I appreciate you linking directly to the argument.
However, the presented tweets, especially removed from any greater context, barely budge the needle from what I already believe, as stated above.
It still reads like she's simply sticking to her guns under heavy, withering attacks against her in a battle she never invited but is, at this point, willing to fight. Her guns being that women's rights are a distinct, important cause worth upholding and that redefining 'woman' starts to erode those rights in a subtle way.
"Rowling is an extremely outspoken opponent of trans rights. This has been her main issue for several years now."
Yeah, so right around the time trans rights were made into a central social issue in the culture wars. Could it be that it's just her being consistently pro-woman in her beliefs and responding to just the latest attacks on women's rights as she would on any other matter? I don't think she's been harboring hidden anti-trans beliefs all this time, or that she arbitrarily decided to turn trans rights into her defining cause in the past few years. How does one differentiate between someone who started singling out trans people because they hate them vs. because trans people have been getting much, much more attention than previously?
Also, maybe because she believes that there's an inherent contradiction between what trans-rights activists want and what is good for women as a class?
You can't square that circle unless you agree "trans women are women" which... J.K. by all appearances honestly believes is not the case.
"Rowling doesn't ask her audience to think; she asks them to fear"
And HOLY SHIT if that's the standard for determining who is a bigot and creating '-phobias,' then there's a laundry list of mainstream personalities who are apparently spreading, among other things. incelphobia, Russophobia, and constant, CONSTANT androphobia.
Maybe explain why she's not allowed to invoke anger and emotional pleas while everyone else throws them at her, and happily invokes them on other issues?
As with other groups, this starts to read as a special pleading. "The mere fact that you're criticizing [group] at all indicates you must hate them." But why is THAT group thus immune to criticism in a way others are not?
Why do I even feel like defending J.K. Rowling? I just get really sick of this whole "we picked a fight against someone and they didn't take a dive in the first round as planned, so we've doubled, tripled, quintupled our efforts and HOW DARE they continue to fight back" approach employed by activists.
Pulling on the Fight Club thread, I can speak directly to how men seem to need structure, challenge, and, yes, some form of 'violence' or otherwise direct physical risk to reach full self-actualization.
I'm a martial arts/combat system instructor at a local gym. Krav Maga.
I fully attribute most of my confidence and positive affect in life on my participation in this hobby. I'm really good. It makes me happy.
And I have now, across dozens of examples, observed exactly how getting to engage in a healthy outlet for aggression can turn a man's whole perspective on life around.
Guys of all ages come in having never thrown a goddamn punch in their life, they awkwardly cast Fist towards a thick, cushioned pad, they feel the impact and maybe their knuckles start bleeding, they tire out within a minute... and a wide grin starts to spread across their face. Not all of them stick with it, mind. But in that moment, it is like they've finally gotten to connect with their primal purpose and let deep instincts loose, and not only are they not chastised for it, they're encouraged!
Those who show up repeatedly and advance through the levels usually get really into it. Their confidence increases, they start training cardio harder, their discipline goes through the roof. We introduce them to sparring and they get hit in the face the first time and it shakes them up, but they redouble their efforts because being able to shake off a smack to the face is actually an important life skill. And this is where the Fight Club parallels really come to a head, when they're showing off bruises they received and talking up how excited they are to go another round. They'd honestly rather be in the gym getting smacked around than spending time at work. I have, personally, given a guy a black eye (accidentally!) and he comes in the next day sporting that thing like he received an award, ready to learn more.
All in all, what I see is guys 'discovering' and embracing masculinity beyond just the superficial brand that Redpill/manosphere types tend to shill. Its not just an image they're projecting, it is a complete renovation of the self. And all it took was learning to deliver an efficient and effective beatdown.
And one of the 'strangest' trends I've noted? The types of guys who take these classes tend not to be the jocks, meatheads, or 'bros'. My most consistent students are the fucking nerdiest, most introverted and awkward types you can imagine who are still able to maintain basic hygiene practices. Dudes getting masters degrees in hard sciences, who hold down tech or tech-adjacent jobs (One guy, about to get his black belt, is the owner of a company that does does computer repair and home networking!). They're not jacked, they're not looking to become jacked to attract women (some are already married!), there's really no superficial motivation other than self-fulfillment and the acquisition of a potentially useful skill.
Its like they've realized that there's some aspect of themselves that they have been deprived of since birth, and perhaps told that they shouldn't express, and yet having found a place where they can express it, they are driven to devote their lives and time to it to the same degree you'd expect a nerd to devote to any borderline-obsession hobby. And they're better for it.
Anyhow, I strongly feel that martials arts might be the sole remaining bastion of pure, healthy masculinity left in Western Society, and it is almost certainly the only one that hasn't come under direct attack from the Cathedral, like team sports, military service, and fatherhood have.
Which is why I also feel like the recent trend of Influencer Boxing, despite being silly on the surface, is actually going to be an extremely positive development if it gets young males to develop their martial side in something other than Call of Duty.
EDIT: I want to emphasize my point about it being nerds who are the surprisingly most devoted students:
Check out Mark 'the Zucc' Zuckerberg, training MMA:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Bu3_EW0muC0
I'd enjoy hearing how the sight of that guy throwing hands like a semi-pro has updated your priors.
What does it take to achieve "friendly interactions between blacks and whites as the norm rather than exception"?
Speaking from a longish life living in the south, in generally diverse areas.
I attended a high school that was 8% white, with the vast majority being black and Hispanic. I was never targeted with racial animosity and I can unironically say I had multiple black (and Hispanic, and Irish, and Pakistani, and Iranian, and Chinese, as it happens) friends. Worst thing that happened to me was getting my gym shorts stolen once. It was jarring but wasn't what I would call a hate crime.
So largely this is observation over time of situations where racial harmony was prevalent, and a few where it was less so.
On the one hand, having multiple things in common with another person that isn't race allows one to forge a relationship that is MUTUALLY BENEFICIAL.
