RussianAmericanMormon
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User ID: 4365
RussianAmericanMormon
13d ago
Hmm, with regards to activity and the people who post, I do think it depends on the sub-forum. Like many other forums, you have a select few crap-stirring regulars that make the experience less pleasant, and once you know which handles to ignore, it gets much easier to participate. There are some neighborhoods and suburbs that some people treat as the be-all and end-all, but I also do see healthy pushback to those kinds of sentiments by others. I appreciate that the people who post there tend to be more articulate and conscientious than Facebook or Reddit users, even if that bar is in hell. I would definitely consult CityData before a turboprogressive city sub if I wanted to solicit some relocation advice.
Personally, there's just something surreal about browsing through 2008 threads about the subdivision I grew up in, or one about a small town an American friend I've met here in Europe tells me he was raised in. You get to learn about the local chamber of commerce, gossip about municipal scandals, hidden gems such as an art gallery or a biking trail most people in the area don't know about, and the agreeable subdivisions of an otherwise poorly reputed suburb, etc. As a zoomer, I imagine this is the closest I'll get to living in the 2000s zeitgeist along with watching TV shows and listening to music from that time window.
RussianAmericanMormon
14d ago
Is there any overlap between this forum and development forums in the vein of SkyscraperCity and CityData? SkyscraperCity is an urbanist forum, and I find it intriguing to browse threads there to see what infrastructure projects various cities are undertaking, including my nearest city.
CityData was originally more of a real estate forum where people could start threads to inquire about life in various American suburbs and small towns, and it's quite fascinating to learn about the amenities and ins and outs of a random small town most people overlook in a state that I've never set foot in. It's branched out into different subforums for politics, philosophy, theology, and hobbies. In a sense, it is like a smaller Reddit that is substituted with conservative boomers. The caliber of discourse tends to be higher as you don't have stoned vegetables giving their dilettante conjectures, though it does have a few occasional trolls.
RussianAmericanMormon
16d ago
At the risk of doxing myself, O&G is all I'll divulge. Hence I'm in Norway.
Based on your preferences, you should probably pick a US based college where you blend in.
That is the plan, I will stick around in Europe for another year on logistical grounds, but I expect to transfer from there. BYU undergrad and Ivy postgrad/postdoc is the route I intend to take.
You do seem a little high strung
I've talked about this on the Wednesday Wellness thread before, I grew up in a very psychologically volatile household and had little to no avenues to socialize the first two years after relocating to this town, which has exacerbated my interpersonal paranoia. In recent years, thanks to my social life generally improving through church, my prowess in approaching women and asking engaging questions has improved considerably; it's just that I often find myself ruminating extensively post hoc on every exchange with women, but I don't believe it affects the exchanges themselves. I do have female friends outside of my immediate area who are part of a larger friend group, but so far it's just that with no ulterior motives.
Another thing I didn't include in my original message is that I've also had women turning me down because I'm too young for them, due to my preference for women 2-3 years older than me.
I've lived in small American towns, and didn't notice these sorts of behaviors, or not in a way that got on my nerves.
Well at this juncture, I am based in Europe. I truly believe White Americans possess higher levels of human capital than Europeans of the same class. I've had plenty of constructive conversations with individuals that many Bostonian elitists would write off as rednecks and country yokels. Some of the American missionaries in my church that I highly respect attend open admissions schools and are not rocket scientists, but nonetheless pleasant people to be around in a way that many of my classmates weren't. I was actually raised in an upper-middle-class pocket of a lower-middle-class Southern suburb, and on paper, that's the same variety of community I reside in in my current area, and yet it couldn't be any more different.
I attend municipal concerts, participate in volunteering initiatives, and even got involved in municipal politics for a brief period. I have met some upstanding people who are highly unlikely to share many of my hobbies, the problem is that those kinds of encounters tend to be sporadic and those people tend to be decades older than me.
Honestly, it seems like the reason you're struggling is because you hold everyone you interact with in contempt.
You're reading something into my message that simply isn't there, I believe your post contains many conjured assumptions that are not congruent with my actual situation. I have now repeatedly stated that there are several settings where I haven't experienced the issues that I currently do. I have specifically said that I don't expect a random individual on the street to have read the exact books that I have, so I fail to understand where you could've possibly read into me saying that I expect everybody to share my exact interests.
Edit: How that egregious misrepresentation of the grievances I've actually expressed garnered 10 upvotes is beyond me, but I digress.
Here is what I've actually said:
If you're not into soccer, Instagram Reels, or getting blackout drunk and then bragging about getting transported by paramedics, your options in this area are very limited. I want to date a peer, not be a babysitter. Back in my suburb of a large American metropolitan area, you had a culture of go-getters who were passionate about one thing or another; crochet, photography, floral design, dancing, w/e, which is substituted here with a pervasive unsophisticated bro-hella-dope culture.
