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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022

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One working definition of a professional I came across in my readings for an upcoming exam -- people occupied in a position wherein their clients lack the wherewithal to judge the merits of their abilities. Of course this is a fairly wide continuum, and the therapeutic relationship matters most of all even if it's based on misunderstandings, pretenses, irrelevancies etc.

I tried to get my partner to start reading the Motte culture war thread and Kiwifarms because it was obvious he was being actively hindered by just having been too old/busy to keep up with the nomenclature and dogma. He called me in exultation after his last (nth) exam prior to full college membership where the question involved an Aboriginal woman having trouble meeting eye contact. "I can answer this!" he must have giggled before writing about Jung, Lacan, maybe even some Male Gaze nonsense .... I had to be the one to tell him he had failed again, that the question was designed to both be simple (special cultural needs for special groups -- in any case, he'd already been assumed to have any amount of technical knowledge as he had been doing it since his early 20s) as well as a plausible way to keep out those who haven't had the time and inclination to keep up with the mores of the day.

So I am trying to compile a sort of culture war compendium, or at least stick map of the deadliest minefields, for his benefit and maybe those of some of his colleagues down the line. If anyone has any ideas about how to go about this, let me know. A lot of people don't "get" the clues to the zeitgeist in wacky articles I might link to, it may as well just be The Onion as far as they're concerned.

Your boyfriend sounds amazing lol. I'm glad he has you as a minder to fend off the quokka-poachers.

Thank you. I am pretty weird and trouble-prone and he keeps me sane, happy and loved etc. He has always known about my financial circumstances and supported me during periods of "the outs" with my family and I don't think he actually believed me when I said what's mine is his -- at least not when I would get serious money. So I look forward to surprising him in less than two weeks when I get my inheritance for meeting my last condition and while I have not come up with a definite plan it will involve me studying and memorizing every detail of his face when he realises that the biggest hurdle is done in life and he can live, work, travel, etc. for as long as he lives. It will end up being the best or worst decision of my life -- obviously he will become capable of walking away and enjoying himself in his own way (sex with much better looking younger people) because he will be totally independent but I doubt it, and if he did he'd have earned it anyway for years of loyalty, and in any case I won't hold him hostage by doling out monthly sums. I also worry the money will destroy his incentive to study for his career exam and he may blame me on some level for not just keeping my mouth shut a few months longer. Which is admittedly my selfishness not my desire to help so much. So hard to decide what to do --- ugggh. Maybe I'll organise things somehow to give him all but a few percent in property so that he gets slow regular returns to live off and can't make any spur of the moment bad decisions on a roulette wheel. Or just tell him he gets only a few thousand a week until he meets his own exam goal, and allow that time to adjust to a new lifestyle? Or be an asshole and just say that though the money is his and in trust with me for the duration of our relationship only and I am just a stopgap in case he gets drunk and tries to buy a submarine? I feel like a total killjoy already...