naraburns
nihil supernum
No bio...
User ID: 100
naraburns
nihil supernum
1d ago
Hello, and welcome to the Motte!
I am approving your post. However, I am doing so with some hesitation, because it intersects kind of an ongoing concern, for which I will, with apologies, partially hijack this thread to mention.
This is a discussion site. The sidebar explicitly invites posts more-or-less like this one: related to philosophy, submission statement, appropriately outside the CW thread, etc. However new users with zero posts or comments here, pitching their blog rather than engaging directly, raises questions about the extent to which this is a discussion site as opposed to a click-farm for geek links (it would for example have counted more in your favor if you'd simply reproduced the entire blog post here, but submission statements are also, strictly speaking, okay, and of course better when linking other people's stuff you don't technically have permission to copy). In the era of ubiquitous generative AI, the problem is further complicated by our aim of being a discussion site for sapient users.
The mod team has not (yet?) really worked out a consistent response to this. We do have some interest in new users, it's healthy to the site and helps advance the foundation of the rules. So I'm approving the post, but I make no guarantees as to whether similar posts (from you or other fresh-rolled accounts) will be let through in the future. For whatever it is worth, if you had posted this after participating in discussion elsewhere on the site for a while, I'd likely have approved the post without further comment. Users with an established posting and comment history are an easier call and continue to be encouraged to post. This is a reputation economy!
naraburns
nihil supernum
12d ago
So, what are you reading?
I just started Platform Decay. Murderbot is comfortable science fiction, to me. It's not groundbreaking work, but it is smoothly executed and enjoyable. The series definitely does a bit of anti-capitalist pandering but this never does successfully undermine its meritocratic undertones. The TV adaptation was also watchable, though strictly inferior (and more inclined to lean into the pandering).
naraburns
nihil supernum
14d ago
Wasn't Utah settled from the Midwest?
Initially, yes. But the earliest Utah settlers were quickly joined by converts from all over the world, albeit mostly England and Scandinavia.
I know they love cosmetic surgery almost as much as the Koreans, but I think s_m_h would've noticed that.
I think this is a "Mormon moms" thing ("staying hot for hubby")--girls out seeking converts will most often be in their early 20s, when cosmetic surgery would in most cases be premature.
naraburns
nihil supernum
14d ago
Surely polygyny means women should be subject to less sexual selection, not more.
Attractive women do not just come from attractive mothers; they also come from high value fathers with substantial resources (such as would be needed to support families with multiple wives). Additionally, Utah was disproportionately settled by immigrants from Scandinavia and the British Isles. You can find similar phenotypes in the Midwest, especially Wisconsin and Minnesota. This is probably also an HBD explanation for why Mormons and Midwesterners have such rhyming cultural stereotypes (e.g. passive-aggressive politeness, or Mormon "funeral potatoes" versus Minnesotan "hot dish").
naraburns
nihil supernum
18d ago
Do you have any idea what's going on?
Not to be a single-note piano, but "the Great Awokening" seems like a plausible culprit for what you've observed. It's just identitarianism forcefully asserting itself. This, basically, and then this (PDF warning). "Assimilation" used to be a goal; then it got dumped into a bucket with "colonialism" leading to the crazed perception that Indians (or whomever) who travel to Europe or the Americas are being "colonized" if they assimilate.
I have met a fair few immigrants who are actually quite insistent that their children assimilate, but in many cases this seems to backfire somewhat. There are definitely people out there who prefer to feel attached to the culture and practices of their ancestors, for various reasons, despite being geographically remote. That I am a rootless cosmopolitan does benefit me in some ways, but there are definitely times when I wish I had been better suited to becoming a key figure in a community of comparatively limited importance beyond its own boundaries.
Well, not when it's someone else's essay. But yes, generally we don't mind if someone mirrors their blogpost here, and generally we do frown on bare links, so something between "include some commentary" and "make the whole post" is the norm. (It also tests our patience when someone posts their blogs here but then entirely refuses to engage with responses in the comments--obviously no one is under any obligation to reply to everyone, but we are watching for patterns that look more like the user using the site for their own ends, than for its stated purpose.)
But as I said--we haven't developed much in the way of hard-and-fast rules, particularly concerning non-CW posts. Again, welcome!
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