Sharing a favored sports team, or a hobby, a favored hunting/fishing spot, or musical tastes. Now you're bonded with someone over some shared experience which breeds immediate empathy and camaraderie.
At a core this is just basic human tribalism, but instantiated in a way that ignores people's physical characteristics or even political ideology, and so allows for co-existence in happy peace, assuming that everyone feels treated fairly by the system. People will get WAY more worked up over a rivalry between College Football teams than they will over racial tensions, by and large.
What does a middle class white liberal in New York actually have in common with a middle or lower-class African American? I'd doubt they share taste in music, the white liberal probably isn't much of a sports fan, and I'd guess there's minimal crossover in hobbies. What's the groundwork for creating a harmonious interaction betwixt them? I know many New Yorkers view "living in New York" as a cultural touchstone. I honestly can't say how strong that is.
On the other hand, the culture of the south honestly does view race as a secondary concern to the overall need to be polite, helpful, and optimistic. I'd guess this traces to religiosity among other things, and basically results in an underlying assumption that everyone you interact with is going to be friendly, and thus you should default to friendliness until given reason not to. This is where the reputation for neighborliness in the South comes from, ultimately. If your first interaction with the neighbors is a friendly one, then the respective races of you and the neighbors won't even come up as a consideration. Indeed, it wouldn't be 'polite' to make a direct acknowledgement of it. You wouldn't ask a black dude who his favorite rapper is, just because he's black. Of course, if you're deeper into the friendship with someone, the comfort level might actually allow you to use race-based insult humor with them, when it's all in good fun.
And on the gripping hand, the South is more fundamentally tied to the "American" identity than your average white liberal is, I'd wager. History of rebellion notwithstanding, Southern culture is very directly tied to the agricultural land, the geographical features, and the people who occupy the actual territory that makes up the U.S. although maybe less so to the government that lays claim to said territory. Perhaps it is a less 'enlightened' perspective than one which views humanity/earthlings as a whole and becomes less relevant with time as globalization dissolves territorial boundaries to a greater or lesser extent. But When you're deeply rooted to the land itself, then you can have a stronger connection with others who are also so rooted, and your group can feel that you're more authentically 'American' than people who live in cities and have minimal knowledge of/connection to the greater geography of the country.
So this all rolls into a situation where the people are much more likely to focus on what unites them than what sets them apart, and they're sort of culturally opposed to interpersonal animosity when it can be avoided, and has very little reason to single out race as a central part of their identity.
For my part, having grown up in the South makes me feel pretty uncomfortable in situations where people are actively choosing to center their identity on their race and drive a discussion (for some values of that term) about racial disparities and how to rectify them. My phrasing there is deliberate, as it applies to white supremacists AND hardcore lefty intersectionalists.
When I find myself in such a situation, my instinct is to say "bless your hearts, y'all have a good day" and just leave.
Anyhow, if you want a more scholarly take on this, I can say Thomas Sowell has done some strong writing on this topic:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Rednecks_and_White_Liberals
https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/thomas-sowell/intellectuals-and-race/9780465058723/
faceh
1yr ago
It has been darkly amusing to watch the "NAZIS ARE EVERYWHERE, WE MUST FIGHT BACK" crowd going to bat for the honest-to-goodness "Round up the Jews and exterminate them" authoritarian brigade.
I'll go ahead and say it: it is increasingly difficult to take allegations of this nature seriously in this world where women are simultaneously demanding to be treated as fully agentic adults in every other decision they make, ESPECIALLY those involving their own bodies, but are infantilized when it comes to sexual interactions with an older male.
The allegations against Brett Kavanaugh were at least serious enough in nature to warrant serious disdain and distrust if proven and there was no component of 'asking for it' on the victim's part whatsoever. I can attach moral approbation to my judgment of the situation.
But hearing that a woman absolutely sought out interactions with a famous guy, made her fawning interest in him clear, expressed positive affect about the interaction(s) after the fact, and perhaps most obviously continued to seek his attentions, only to express regret years later is like a kid indulging in a candy binge and then, hours later, crying aloud that they have an upset stomach and it hurts.
I can even agree that maybe a young woman can grow and mature and look back at interactions from her earlier years in a new light and realize how her decisions were informed by unhealthy influences and urges she didn't fully understand or control.
But it'd be nice if they would express it as just that. Ill-advised flings, perhaps based on a childish crush and a naivete about human sexual politics, and while they were 'positive' experiences at the time they would absolutely NOT repeat them. Maybe demand an apology and a promise to change behavior.
If we're instead going with the idea that 21-year-olds can be 'groomed' and are too easily susceptible to the wiles of older experienced men to be allowed to interact with them, then lets build some social standards and tech around that assumption. They're just not going to like where that goes if taken to any kind of logical conclusion.
And ultimately I am having a harder time accepting that a famous, talented, otherwise beloved figure should have their legacy demolished and shunned from the public eye so that everyone else is 'deprived' of their work for behavior that isn't criminal and indeed it is doubtful has left any lasting harm on the alleged 'victim.' The loss to society is probably larger than the loss to the victim in many cases, and so economically speaking seems like a deadweight loss.
Attractive young women are functionally the most sought-after resource on the planet, and their supply is tightly constrained. Allowing these same women to 'regulate' their own market seems to be creating a lot of externalities.
I'll just draw a brief comparison to my "Skin in the Game" rant from a couple days ago.
We have here a massive contrast to the problem I pointed out with most elite institutions.
In this case, the particular man responsible for the failures put his own life on the line as part of the process.
So, regardless of what else you think of the guy, he didn't slough the consequences of his decisions off on someone else. If they got stuck and had to suffer for days of slowly dwindling oxygen supply, he was down there suffering with them (unless they killed him or he killed himself first).
Compare that to this little bit from the aforementioned rant:
The overarching issue is that no matter how much damage an elite causes through their decisions, no matter how foreseeable that damage was, no matter how incompetent and unsuited for their position they are, the system as it currently operates does not allow them to actually suffer in any way that matters. There's no 'feedback loop' or filter that catches bad elites early on and keeps them from advancing to positions of greater power or enacts harsh consequences when needed to dissuade others from misbehavior.
