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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   32879 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 10, 2022

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These kinds of choices are just degrading, painful and exploitative. What’s the harm if I offer a poor man one million dollars to have sex with his wife? If he values his wife’s purity he can just refuse, no harm right? Obviously not, if he’s in a situation where he needs the money, even just having this option can be deeply distressing.

You know, I'm going to call you on this one:

Under what possible, realistic set of circumstances would someone actually be willing to pay $1,000,000 to have sex with a particular woman, rather than just buying time with 500 top-tier escorts?

And what person would experience emotional distress in excess of what 1 million dollars could ameliorate?

Okay, so imagine a much smaller offer, say $10,000. You could prevent having to accept that offer by naming a higher price, but you have to pay a tax to do so, a tax calculated to be punitive enough that you would be indifferent toward paying the tax or not increasing your price.

Under what possible, realistic set of circumstances would someone actually be willing to pay $1,000,000 to have sex with a particular woman, rather than just buying time with 500 top-tier escorts?

Revenge or sadism, by a fairly rich person.

The fact that people kill other people over infidelity should be taken as evidence that infidelity is sometimes taken to a million-dollar-equivalent level.

Revenge or sadism, by a fairly rich person.

Have to imagine this will result in maybe a couple dozen instances, tops. Which is to say 99.999999% of couples will never face this particular conundrum.

I guess I don't see this as something I'd consider an appreciable threat. Feel free to convince me otherwise.

I happen to think that the vast, vast majority of wealthy people aren't really so villainish in their tastes, but I'd be open to seeing an example of one who was and used their wealth to exercise their sadism in this way.

The fact that people kill other people over infidelity should be taken as evidence that infidelity is sometimes taken to a million-dollar-equivalent level.

Or as evidence that people make rash decisions without thinking through the consequences.

Assuming we could get rid of all counterparty risk, and the parties involved were given ample time to consider their options, what are the odds of a couple who agrees to accept $1,000,000 for a single instance of infidelity ending up involved in a murder somehow?

The million dollars is an example. You probably wouldn't be offering it to someone who can afford to pay the tax on a million dollars, so you wouldn't have to make the offer that large.

Wow, there was some French movie with that exact plot I saw when I was four. Wonder what the title was.

Indecent Proposal in America

Oh thanks, don't know why I thought it was French. Probably the degeneracy.

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