At no point have I stated that I expect my social circle to consist entirely of people who participate in spaces like this. I treat everybody with fundamental dignity and have frequently been told that I'm charitable to a fault, though I simply don't draw conclusions about a person from one interaction when I'm not privy to their background, and always wish to assume well-intention among people I speak to. I have pals at church and former classmates with whom I can grab lunch, take a hike, or go to the beach and bond over shared experiences. I don't think I'm unreasonable in setting standards for whom I wish to develop a long-term friendship with. In my town, it is commonplace for people to make overtly sexual jokes around children, people prying into my political views at random right as I introduce myself, people at functions reaching for food in a communal bowl with their hands instead of using the spoon or tongs in it, people nudging me with their shopping carts or standing like deer in headlights instead of asking me to give way, people breathing on me through their mouth as they reach for some frozen pizza, etc. I'm not asking for a highly curated social circle, just that some baseline of social etiquette, curiosity, and open-mindedness exists.
When it comes to a dating partner, I am dating first and foremost with the desire to find a woman I can see myself living with together for eternity. I don't want her interests and background to be identical to mine as I want a relationship where we can mutually refine each other. I do want her to be decently ambitious and well-read.
RussianAmericanMormon
19d ago
I am somebody who is very much intrigued by 00s vBulletin forums and 90s Usenet newsgroups. I know that the rationalist movement was pioneered by Robin Hanson with the Overcoming Blog and Yudkowsky's Sequences around 2006. Where did the proto-rationalists hang out prior to that?
RussianAmericanMormon
19d ago
learn how to drop the "I'm not like all the other normies" mentality that you mentioned in other replies
I specifically said that I've fared perfectly fine in more affluent suburban settings. If that's where you were raised and have little exposure to what it's like being a bored high school kid in a small town where you don't fit the mold, you may surmise that the baseline quality of your peers is more or less universal anywhere, but that's not the case. I hate being the most intelligent person in a room exactly because I am well aware that I am far from a genius, and I actually want iron to sharpen iron because I gain no joy out of a petty dick-measuring contest and realize that I have not yet found the right tools to realize my full potential here. I live in a town that has a pervasive anti-intellectual culture, think a Norwegian equivalent of a rust belt town that has seen better days. I do believe that there is less of a disconnect between my peers and me in a more prosperous locale, which is why I'm more frustrated by the fact that I'm currently not in an environment where I am perfectly capable of thriving.
RussianAmericanMormon
20d ago
Not looking for hookups for obvious reasons, but sounds like a good idea otherwise.
RussianAmericanMormon
20d ago
I've read up on this subject before. The question that arises is, can't I weed out the more basic women by attending a school with selective admissions and look within my major? I'm not expecting to talk Wittgenstein and Krauthammer with a random girl I bump into on the street, but surely within a more curated environment, I can find women who have the curiosity and intellectual hardware I'm looking for?
RussianAmericanMormon
20d ago
Even at an Ivy League school, or a school with selective admissions?
RussianAmericanMormon
21d ago
Those are just common gender dynamics which I am well aware of. What I mean is I want to date a woman that is intellectually compatible with me (shouldn't be a big ask) with whom I can have profound conversations with, beyond reality TV programs and social media slop.
RussianAmericanMormon
21d ago
What if I get plenty of women telling me I'm too tall?
See I'm a tad older than 17 and have been told by many people that once I find the right people in college, my situation will change drastically. I'm just venting about this right now, as that notion sounds so inconceivable to me, operating on my observations from the first 19 years of my life. I could and perhaps should wait another year to see what happens, but right now I feel suffocated.
RussianAmericanMormon
21d ago
I've been told I'll bloom in college, which is just a couple of months away. I simply haven't lived long enough to see it and attest to it yet.
It sounds like you just don't have enough casual social contact with girls.
Not at my school, though I do interact extensively with the American female missionaries at my church at Bible study and young adult activities. They tend to be 2-3 years older than me and are typically chaste and cordial, which cannot be said about most of the girls in my area. Like Orthodox Jews, Mormons typically try to date within the covenant, though as I'm not in the Mountain West and not at an age where I'm preparing to get married, I do want to gain general experience connecting intimately with women. There's one that has recently finished and returned home to be an ordinary member of society. I DMed her my number, but my message has been sitting for 24 hours now (she's 7 hours behind me FWIW), which is actually what prompted me to write this. I'm currently based in a remote, blue-collar area because my parents got a sweet job offer here during COVID, and there is a significant chasm between my worldview and aspirations and those of my peers that did not exist back in my old area to the same degree. I don't mean to harbor a sanctimonious attitude, but I don't believe that any of the local girls can bring anything to the table in a relationship. If you're not into soccer, Instagram Reels, or getting blackout drunk and then bragging about getting transported by paramedics, your options in this area are very limited. I want to date a peer, not be a babysitter. Back in my suburb of a large American metropolitan area, you had a culture of go-getters who were passionate about one thing or another; crochet, photography, floral design, dancing, w/e, which is substituted here with a pervasive unsophisticated bro-hella-dope culture. I live 2 hours away from my closest major city, and now that it's summer, I make the pilgrimage there once a week, but randomly scouting people out is a fool's errand.
Also you're too young to visit youth hostels in different cities.
I'm 19 and about to start college, so this may be a possibility. As I've mentioned to another user, the country I'm in has a 13th grade which has led my circumstantial social inadequacies to prolong.