In this case, the CEO willingly put himself into a position where his own survival and comfort would be compromised if the comfort or survival of his customers, riding in his vehicle, depending on his decisions, was compromised. His incompetence, to the extent it impacted the outcome, would impact him as well.
The feedback loop and consequences in this case were pretty much instantaneous. We don't even have to go through a lengthy investigation and trial, nor wait for a vengeful family member to attack him. If the submersible imploded, he died. If they survived for days in agony, he suffered... then died.
And now he has filtered himself out of the system, so whatever bad decisions and processes he may have been following are shown to be defective, and the person pushing those decisions and processes has no more influence.
And, in theory, this should make future incidents of this particular type substantially less likely, so the system as a whole is stronger for his absence, although we can certainly mourn for the people he took with him.
faceh
8mo ago
Meanwhile, McDonald's corporate HQ sent what I think is a very good memo to franchisees explaining the value of their goal of political inclusivity and how that manifests as allowing visits from anyone who asks and being proud of being important to American culture.
This was actually my biggest takeaway.
I had thought that the art of using Corpo-speak to avoid political landmines without being tone-deaf was lost. But somebody managed to produce a memo that carries the subtle implication "We just make food and people give us money for it, don't read anything more into it that that" without taking a side or being dismissive.
I want more of that. Just do what your company is good at. Make money, don't throw jabs along ideological lines or invite political/culture wars in.
As for the stunt itself. The reason Trump 'gets away' with this stuff is he is just that guy. I think with most politicians, we're all aware that they have a mask that they put on to perform when campaigning. That mask drops in private, and they can be nasty people with few redeeming qualities.
Trump doesn't have that Kayfabe. He is himself. If anything, he's just more Trumpy in private (or so leaked audio suggests). So there's a level of earnestness that makes this appearance less of a clearly artificial performance, although it undoubtedly is artificial. Dude actually seems pleased to be out slinging fries, rather than just getting it over with to pull a few extra votes.
For a standard politician to achieve sincerity doing this, they'd have to drop the mask. Which might be a really bad move. Trump just doesn't have a mask.
The positives have to be weighed against the negatives. Maybe certain classes of immigrants are net-negative and a better immigration policy would be able to discriminate against these people but I don't think the UK is at the point where all immigration is net-negative.
There's a bit of a weasel going on with this argument.
I am actually willing to admit that immigration taken completely as a blind, nonspecific, aggregated economic phenomenon is probably a net positive, although this assumes an overly simplified utility function/value system. And perhaps ignores likely long-term second-order effects.
But the negatives (increased housing costs, increased crime, depressed wages for low-skill labor, and loss of social trust) are almost entirely borne by the middle and lower economic classes. They can't afford to move to native enclaves and they have much less political influence to keep immigrants out of their existing communities.
The positives will disproportionately accrue to the upper class professionals/elites whose skilled jobs are not threatened, who can send their kids to selective private schools and can use their clever NIMBY policies to keep the actual immigrants away without triggering accusations of racism. And the neighborhoods they live in are already too expensive for immigrants anyway so it doesn't even put much upward pressure on their housing costs. Cheaper labor and goods and political influence and the warm and fuzzy feeling of giving a disadvantaged minority a leg up are all unalloyed goods for them, so of course they will continue to support the same policy.
And this is of course exacerbated if the government's formal or informal policy is to favor immigrants for monetary handouts, jobs and/or slots in the good schools. Or if they implement policing/justice policies that treat immigrants with kid gloves while natives get the full force of the law.
Cheaper labor costs is generally a benefit to a nation so long as it translates to lower prices for critical, basic goods and services. But the specific kind of labor immigrants provide in this case is almost universally unskilled, which means both that high-skilled (i.e. the kind that produces the most value/unit!!!!) labor does NOT become cheaper... and in some cases demand for skilled labor like doctors or bankers will increase with immigration which will push those prices UP! Immigrants need medical care and financial services regardless of their contribution to society.
So the phrase "immigration is a net positive" can be true in a broad sense but still not accurately describe how the actual citizenry experience it in their day-to-day lives.
If it turns out that it's a net negative for ~50% of the population, an almost neutral factor for another 30%, and then a MAJOR benefit for that last 20%, overall it could be characterized as a positive if you collapse it down. But then the question is *why should 50% of your countrymen be forced to absorb the costs?"
And more to the point, if 50% of the country absorbs the cost, they may be motivated to vote against immigration, but if the other 50% of the country believes its a net positive, they'll vote in favor of it happily... and in a democracy that probably means the half who are getting the shit end of the deal keep losing the votes.
There's also the question of whether or not you count the wellbeing of the immigrants themselves in the equation. Because a third world migrant moving out of a hellish ghetto in their home country to a slightly-less-hellish ghetto in a wealthy country where they get a small welfare check is indeed better off, and so including them in the equation makes the case that immigration is good stronger... but also feels like cheating.
"If we import 1 billion foreigners who are each made 5% better off by migration, and 10 million natives are made 25% better off by migration, but the other 90 million natives are made 50% worse off, its a massive net positive to the group as a whole and thus morally required!"
"Okay, but explain the assumptions about why the 'import 1 billion foreigners' step was necessary at all? Surely there are other options we could try that don't impose such costs on the natives?"
"I just told you, it makes them better off on average."
"Right but it seems like you're conflating the interests of the 1 billion foreigners and the 100 million natives even though you don't have to?"
"Shut up, bigot."
"Also, I can't help but notice that you are likely to be one of the 10 million natives whose life is better off..."
The playbook has gained a few pages but man it's been the same overall strategy to respond to mass shooting events as long as I can remember:
If the shooter's political motivations make outgroup look bad, hammer on those.
If shooter had no clear political affiliation but their identity (white and male, usually) is useful, hammer that.
