Its interesting how the past approximately 10 years of diplomacy in that arena has led to this being possible.
There was some Salami-slicing going on during Trump 1 thanks to the Abraham accords, a number of major Arab countries brought into the Western orbit and shown the benefits of being onside and chilling out about Israel. I have my misgivings about their reliability as 'allies' (something something scorpion and frog) but clearly they have the ability to sit on their hands when told to.
Then Russia got itself entangled in a conflict that keeps it from offering much in the way of support/deterrence.
Then Syria's government fell.
Probably a few other things I'm forgetting, but it all ultimately left Iran with no major buddies to lean on (China, I suppose) and thus the immediate consequences of going it 'alone' against its western adversaries.
Which is what made it safe enough for Israel to pulverize their defense systems from several angles.
Which made it safe enough for the U.S. to commit a huge portion of its strategic stealth bombers to the operation with assurances they'd all make it back, and presuming they had the firepower needed to do the job, could expect to actually cripple Iran this time.
I dunno how far in advance this stuff was planned and anticipated but I think this pretty much answers the "why didn't we do this 40/30/10 years ago" question. Too many uncontrolled variables, much higher risk.
Nothing's ever over. If I were Iran and I had some breathing room I'd probably be offering China near Carte-Blanche to give me some nuke tech. That strategy doesn't usually work in, say, Civilization VI but hey, the U.S. is vastly far ahead on the Science Victory, Cultural Victory, and Space Race Victory tracks, so options for both me and China are limited.
I'd vaguely fear Iran deciding to go full 'blaze of glory' mode and activate any and all contingencies and proxy parties it has abroad and just fire off 90% of its remaining missile stockpiles into Israel and daring the U.S. to put boots on the ground again.
But I don't see that as being the rational response and even if they don't come to the bargaining table, they're probably better off waiting to see if any other conflagration points pop off that might distract U.S. attention.
Yeah.
Any argument based on "TFR is going down, which clearly shows that X is the cause" is trivially defeated by the fact that every country has this same outcome regardless of the cultural starting point.
Its almost legitimately bad faith to deploy that argument.
faceh
13d ago
Kinda has to be, if every single country involved in manufacturing any bullet used to fire at your troops is now at war with you, things would escalate very rapidly.
All the more so in the current age of globalized industry.
That said, yeah, if your country is selling fully manufactured high end weaponry to another country with the basic knowledge that its going to be used in an extant conflict, you're clearly tapdancing on a somewhat blurry line.
Selling gasoline to a belligerent country is at least plausibly deniable, since it has civilian uses.
faceh
14d ago
They add increasingly absurd, uncomfortable and intense scenarios to make them crack, too.
And the audience is able to interact with the contestants directly.
faceh
15d ago
Nope. But its definitely authentic about it, it doesn't hate the contestants.
faceh
15d ago
He and Fishtank got mentioned on Rogan recently which probably helped too.
I do think Sam wants to be perceived as this inscrutable, unpredictable character, rather than his true self. I think he lets his true convictions come out and play pretty often (like the Elon vid), but he's made it effectively impossible to know what his 'authentic' personality is. This is what I believe the closest example is, that I've seen.
Then there's the interesting theory that he may literally be a cryptid.
The interesting thing about Sam's resurgence is how, simultaneously, a number of people who were opposed to him are crashing and burning, notably IDubbbz, where Sam legitimately tried to pull him off the path he was on during their dueling documentaries (goddamn that was 3 years ago).
Despite how he portrays himself in his comedy and public persona, he's clearly got his life far more put-together and on a better trajectory than most influencers/youtube celebs.
You are basing your worldview on random ragebait TikTok videos
Uh, No.
I've basing it on literally years of research on the topic:
I've researched the Low TFR Issue
I've researched the legal and economic side of it. Pointed out how corporations are technically competing with men for women's commitment.
I brought up the "how many marriageable women are actually out there question literally a year ago, then I ran some very rough numbers.
I've pontificated on why intersex relations have degraded over two years ago.
I've even researched the age-gap question.
This includes talking to real people, I can offhand name a dozen people in my circle experiencing the EXACT. SAME. ISSUES.