RussianAmericanMormon
21d ago
I just graduated. The European country I'm based in has a 13th grade, which has left me stuck in this town for another year. I do have visible abs, and I know plenty of people to whom that has been of no aid.
Like I said, I'm socially adept enough and have seldom struggled with social cues growing up. I recently found out that I'm a highly probable candidate for inattentive ADHD that has flown under the radar as I'm not meaningfully hyperactive, which may explain why I've never been able to stop at a one-liner in the name of precision and clarity and have managed to focus intensively in subjects I enjoy.
I decided against posting this on Wellness Wednesday, as I imagine this issue may sound comically trivial when juxtaposed with the other posts.
RussianAmericanMormon
21d ago
I often find myself feeling as if there's something inherently controversial about me that will create friction between a woman I'm interested in. I've spent my formative years living in a rather remote area with a narrow dating pool, and the few times I have approached women to ask for their numbers, they've told me without fail that they are already in a relationship. The high-quality women around here clearly are quick to get taken for good reason. I've never been on a single date, and I've never had a texting stage with a girl. To add insult to the injury, my upbringing has led me to struggle with paranoia and me psychoanalyzing every detail of an exchange I have with an attractive individual of the opposite sex.
I'm 6'8" and consider myself to be socially adept enough, well-groomed, well-mannered, and decently-read for my age. I've been told I'm tall to a fault where my towering over everybody is just too intimidating. I work out regularly, and given my height, I'm in no means obese at 225lbs, but I've given up trying to reach the ideal body fat-to-muscle ratio and have prioritized raw strength. I also have hair down to shoulder length, and I personally believe it is harmonious with my facial structure, but it probably lowers my mass appeal. I'm too conservative for the median chronic Instagram Reels scrolling woman, too liberal for the median grass-touching, actively churchgoing woman. I'm old enough for dating apps on paper but too young for them to be a widely used, effective avenue among my peers.
I feel as if all my dating prospects are behind a glass wall that I just can't shatter. I'm not some unkempt maladjust, but my circumstances have made it difficult for me to develop the same connections that many people at my age do. I've been told that this is bound to improve the second I get to college, where there is a density of like-minded cohorts, but right now I can only say that I'll believe it when I see it.
RussianAmericanMormon
24d ago
Thank you for such a thoughtful response!
I am familiar with Anton and Davis Hanson. Unfortunately I cannot say I'm particularly impressed with the two; Anton's Flight 93 essay sounded like a histrionic rhetorical piece, he called Taiwan a "Cold War relic" that is not in America's interest to defend while ignoring entirely the TSMC and Taiwan being a test case for America's deterrence and maritime capability, and he didn't sound particularly knowledgeable in his interview with Eli Lake. Hanson was a serious historian in the 80s and 90s, but shifted to full-time punditry around the 00s, which is why his field has seemingly moved past him.
Will take a look at the other people you mention.
RussianAmericanMormon
26d ago
Fair enough, most of this is anything but a given in Europe, too. Unless you're in Italy or eastern Europe.
RussianAmericanMormon
26d ago
I'm curious as to what your standard for walkable is. Mine is simply that commercial areas are accessible by foot with sidewalks and walkways. Sure, most of Houston is highly residential and not replete of neighborhood stores like a city with more urban bones such as NYC or Chicago, but during its population boom in the 1970s, downtown was a gargantuan parking lot, and it wasn't until the early 2000s that its utility was no longer confined to office workers. It is absolutely possible to walk to your local HEB within the I-610 loop. If you are looking for a place where you can find a cafe and a supermarket immediately at your doorstep, then as you leave major cities that simply is non-existent in most of America, and for that matter, northern Europe due to the regulatory constraints of the zoning law.
RussianAmericanMormon
26d ago
What? Densely populated urban areas will skew left just about anywhere in America (bar some pockets of Miami, thanks to Cubans, and Las Vegas, due to Mormons), but Southern cities are the ones that are more likely to have a substantial Republican minority, with neighborhoods that see 30-40% of their residents voting for Trump. Off the top of my head, you have Fort Worth, Jacksonville, and Virginia Beach (I don't consider Virginia to be a Southern state, but it's no less Southern than NC) which are some of the largest cities in the nation to have elected Trump. There are plenty of affordable, decently conservative neighborhoods around the SMU campus in Dallas and Houston's Energy Corridor/Memorial area (unsure if you mean walkable in a more purist sense, but you absolutely can walk to the supermarket and other retail spaces). Oklahoma City and Tulsa have plenty of solid downtown neighborhoods that are only 50-60% Democratic. In New Orleans, you have the tranquil Lakeview neighborhood entirely removed from the unsavory elements further east in the city, as safe as any suburb. Nashville, Memphis, and Birmingham's majority-white neighborhoods are not DSA strongholds, you have some rebellious partisan Democrat college kids but also many Republicans born and raised in the city. If you can handle a neighborhood that is only plurality-white, you'll have plenty more options made available.
If your idea of Southern is limited to Atlanta and Charlotte, then you may very well be right.
Ah screw me, I'm slow. Stayed up all night and it's 6AM here.
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