If their identity is bad for the narrative but the victims are particularly sympathetic (children, women, LGBT, immigrants, etc.) hammer the hell out of that. I would bet most people don't remember that the Pulse Nightclub Shooter was an Islamist. And the 'new' page is blame outgroup for 'hateful rhetoric' causing the shooting anyway.
If literally all else fails, then just hammer the lack of gun control (even if it happened in a 'gun free zone' in a state with strict gun laws). Usually the pivots aren't as visible, but you see them regularly.
The Kyle Rittenhouse situation was interesting because they tried, very poorly, mind you, to use every one of these approaches, despite it never really being a good fit on any count. There's still people who claim he was a White Supremacist who crossed state lines with an illegally owned rifle with the intention of killing minorities. This, after an acquittal at trial and copious video evidence he was attacked and chased and everyone he shot was white, anyway.
Incidentally, I do believe this is why the Waukesha Christmas Parade Attack got relatively little coverage and has not led to any particular political movement. 6 Deaths, 62 injured.
No political motivations, attacker was minority, and the victims were middle class and white and probably Republican, and there wasn't even a gun involved.
And I'm not saying there should have been a political movement! I think treating it as a semi-random tragedy is the right approach and overreacting by, say, banning parades or something would be stupid.
But the fact that journalists and media don't take this tact with every mass killing gives away the game.
People have seemingly shortish memories as to what Twitter was before.
Users would request seemingly simple features for months or years, and eventually get the literal opposite of what they were asking for.
It would go down on a regular basis, and seemed to have NO CLUE how to monetize the userbase.
There was that massive breach where huge accounts got exploited for a crypto scam.
Like, how can one pretend that the site before was a paragon of stability, usability, or security compared to now?
Nothing of that magnitude has occurred since the takeover.
The site clearly, CLEARLY never needed staffing at the level it had. So long as Musk doesn't break the core feature of short-form messages in easy-to-follow threads it isn't going anywhere in the near term.
And let me be clear, I say this as someone who would much prefer Twitter (and insta, and reddit, and quite a few other sites) died a quick death and have for a long time.
Its funny, I'm an elder millennial, so I can remember a childhood without phones (and, barely, one without computers or internet), so I actually balk from blaming 'the phones' in the abstract. I was able to adapt from the old nokias to the slick flipphones to several different form factors for 'smartphones' and I think this gave me a practical view of the phone as a tool for organizing IRL activities and keeping in touch with distant friends. That's what we used it for originally.
BUT, I work with 20-21 year old Zoomers, and holy COW they treat their phones like an inseparable appendage, and you can catch them doomscrolling constantly. I can SEE that growing up with this influence leads to a qualitatively different relationship to/dependence on the gadget, which could be source of the other observable problems. Oh, and now they're used to having a semi-reliable AI assistant in their pocket at all times, so now they can use this machine to do a lot of their literal thinking.
And now there's been a couple decades of engineering and testing to optimize the apps for taking your money and sucking up your attention and otherwise making you dependent on various digital services that we previously lived without.
Tiktok being banned won't solve much, there are 50 other apps ready to jump in and replace it, but maybe, just maybe someone will produce reliable research to measure the impact of these apps and finally get towards some policy proposals aimed at cutting out the most harmful elements while retaining the benefits. I can dream, right?
There are similar vibes in many of the other hobbies I take part in: gardening, swing dancing, reading: a trend towards pick-and-choose attendence of events, rather than attendence out of any sense of obligation to a particular community.
Seen this issue a lot. You can't build a community without a core of dedicated people constantly showing up and doing the work to put together events, and that core of people will get frustrated and burn out or give up if there's too much turnover in membership or members are extremely flaky and unreliable. So hard to even get one off the ground.
My martial arts gym, which HAS an extremely dedicated core tries to hold social events every so often, with plenty of advance notice, and it still a crapshoot as to who will show up outside of that core group.
I've spent the past two years holding regular social gatherings at my house, which is cheap, low-pressure, and I can control the environment to 'guarantee' a pleasant experience. Wrangling adults to hang out together is HARD. Some can't find a babysitter, this one's busy with work or school, that one's just tired and wants to go to bed at 9. So you invite people on the assumption that there'll be a number of last minute dropouts.
Everyone has like 15 different commitments going on at any one time, so getting them to TRULY prioritize a commitment to one group over the other is nigh-impossible. And this also seems to have shifted how humans value individual relationships. There's billions of humans you can potential interact with, and if you aren't satisfied with the ones in your circle of friends, discarding them for new ones is easy. Even if you can't find local friends, your phone offers the potential to make 'infinite' friends! Parasocial relationships! You can spend all day chatting with an AI version of Hitler or Tony the Tiger if it strikes your fancy! Why value real-life relationships at all?
This becomes especially stark on the dating apps. Human connection is immensely devalued.
As somebody whose preferred method of making friends is to identify good people and then forge a deep, long-lasting bond with them (my best friend, whom I still talk to regularly, has been in my life since Kindergarden, literally 30 years), this world of ephemeral connections where people flit in and out of your life on a whim is a bit of a waking nightmare.
but people my age aren't interested in the other ministries that the church offers: working with soup kitchen, church garden, and food pantry to help feed the homeless, book clubs, or even social events, many of which take place right after mass
I can say for myself, I used to attend the soup kitchens, food pantries, and service to shut-in elderly folks to mow their lawns and such. It was fulfilling in its way.
But what I concluded is that this was basically burning up the manhours of competent people to provide modest benefits to people who simply aren't able to produce value on their own. It is literally more efficient to donate money to some professional org that will pay to provide these services than for me to go out and spend hours on a weekend mowing a lawn myself, and I could do something more enjoyable, to boot. I guess I was engaging in prototype effective altruist logic.
But I do think that engaging in activities that constantly expose you to the 'dregs' of humanity, and seeing that no matter how much money and effort is poured into these folks, at best you're basically just raising their standard of living by 2-3% temporarily, not dragging them permanently out of destitution and fixing the problems that put them there. If you're not a certain type of person, the futility of it probably burns you out. I even tried volunteering at a dog shelter, but that burned me out EVEN QUICKER because holy cow the problem of stray and abandoned dogs is intractable, and there will never be enough funds to shelter all those poor animals, just the few that we can locate, rehabilitate, and get adopted. Volunteering your time for such a sisysphean endeavor seems irrational unless you honestly do have a deep and abiding love for animals. Which some do.