I beg you to try and give me some data that I haven't seen yet. You came in and assumed off of 3 comments that I've somehow NOT bothered to look into this issue at every level I can?
In fact, I've put in a LOT of effort to try to find the evidence that runs against this point, but in this search I keep finding videos like the ones I posted, which seem to confirm the data, the anecdotes, the personal experience. All of it pointing in the same direction.
Your attempt to dismiss my point out of hand without a single argument has been noted, and my opinion has remained utterly unchanged.
But anyway, that should be an advantage for you. Getting a nice haircut, moisturising regularly and buying a few well fitting fashionable outfits will already set you apart from the crowd.
This is not a problem for me. I am not the one who needs to hear this advice.
I am the one telling you this advice is useless for most men under current conditions and you sound like a Boomer telling someone to sharpen up their resume and give the manager a firm handshake to get hired.
faceh
15d ago
Hah, I've been pretty convinced that my hair is thinning around the temples for the past 4ish years.
I'd go back and look at photos of me from college and try to guesstimate if I've lost a couple millimeters.
I considered using some kind of marking system to see if there was any retreat. But I'm 36 now, and hair is still pretty thick, so even if I lose a bit on the Temples I doubt its a real concern.
Also, apparently the convergence of techs available now mean that you really can get your hair growing again with some investment of time and money.
but falling marriage rates do not in themselves indicate that "no one is finding a partner."
Yeah, the increasing numbers of people who report not having a partner indicate that actually.
If you think this data is just wrong, fine.
But its all kinda points in the same direction. Fewer relationships, women being more choosy, men losing ground, and marriage rates tumbling, along with birth rates.
I keep posting data from various countries, from various sources, and asking someone to find me data that disagrees with this, that shows a different story.
And about the best that I've seen is that SOME PARTICULAR SUB-POPULATIONS, say the Amish, the Mormons, other religious sects, are doing pretty well overall.
If you were proposing we ban dating apps, I'd have qualms about the legality and the implementation, but I'd probably approve in principle.
Well here yah go, from me:
Identify the cohort of males who are carousing and stealing women's most fertile years and cull them. Just straight up kill 'em.
If that's too extreme, we can just castrate them. Compromise!
That cuts out a major factor that is both preventing women from settling AND is making them less marriageable. Heavily punish males who exploit young women's emotions and leave them worse off than they found them.
If that's still too extreme, then maybe just ban dating apps altogether.
If THAT is too extreme, just require every dating app to VERY publicly disclose their actual success rates for men and women forming relationships, so people can make an informed decision when using them. There's a reason they don't disclose them normally. They're abysmal.
And then, reduce or remove all economic policies that explicitly favor hiring women so that women are less likely to marry a corporation. There's enough competition amongst biological men without having to compete against Megacorps anyway.
Then reduce or remove most policies designed to allow an unmarried women to live 'comfortably' on the public dime, thus becoming brides of the state.
Basically, remove the economic policies that keep women from enduring any significant difficulties, ever, from childhood on, so that women will actually need a man in their life for more than just happy fun sexy times. This is called "ALIGNING THE INCENTIVES."
I'm standing by each of these suggestions.
Do you want to go full Dread Jim (literally make women property)? Do you want to retvrn to traditional (pre-Enlightenment) Church rules?
No.
I'd like to return the a legal status quo of approximately 30ish years ago, where there wasn't nearly as much direct economic support for women to pursue additional degrees, or hang around in the long term in corporate jobs, or to remain unmarried even with kids b/c the state and the corporation will pay their bills regardless.
I'm not hiding the ball, I've stated my main position/suggestions openly. I'm not out here yelling "REPEAL THE 19TH." I know guys who are.
Just even the playing field and the incentives and I think we see improvement. Women need some reason to prefer marrying a guy and sticking with him, rather than being able to just extract the same resources via the state, or from hundreds of microhusbands on Onlyfans.
But Gen Z men are turning further and further right. (Caveat, of course, Gen Z women have made an even more pronounced swing left, which makes them even less appealing as partners.)
And let me just point out. These are men who were raised, in some large portion, by single moms. As in, steeped in female influence literally from birth.
They were taught mostly by female teachers.
