larger point for this post, only that it’s incredibly frustrating that a significant portion of mainstream culture has erected these standards for the dating marketplace where one false step not only does, but should result in social and moral annihilation.
Testing123
1yr ago
This reminds me that there is a "just kidding, but not really" meme of modern young men idolizing Marcus Aurelius, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, etc. People from hundreds or thousands of years ago who lived in different cultures, spoke different languages, and had unimaginably different lived experiences can be admirable in their ways. No common skin color is required.
Testing123
1yr ago
Testing123
1yr ago
Gillian Flynn was attacked for sexism for writing "Gone Girl," where the antagonist is evil in a distinctly feminine manner, and Flynn, an old school feminist, argued that true equality means being able to portray both men and women as complex evil psychopaths.
The rebooted reality tv show, "The Mole," has a trans contestant (MTF) who they don't even mention being trans.
EDIT - the HBO reality tv show "The Climb" also has a trans contestant (FTM). He 100% passes and I didn't know he was trans until he brought it up.
Testing123
1yr ago
I can’t help but pedantically point out that Demon’s Souls is prob the easiest Soulsborne game, except maybe DS1. Elden Ring has to be the most difficult, followed be Sekiro.
Testing123
1yr ago
I bought my first gun, a .308 Ruger American, a year ago. I’m looking to buy a handgun now just for fun and use at the range. I’ve never fired a handgun and don’t really know what to look for besides something fun to use and not super expensive. Any recommendations?
Testing123
1yr ago
Is it men loving Asian women? Or is it women loving Asian men? Big difference. Why do they not reveal gendered racial statistics like OkCupid did?
They don't give gender/racial breakdown, but they do have most viewed categories by gender which are surprisingly similar (Japanese is the second most popular category for women???).
Why is "teen" a taboo subject?
Because, whether rightly or wrongly, it's considered pedophilia-adjacent by some. Porn Hub banned its unverified amateurs because it was accused of hosting a lot of underage porn. It probably had very little actually child porn, but quite a bit of jail bait underage porn.
Testing123
1yr ago
Pornhub released its annual "Year in Review" - https://www.pornhub.com/insights/2022-year-in-review
Some observations:
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The big one... transgenderism had a major bump this year. It's now the 7th most popular category worldwide, and number 1 in Brazil. Perhaps even more surprisingly, "“FTM” (female to male) searches were 8 times more popular than “MTF” (male to female)." Big caveat - the discrepancy might be due to search terms since "trans" and "shemale" default to "MTF."
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Asian search terms have an insane dominance. Among the top 6 most searched terms are "Asian," "Japanese," "Pinay," and "hentai" (if that counts).
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For the SOME LARGE NUMBER of years in a row, hentai is one of the top search terms. Is the 4chan meme that 2d girls better than 3d true?
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The search terms by age group is kind of hilarious. Zoomers love virtual reality, cosplay, and hentai (unreality/escape from reality). Millennials love Asians, tattoos on girls, feet, and transgenders. Gen X is just as degenerate, only the boomers like good old honest red blooded smut like handjobs, "babe," and small tits.
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One big caveat over the entire "Year in Review" is that Pornhub banned unverified amateur content a few years ago, so niche searches are probably marginalized.
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The other even bigger caveat is that there is definitely stat manipulation at play. "Teen" is mysteriously absent from the entire page, even though it has to be among the most common searches. Same for "step-sister," "rape," and probably a few other taboo subjects.
Testing123
1yr ago
Should the United States just double or triple the size of its legal infrastructure (courts, judges, etc.)?
Even if you're not libertarian/minarchist minded, you probably agree that running a legal system is one of the most important things the government should be doing. Yet it seems like so many of the problems of the legal system are simple supply problems. Issues like bail, the costs of litigation, the difficulty of executions (as mentioned by a poster below), the inconvenience of every single legal encounter, etc. would be solved or greatly lessened by expanding legal resources. And relative to the vast majority of things the government does, courts are not expensive. I'm guessing the U.S. could double the entire legal system for less than 1% of the budget.
Testing123
1yr ago
For anyone who is having trouble remembering how they know the name ‘Tommy Tallirico’, it might be from co-hosting Electric Playground on G4 way back in the day.
Testing123
1yr ago
Nah, not really. There was an earlier incident in 2021 where Marin may have given Covid to a minister after catching it in a club (Marin was vaccinated and was told that she couldn't spread it), but the video leaks were in 2022 after all the restrictions had ended.
And she gets the kiss too - https://youtube.com/watch?v=Ijuzvl8tv8k Later in the episode, the other doctors make fun of Chase (the adult male doctor who did the kissing) but the episode's narrative frames it as a good thing.
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