Now, I'm not denying that engaging in acts of service is enriching, and exposing yourself to that side of humanity probably makes you a better-informed person. But its also easy to do it just for the virtue-signal points.
That might be another part of the equation. Sympathy for strangers seems to be on the wane, and this has pushed us ever deeper into our chosen ingroups, and built up a wall of suspicion against all outsiders who might want to forge a connection with us.
but from my perspective the abortion and trans rights issues look entirely defensive from the left. The left wants the status quo ante of Roe v. Wade and wants trans people to be left alone. The right is the side making those into culture war issues, not the left.
Only in the "cries out in pain as he strikes you" sense, holy cow.
It's really interesting that you simultaneously suggest that "the left wants the status quo ante of Roe v. Wade," (nevermind that was imposed by SCOTUS and not anything like the result of a legislative process where all citizens had their say) because when it comes down to it the right wants the "status quo" of people with penises and Y chromosomes to have separate bathrooms, prisons, sports teams, and certain other facilities from people with uteruses and lacking Y chromosomes.
And definitely prefers the status quo where it doesn't matter what the person claims to identify as, the term 'man' and 'woman' has an easily verifiable component that isn't subject to the individual's personal preference. And that, on it's face, is entirely compatible with trans people being 'left alone.'
If trans people 'just want to be left alone' that message REALLY hasn't gotten through to the actual left.
Why else are, among other things, the existence of a biological male competing against biological females and unsurprisingly dominating the sport supposed to be celebrated as an achievement, even if this ruins the competition for biological females?
In what sense does this gel with trans people being 'left alone,' if it imposes on people who are trying to compete on something like a fair playing field?
Because blanketing a whole town with flags that represents your identity is almost fundamentally opposed to the concept of 'being left alone.' By this very act you are demanding people confront, acknowledge, accept, and support your particular beliefs. In so doing, you are requiring them pay attention, which is the opposite of leaving you alone.
Similarly when you make biological females wax your penis. That's not 'wanting to be left alone.' Nor is insisting to be allowed into a women's changing room with pubescent females. If this isn't some version of culture warring, then what is it?
You don't get to call it 'defensive' and then literally threaten to take people's kids away for failure to comply with your beliefs.
Or appoint openly trans officials to high ranking federal government positions seemingly only on the basis of their trans identity. This is not behavior that implies a desire to be 'left alone.' It is being openly stated there:
As many facilities across the country face harassment, including death threats to providers who offer gender-affirmative care, Levine told physicians “to highlight the importance of the work that they are doing for vulnerable, transgender and gender diverse children and their families, and to continue to do that work and to keep the faith.
What is 'the faith' in this case?
“You can see a pattern here in terms of the attacks on rights,” she said. “I really reject the language that the opposition is using. I reject their terminology. I reject their ideology.”
"Just want to be left alone" but if you disagree with them, people at the very highest levels of government are ready to come for you.
I don't know that you're even arguing in good faith, but assuming you are, please put forward a plausible narrative of the last twenty years in which the right is the side that pushed trans issues to the forefront of public conciousness as a culture war issue.
First of all, you have the schools not only promoting, but enabling the trans kids. A kid who goes to a public school will be told that trans people are special, be told to celebrate them, etc. any kid who decides they might be trans will be given access to trans clothing, be allowed to change their name and pronouns, be allowed in cross gender spaces and sports teams, etc. the kids around them will be told how awesome they are, and be forced to acknowledge the new them. Parents are told none of this.
That last bit is what really got me to break my cautious neutrality on this issue. It is absolutely bad enough what Public schools do to kids normally but if they are allowed to press political ideals into their brains and work to influence their actual psychological development without parents involved, it looks extremely dystopic. "The state will shepherd your kid through the psychological turmoil of puberty without your involvement" is a bone-chilling statement.
If I were a parent (I am not) I would insist that it is NONNEGOTIABLE that I be informed of any medical or psychological issues my child exhibits. I would flip tables if the teachers were allowed to actively engage with my kids regarding their sexuality without me being in the loop, full stop.
The argument against 'parental notice' as the standard is simply too weak. "What if the child is hiding their identity because of abuse/risk of abuse at home?" Then figure that out and call fucking Child Protective Services. I am going with the assumption that the parent is inherently more invested in the child's wellbeing than a teacher. Many teachers don't even have kids of their own, why in the hell would they be expected to want and know exactly what is best for others' children?
And as we've seen, the inevitable ratchet on this process is that it will eventually gets defined as child abuse to deny a child's gender identity. In that scenario we now have a situation where a teacher can 'induce' the very condition that can then be used to take the child from their parents. The teacher convinces the child to express a trans identity, and if the parent finds out and is skeptical, teacher gets to report the abuse too.
Sorry, bridge too far for me, I don't care what other justifications you can contrive for it, even if you argue that its such a rare situation I shouldn't worry, the consequences are far too grave for me to ignore.
Now, I live in Florida, and since Desantis took some pre-emptive steps to prevent these sorts of outcomes, I'm not too worried about it happening to me. But yeah, the GOP managed a propaganda coup by centering this issue and more or less forcing the Progressives to defend it and, as it seems, retreat from it a bit.
The female divergence is interesting, because from a somewhat objective perspective almost every single policy that has been passed on the state and federal level for almost 100 years has been explicitly designed to benefit them directly or indirectly. There's certainly been close to ZERO that would advantage men over women. Just a random smattering: Marital rape exceptions have been repealed across the board, Title IX has ensured Womens' sports survive, the ACA requires birth control be covered in full by insurance even for those who can't give birth, there's special accommodations for females in military service, and there's virtually no restrictions on women's sexual behavior on either a legal or social level. Indeed, regardless of what 'mistakes' a woman makes in this area, there's probably a program designed to alleviate the consequences at almost no cost to herself.