They've had their lives guided by female academic administrators, HR staff, hiring managers, and they've had their dating lives governed pretty much completely by female standards since they hit their teen years.
They have their entire upbringing defined completely and utterly in terms of female guidance and authority. I won't go into the concept of "the longhouse," but that's just the facts.
And they're turning right. They're listening to Andrew Tate, and they're voting for Trump and Co.
What do YOU think this cohort of men will do if they hit their 30's and find themselves unable to form families or hit the other life goals that they'd expect to achieve by then?
Just throw some thoughts out there.
I'm offering the moderate options, but these guys are even less likely to give a shit about women's input.
faceh
16d ago
Of course not.
I contend, however, that fewer people in the younger generation meet that definition of "sane people." Particularly young women.
Its becoming more common because people are becoming less sane.
This is a completely compatible set of views, supported by the evidence.
Because more of them are exposed to exactly this sort of ragebait and manipulation, constantly.
The internet isn't real life, but its correlating with something.
Anyway, here's a tiktok video with over 600k likes and 8000 comments where a woman breaks down in tears b/c a man she considers ugly gave her unwanted attention. (read: asked her on a date)
Is it a lie? MAYBE! But a lot of people believed it and completely support her position anyway!
Here's one with 367k likes and 64k comments claiming MEN are the ones not putting in enough effort into their appearance and there's just not enough hot men out there.
Ragebait? Could be, but a lot of women happily gobbling it up and affirming it. There's a comment with 64k likes claiming "I see a decent-looking man once a week."
Is it true? Do the people liking the comment BELIEVE it is true?
You tell me what one should make of this.
Frankly, I believe my lying eyes more than I believe a collection of blackpill-curated stats from places like the Institute for Family Studies.
They're stats from literally everywhere I look. Stats that have been tracked for decades. Unless something radical changed with definitions or analysis (possible, I grant), then the trends are all pointing the same way, and demonstrating the same underlying phenomenon.
I've been through it, I've had multiple close friends and acquaintances who are all having the same difficulties. I find it on reddit forums, I find it on my groupchats, I find it when I hear from people in my age cohort and younger in here.
Its a rising chorus of voices that some people claim not to hear.
When the stats are lining up with the anecdotes are lining up with the personal observations, and EVERY SINGLE person on the other side says "No, can't be true, I know a guy that is doing fine" while offering zero verifiable evidence...
I'm not going to update very heavily in favor of that.
There is literally not a single piece of statistical evidence that supports the idea that relationship formation is improving.
I can't find ANY single person who is having a 'good time' in the 'find a partner' game.
None.
Zero.
Marriage rates are about the most objective stat you can find that are tracked by the Census, and the definition of marriage is about as standardized as you can get.
They're in the tank., especially among the younger generation.
This is downstream of something.
Offer me an alternative hypothesis.
No, the game is not rigged against you. No, there are not zero acceptable single women in your city. No, the solution is not to contrive reasons why women should not have agency to choose.
If you say so.
Anyway, here's an extremely recent article from The Economist bemoaning the fact that despite the fact women are now outperforming men in EVERY school subject, but can't seem to keep up in Math, so OBVIOUSLY we need to close that gap.
Very evenhanded analysis.
Here's direct evidence that Lockheed Martin very directly discriminates against White Males in deciding on who gets bonuses.
Would you wager on them being the only major company doing this?
What does 'rigging the game' look like, to you?
No, there are not zero acceptable single women in your city.
Never have I said anything remotely like that.
What I HAVE said is that the competition for the pool of 'acceptable' single women is high enough that its guaranteed that many men will lose out.
And women having the perception of more choice makes the average woman less likely to settle, at all.
Too many men chasing too small a pool of women, full stop.
That's just objectively true if we restrict our examination to dating apps
No, the solution is not to contrive reasons why women should not have agency to choose.
They've been choosing quite freely for a long time, and they're less happy than ever. TFR is in the gutter. Women are suffering from more mental illnesses than ever.
What now? Shall we try even harder to give them MORE choice?
Or just let the status quo continue?
You tell me.
faceh
17d ago
Now I am wondering what the equivalent to the church service is for these folks.
Protest marches, for one, but surely they don't have weekly sermons in the equivalent of a chapel.