But there's always some other new issue that is now causing them horrible discomfort that must be addressed immediately, at all costs.
Seems like there are a few incontrovertible facts on the ground:
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Women have, year over year, decade after decade, been getting LESS HAPPY since about 1970, despite receiving virtually every political benefit possible, as described above.
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The percentage of females taking psychiatric drugs for diagnosed disorders has massively increased.
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Females, or specifically unmarried ones, have been swinging further and further left by any reasonable measure.
Which is to say, they want MORE political interference on behalf of disadvantaged minorities, even when they themselves are quite literally the most advantaged group in the entire world.
Feel free to controvert any of said facts if you have reliable information to the contrary!
My basic thought on this is that we now have a huge sub-population of perpetually dissatisfied voters, who are particularly sensitive to fear-inducing stimuli, and are constantly under the influence of some kind of mind-altering substance. Who are also constantly, incessantly, loudly pushing for more of the sorts of policies that haven't led them to happiness and life satisfaction in the past. Nothing will appease them, granting political rights hasn't helped, medication hasn't helped, control of an increasingly large share of the economic pie hasn't helped. Give a woman billions of unearned dollars, she'll still go all in for Leftism!
(On a side note, its interesting that the single easiest path for a female to become a billionaire is... to divorce a billionaire. Actually rather amazing that the law of this country enables someone to claim billions of dollars on the basis that they're not satisfied with their marriage. And if a billionaire can't keep his woman satisfied, what hope do the rest of us have?)
While we simultaneously have an entire media edifice/egregore screaming in their ear at all hours that they have to be afraid of virtually everything in their environment, including the environment itself, and the only path to safety/protection, absolution for sins, or social acceptance is to fall in line behind [BLUE TRIBE CANDIDATE], and join the mob that is howling at the rest of the population demanding action on whatever the issue du jour is.
So it makes sense to me that there is some level of intentionality behind these developments, because it allows the powers that be to have a reliable voting bloc that can be pushed towards or away from any given policy goal simply by adjusting the messaging sent out to this group so as to scare them into supporting whatever said powers need to do at that given point in time. If TPTB want them to be afraid of taking an 'untested' vaccine, they can pull that string. If they want them to be afraid of NOT getting the vaccine, they can swap messages. Which is precisely what we saw.
And additionally, to the extent males form a block of uniform voters at all, it is in the interest of the Cathedral/the Machine to keep them divided and demotivated from participating in the political process, lest they advocate for policies on the basis of their expected outcomes or cost/benefit analysis or something.
I think it mostly implies an extreme economic bifurcation wherein the elites get to live in luxurious towers or gated neighborhoods with private guards and robust social services and get to enjoy the benefits of cosmopolitan globalism by jetting around to whichever major international hub they feel like visiting. And don't have to think much if at all about the state of the rest of the nation.
Whilst the poor end up living in densely packed favelas/apartment blocks/ghettos and while they are generally able to get by their chances at economic mobility are virtually nil so a large criminal element ends up taking root and providing an alternate, highly risky means of achieving the opulent lifestyle that simply cannot be ignored, and as violence becomes prevalent policing becomes more dangerous and cops end up becoming more violent which further sours the relationship between the underclass and the ruling class.
The middle class (such as it exists) probably end up having to put up tall fences and heavy security efforts to protect themselves from the criminal element that cannot be contained and are desperate to prey on the wealth that trickles down from on high. There are no trusted, effective, and non-corrupt public institutions to speak of.
Property crime, drug-fueled violence, and kidnappings shoot through the roof as policing becomes extremely hard outside of the few pockets of civilization that can be maintained against the rising tide of (relative) poverty.
And of course we get maximum 'diversity' which really just means that everyone hates everyone to for varying reasons. EXTREME low trust society as the social fabric that previously kept citizens together frays and decays, even as by many metrics society is finally achieving the demographic ideals that progressives aimed for all along.
Think of an ideal version of America with relatively large middle class, a persistent but small underclass, high economic mobility, a class of elites that are responsive to the needs of the citizenry and thus maintain some level of trust and accountability, and that generally enables every citizen to feel they're safe from violence and have a strong affinity for their neighbors regardless of race, class, religion, culture, etc.
Then imagine whatever the exact opposite of that ideal looks like in your head. THAT is Brazilification.
Literally the only thing I want to hear from the MV residents who were so 'enriched' after this experience is whether they want to accept more migrants or not.
If so, Texas can start sending them trainfuls. Should turn out great. Win-Win-Win for all.
If not, then at least stop playing at being a 'sanctuary' city if you are unable or unwilling to provide sanctuary.
I don't think ANYONE actually believes they support these people in anything more than the abstract sense if they only take action when migrants are brought directly to their doorstep. It's just standard NIMBY behavior.
Finally, I was surprised to see how much more aggressive Rowling has gotten in her anti-trans rhetoric. Not that I necessarily disagree with her, but it looks like I can no longer say that she's being unfairly smeared as an enemy of the trans movement.
I have still not seen a single quote or statement attributed to JK that reads as anything other than bog-standard third-wave feminism applied to a situation she perceived (correctly, I might add) is a threat to the gains previous waves of feminism made for biological women.
She's not come across as 'anti-trans' so much as 'pro-women' and defines 'women' in the terms that are directly related to biology and social roles that inherently set 'men' and 'women' apart.
VERY LATE STAGE EDIT: She confirms as much in her own words. You tell me whether you believe her or not.
If she's gotten 'more aggressive' it is probably just a result of the doubled and tripled efforts to redefine the aforementioned terms in the public eye and she, unlike many, can afford to actively fight back without risking her life being torn down.
Using suboptimal methods just because it feels good is perhaps the most common failure mode for everything humans have done in all of history. The entire gambling industry exploits the extreme version of this feature of psychology.
Especially to the extent we are evolved to feel good using the suboptimal methods.
Edit: I don't need awards, this point is general enough it doesn't really contain much insight as far as I'm concerned.
faceh
9mo ago
Adding to the confusion, only the guilt is transmitted forward through time. For some reason, none of the credit for building a first world country follows.
The same people saying "You must feel bad for the horrible things your ancestors did" will not even skip a beat before saying "you can't feel pride for the great things your ancestors achieved." So conveniently you can't assume any credit for creating a successful nation, but you get to feel blame for what happened to any minorities or natives who suffered during its creation, just in case you thought those two factors might balance out the ledger.
I am utterly unclear as to the mechanism that allows blame to propagate forward through time and generations but doesn't allow credit and pride to propagate as well.
Yeah...
I am old enough to remember, even though it's now been about 4 years, Nancy Pelosi telling people to go out and Celebrate Lunar New Year (as in telling people to go out in public around large groups) when fear of Coronavirus was right-coded. Its right there in an official communication.
This position was, later, switched towards banning any sort of large gatherings altogether.
Which THEN switched to allow people to gather as long as it was a BLM protest.
I saw this with my own eyes in real time, while all the while I'm becoming increasingly afraid of the implications of the virus itself and the politicization crippling our ability to respond to it.
I could pull my old posts from the motte subreddit at the time to back this up.
The left initiated almost every major action that drove the politicization of Covid.
Some days it seems like having memory better than a goldfish is a superpower.
The Steelman is that it's the only vote that 'matters' if you're someone outside of the elite power structure.
Putting Trump at the controls as the result of an election win (as opposed to something like an insurrection) is the strongest possible message that "We do not like how the political class has managed the government, we want them out of power, and to remind them who is 'actually' in charge of the government."
He is the approximate equivalent of a "none of the above" option when it comes to selecting from the various candidates that the Mainstream parties are trying to shove down our throats. Well, not equivalent because he is not a void, he's an actual candidate with a platform, but there's just nobody else who is outside the standard power structure who can provide that option.
This partially explains why he maintains or grows in popularity the harder they bring the hammer down on him. The more the elites/political class express their spite for the man, the stronger the signal that electing him will send. Of course, sending a signal doesn't mean anything actually changes.
Pulling the lever for Haley is a tacit 'approval' of the status quo. You're not registering your voice in the system so much as clicking "Accept" on the Terms and Conditions of the current edifice and its activities. It doesn't 'count' in any real way, as she's fully ingrained in the current power structure and will not modify it's trajectory one bit.
Trump has remained the major Schelling point for everyone who is very much against the status quo and wants to voice that displeasure rather than merely withdraw.
Edit: I would also mention that Bernie Sanders represents a similar sentiment from the left, but in my opinion he folds to the main party too quickly for this purpose.
I'm not sure going from being the Mayor to the third largest city or a District Attorney to teaching at a college is failing up.
Let us be clear: he's a "founding executive director" for a program at a Law School Ranked NUMBER 10 IN THE COUNTRY, and probably making around $300,000/year if he's paid similar to their professors. He was making About $140,000 at his previous job.
EDIT: He was making $210,000 in 2023
Calling it "teaching at a college" is GROSS understatement.
Failing.
Upward.
Teaching his tactics and ideas that have already failed in practice (although perhaps not by his definition), no less! The message here is "we don't care that your ideas got roundly rejected when actually implemented, we want to teach a whole new generation to do the exact same thing everywhere!" Literally ENDORSING the ideas that the people who actually had to endure them decided to reject.
And in all likelihood, this is just a temporary position and he'll be called up to some other high position of authority in a few years. It is completely possible that a future Democratic president appoints him as head of the DOJ, because why not?
I think it's pretty unreasonable to expect one term politicians to sink into ignominy.
I think it is unreasonable for politicians whose track record demonstrates they're incapable of leading well to be given a position teaching leadership. But of course her entire claim to fame is being the first LGBT and Black Female Mayor of Chi town, so it's easy to explain this all as simply keeping her around as a useful example of how well they treat their people so long as they check the right boxes.
It really wouldn't do to throw her under the bus if they're trying to claim they're committed to diversity and inclusion even at the expense of maintaining functional institutions.
It is GENUINELY FARCICAL at this point, when the voters express their intense displeasure and yet the elites decide that such outcomes don't matter and simply shuffle a failed politician off to a position where they don't need voter approval to keep their job, making them EVEN MORE INSULATED than before.
I'm not asking for them to 'fade into ignominy,' just... go away? Like, you had your shot, you blew it. Go try something else. Maybe come back after you've had some time to contemplate and come up with better ideas, beg forgiveness, see if they'll let you make another go of it.
Being a high ranking politician is low paid compared to the other options available to those with the skills and connections to get elected, and attracts considerably more unpleasant scrutiny and stress.
What other options do they have? Be explicit. If you lack any technical skills or knowledge, if your background is in law or activism, and if you've spent most of your career in the public sector, how can you expect to thrive in a private sector job without a truckload of nepotism?
What high-paying role would you slide into that ISN'T directly related to your connections in government?
I think you're missing the part of the equation where political positions bring significant status and often power over some particular area of interest, which can usually be converted into renumeration, and can definitely be used to push forward you own ideological goals even if you don't personally benefit. Especially if you lack any real talents that might get you such status outside of the halls of government.
The overarching issue is that no matter how much damage an elite causes through their decisions, no matter how foreseeable that damage was, no matter how incompetent and unsuited for their position they are, the system as it currently operates does not allow them to actually suffer in any way that matters. There's no 'feedback loop' or filter that catches bad elites early on and keeps them from advancing to positions of greater power or enacts harsh consequences when needed to dissuade others from misbehavior.
This is exactly what Nassim Taleb was getting at in his book. We don't just want properly aligned incentives, we want sufficient negative incentives that bad actors are deterred from entering critical positions, and bad actors that slip through are filtered out rather than sticking around indefinitely, causing increasing damage by their mere presence.
Elites are basically acting with impunity because they've got a safety net for their wealth, and status below which they cannot fall. If you crack into the ranks of the elite, there is literally all upside available to you and no downside, so your decisions need not consider the needs of anyone outside your bubble.