Women are more religious than men,
Ironically men are attending church more than women now, the previous trend is just barely inverted.
Which suggests women have indeed found a replacement outlet for their religious tendencies. Things are getting janky.
But yeah, to the extent women are saying this, its ultimately just a shit-test or its them asserting high standards so they can pretend they're more selective.
Nope.
The situation has given women more options, which has led to them being more selective.
For the young folks, there's a general recession in sex and in Relationships, which is especially pointed amongst men. Its baked in, young men who don't get experience dating while young will just have a harder time getting dates going forward.
"Women are easier than ever" only holds true for the subset of men that women find attractive on a basic physical level.
Dating Apps, for instance, heavily favor women and the small subset of men who are getting laid left and right and, likewise, have no incentive to settle or commit. Which just makes the women they interact with bitter.
This is supported by virtually every statistic you can find on the matter. You can't self-improve your way out of a game that is rigged against you.
Its harder for everyone else across the board.
but chances you’ll get off on pussy 10x more if you give it a shot.
Men don't just want pussy, they want a meaningful, committed relationship within which they can start a family.
This advice is just not going to work for the vast majority of young men, no matter how much it is repeated.
Now what?
faceh
17d ago
There's some largish subset of Gen-Z women who are claiming that in their daily lives, they almost never see 'hot' men out and about, and the vast majority of the men they do see are hopelessly ugly, don't take care of themselves, and are just horribly unattractive, meanwhile they also claim that most of the women they see are gorgeous, well-put-together, and otherwise "hot" and thus deserve better partners than they've got.
"Chopped" is apparently slang for "rough-looking."
And they further suggest that this is why men are lonely and undateable, since they aren't doing any interesting hobbies, aren't putting effort into dressing well or taking care of their appearance, and are generally "failing" to do the things that would make them attractive to women. And the implicit point in all of this is that the woman speaking is in fact hot and desirable and thus entitled to be as selective as she wants.
The reason its only videos is because that's how Gen Z communicates, which is why this might escape the notice of the older generations.
And of course, the added irony that this is taking place during "Men's Mental Health Month."
faceh
17d ago
What is the objective of this male general strike?
To keep more of our money, I'd say.
Any other effects would be completely incidental. If society isn't offering any net benefits in exchange for the money paid into it, then it is quite morally defensible to stop paying in.
That was like 30% of the justifications put forth in the Declaration of Independence.
Why would any man who’s a productive member of society rally behind this?
Why would any man want to continue to support a productive society that treats him like an expendable worker bee and doesn't even guarantee that he'll at least have the CHANCE to pass on his genes?
That's what the OP is getting at, directly. What's the point? Why stand by and be exploited?
Any blue or white collar male worker needs the police, firefighters, agricultural workers etc just as much as any woman, and can count on disability and unemployment benefits if things go poorly (maybe less so in the US, but that’s another issue).
There's a question their net contributions, clearly. Division of labor is good. But someone who is putting in more than they're getting out has direct reasons to question the arrangment.
Anybody who says "we don't need firefighters, we can fight our own fires!" and/or denigrates the role of firefighters is being stupid and discriminatory.
But anyone who says "we don't need men, we can take care of ourselves" is implicitly saying "we don't need firefighters, solders, builders, police officers, etc. etc. etc."
Its an even more fundamentally delusional worldview.
And it should be acceptable to call that out, no?
You’re just doing the same old identity politics as the feminists you’re complaining about, just flipped.
Yes.
So why is it so easy/reflexive to attack when men do it, but its impossible to find anyone serious suggesting that maybe women should lower their expectations a bit.
Yep.
I think men find it more tolerable to compete for the hand of the 'fair maiden' who is making everyone play the game to win her affections, than to have to face the reality that the maiden isn't so fair after all and they were burning efforts trying to get her to pay heed, meanwhile she's banging Sir Lancelot on the side and was never actually considering his proposal.
Rejection is less likely to convert to resentment when a man is at least 'in the running' for a woman's affections. When he's one of twenty dudes, 4 of which have already banged her, and another 10 have her nudes, its like... what is the point?
A guy being tested by a woman, rising to the occasion, passing the test and earning her hand in marriage is a pretty solid cause - effect /action - reward path. Humans are persistence hunters after all.
But a guy putting in effort, getting rejection, then seeing that the Chad (whom he KNOWS has got four other women on rotation) get the prize with much less investment, well, that's going to sting, it feels personal, even if it isn't.
And of course worst is when the women CONCEALS her other paramores (as they are wont to do) so its only AFTER one man has put in tons of effort that he realizes he could have just used standard pickup artist tricks on her and gotten the sex without the emotional distress.
Having an easily legible, mutually agreeable path for successful courtship solves for all the uncertainty and makes it so much less stressful on men and women, but we've fucking THROWN OUT the rulebook.
faceh
18d ago
Yeah.
Fixing it doesn't depend SOLELY on reining in female promiscuity (although that's a major factor), we would need to PUNISH male promiscuity, or at least the brand of it where a guy exploits a woman's naivete and leaves her more cynical and closed off than before, because he pays no cost for it.
I'd suggest execution, but the nice compromise solution would be castration.
faceh
18d ago
I've made the point before that women are a potent political force, but an incompetent military one
If your political coalition is dependent on tons of addled females voting for them to maintain its support, it is ALSO dependent on NEVER allowing the other side to bring organized violence against them since those same females would fold instantly.
If things get heated for real, the side that wins will absolutely positively NOT be the one that is depending on women voting for them.
So its a question of who has enough motivated men to 'force' the issue.
faceh
18d ago
Where is this all coming from? Is it rejection? I get rejected a lot, who cares? Do a lot of men not share my love of women?
Must've missed my screed about the current state of Western Women a couple weeks back.
That's a bit tricky though.
You turned him down, even after he invested in a gift, and he kept pursuing. And I don't know what if any signals he was reading that led him to think it would succeed.
Meanwhile, the advice that men would get, both from most women and men, is you have to move on after a rejection, because continuing on is 'creepy,' or is 'simping' (ESPECIALLY the gift-giving), or maybe even straight up stalking or harassment. How many rejections is a man supposed to 'ignore'? How much should he invest before it becomes throwing good money after bad?
There is no good answer. And there's the risk of a woman actively exploiting this tendency in men to pump as much money and effort from him as possible.
This pursuit model of the man slowly, politely grinding down a woman's barriers and making increasingly enticing offers for her time and affection is one that I personally prefer. But it just doesn't work very well when women have many available options, and to continually pursue one who has already rejected you just reads as 'desperation' which is a turnoff on its own.
Simply put, why would a guy put himself through that without some reasonable expectation of success?
faceh
18d ago
My brother is pretty much the dropout guy. Rents a room in a friend's house, makes very little money through various gigs (and some less-legal stuff), but has no space to host or otherwise have people over at a whim.
But he's so damn affable and charismatic that he never lacks for invites to go and do interesting stuff. The dude took a day trip down to Key West yesterday (didn't even invite me) and a couple days before that he was hanging out with some guy who, no joke, is building a large reptile zoo facility on his property.
I don't envy him, per se, but I don't get invited out nearly as much as he does. I have to do the hard hosting work. And someone has to.
There's also the aspect that he'll have to clean the mess all up afterwards or hire some maid to do so, and that his social circle will come to expect him to keep throwing cool parties.
Thankfully my friends are pretty tidy guests, and don't tend to expect me to host. Hell, they seem nervous even asking.
My 'deep dive' into the question shows that it is multifactor, although there's some overlap/common causes behind certain factors.
Like, its almost ridiculous how many disparate pressures appear to make women less prone to producing kids (that's a slightly unfair way to put it, but it captures the problem, I think).
Chemicals they randomly encounter in the modern environment, chemicals they intentionally put in their body, social expectations shifting, economic incentives shifting, the (short term) opportunity cost of kids, the increase in immigration rates, the advent of social media, increasing concentration of people in urban areas, and yeah, the fact that women are now solely responsible for choosing their mates and there are zero restrictions left on their decision process... so they decide to not decide.
I don't think all of these factors are downstream of female liberation.
And many of these pressures are only possible thanks to technological developments of the last century. Which is also true of female liberation itself.
As I put it:
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