If the worst possible outcome for screwing up an entire fucking city is you get to teach at one of the pre-eminent educational institutions in the country making a comfy six figure salary, what possible motivation is there to take actions that will make things better for others when you could instead focus on enriching yourself and boosting your cronies' careers to create a self-perpetuating wealth siphoning machine that allows you to live the good life regardless of what happens to everyone?
This is what happens virtually EVERYWHERE ELSE in history when the incentives become so asymetric. We're just at the point where it is impossible to hide and ignore, and they're quite openly favoring themselves to the point that they consider voter sentiment irrelevant to the operation of government.
The situation with Trump's latest indictment is also indicative of the issue. If mishandling classified docs is indeed a criminal offense to be punished, regardless of whether there was any harm resulting, then we KNOW both Hillary Clinton and, eventually, Joe Biden should face the exact same consequences.
But they won't.
They know they won't.
We know they won't.
We and they know there's no mechanism available to us through which we can impose consequences within the system they control.
Everyone who sees this happen is going to make certain calculations based on this knowledge. I expect the elites will realize that as long as they don't upset the gravy train as Trump tried to, they are protected. The proles, however...
Yeah, when I pay attention it usually bugs me that they're openly using this tactic to deflect negative press even when the overwhelming amount of criticism is leveled at the work's basic quality.
The Critical Drinker hit on a salient point:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=ngqO9Hp19_4
Its like they hate their audience, or at least know that pissing off the audience is just as good a way, maybe better, to grab attention as pleasing them. And if you go in knowing you'll probably never please them...
The part that is most insufferable is when they blatantly race-swap an existing character (with weird tendency for targeting redheads), especially when their race is arguably a salient part of said character's identity, then kafkatrap anyone who dares notice it into either agreeing that its an improvement or outing themselves as a closet racist.
They will mock you for asking honest questions like "doesn't this contradict the lore?" or "what else did you change about the story?" or "couldn't you have written an entirely new character just as easily?"
Further, they'll act as though the race-swap is de-facto normal and expected and the person questioning it is the one who must justify themselves.
"Why does their race matter? You seem to care an awful lot about something minor like the character's skin color." Well I dunno, YOU seemed to care enough to make the decision to swap out the races in the first place, and clearly made a deliberate, calculated decision as to which skin color to swap to, so I conclude that it matters enough to you to set aside concerns like staying true to the source material or selecting the "best" actor for the part, so I'm just curious as to the logic that went into the decision.
And if your logic doesn't seem to advance the quality of the work itself, I believe I'm allowed to use this as reason to be skeptical of the end product's quality.
And yet, if any series were to race-swap a minority character, especially if to replace them with a white character, this would presumably be seen as blatant erasure and grounds to protest and boycott whatever media company did it.
Like hey, why can't the new Black Panther be white? Or Asian? Since we're saying the rules are all made up and the points don't matter, there's no reason we shouldn't be symmetrical about this.
How about "Firearm ownership is literally written into the founding document of this country as a fundamental right and thus we are literally entitled to ignore your pleas for gun control unless and until you can garner sufficient political support to amend said document."
Since "we're trying to overturn a civil right that the very founders of the country thought important enough to specifically enshrine AND ignore the actual procedure for making changes to the founding document in the effort" isn't exactly inspiring either, and it's certainly accurate to describe the gun-control movement's approach to the issue.
Or in short, the deal is that we follow the rules set forth when the nation was created, and those rules happen to include this particular provision for gun rights, so amend it or, literally, GTFO to a country that is more politically suitable to your own beliefs.
I have chosen to make this the drum I'm beating every time I see institutional failure raise it's head. Which is near-daily.
The people who have been appointed to make the decisions are insulated from any negative consequences for policy failure (here defining failure as "not achieving purported objectives") but are allowed to reap benefits of their decisions. Hell they often get to reap benefits even if there's a failure. Lori Lightfoot leaves Chicago worse off than when she found it (quite a feat!) and immediately gets a cushy job at Harvard teaching leadership. It's like they're intentionally mocking the idea that rewards go to those with merit and that outcomes matter when judging a person's competence.
Chesa Boudin allows crime to run rampant in San Fran to the point it becomes a national embarrassment. He gets FUCKING RECALLED BY VOTERS because it was too much for even SF libs to stomach... and he lands a teaching job at Berkeley "Failing upward" doesn't even begin to describe it.
And the Biden family, especially Hunter. ye Gods.
When the rewards the elites reap are completely uncorrelated with the impact their decisions have on the rest of us proles then you simply can't expect them to make good decisions, to implement functional policies, or to listen to feedback from constituents. Quite the opposite, you'd expect them to exploit the system for personal benefit at every chance, given that they know that the institutions that are supposed to be holding them accountable are just as compromised and ineffectual.
They've gotten so far entrenched that it is impossible to even discuss consequences for them. Post-Covid it's becoming clear just how many ways various institutions failed, and not just missing goals, but straight up making the situation worse through their action or inaction. And not a single person who had decision-making authority will be taken to task or suffer any lick of punishment.
EDIT: I revise the previous statement to point out that Andrew Cuomo did in fact get punished. But this ends up being the exception that proves the rule because his removal from office had NOTHING TO DO WITH HIS BUNGLING OF COVID and of course he was still hailed as a shining beacon of competence for his handling of Covid.
Just farcical.
SECOND EDIT 04/02/2025. GUESS WHO'S BACK. THIS is what 'Skin in the Game' is supposed to prevent. The bad actor gets removed and thus cannot influence the system anymore. In Politics the bad actor takes a hiatus, gets a new publicist, and re-emerges to re-take the stage and might actually be pushed back into power!
(Admittedly, Trump has taken this tactic to its most extreme instantiation possible)
Eventually the proles will start to conclude that the system is in fact SET UP so as to ensure elites are guaranteed to thrive regardless of the state of the country and that perhaps the only way skin gets re-inserted to the game is if the proles taken action themselves.
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