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Extremely frivolous stuff, but there's a fun debate going down over on Aella's twitter about personal hygiene. In short, as a true empiricist, she measures lots of stuff about her daily routine (iirc, using an app called Daylio), and recently revealed her stats for 2023. What is causing a kerfuffle is not the number of days she had sex (63), took Adderall (126), or escorted (6), but the number of times she showered, namely 37 [sic].
Aella insists she doesn't smell (and says she's consulted with others to confirm this), but I think that's a very relative statement; some people seem to have a high baseline tolerance for stank of various kinds, to the point that even strong odours don't register to them as stank, while others like myself are very smell sensitive; at the risk of TMI, my wife was amused that I could tell when our kids in their diaper days had done a pee, because I could always smell it almost immediately even when she had no idea. Back in my online dating days, there were several dates I simply couldn't follow up on because the person I was with had bad personal hygiene. I'm not talking about a mild healthy body odour here, but when you're having sex doggy-style and get hit by bad ass-stench it's an instant boner kill. And I'll be honest, I've had a crush on Aella for ages; she's a very attractive nerdy woman, and as a sexually confident and charismatic female Rationalist, she is a very horny unicorn among horses. But I've got to say, learning that specific factoid about her life had a similar effect on my idle long-distance lust as an F150's tires do on a small rodent (not that she should care, of course - just putting it out there).
That said, I am a bit of ablutomaniac - I shower and/or bathe 2-3 times a day. I don't think it's a hygiene thing per se. I shower when I get up because it helps me feel awake and ready for the day; I often have a shower or bath in the late afternoon/early evening after a workout because it feels great to soak sore muscles; and I sometimes shower just before bed, because I find it really nice to get into a bed with clean, fresh-smelling sheets having just come out of the shower smelling clean and fresh myself. I also routinely use (carefully chosen, subtle) cologne on my body as well as both fabric conditioner and scent booster when washing my clothes.
Anyway, Aella's feed is pretty funny right now, to the point that she's holding polls about showering, and I was curious what folks here think about it. Obviously me and Aella are at different ends of the ablutic spectrum, but what's a healthy normal number of times to shower/bathe per day? How much of it is down to personal preference?
If it is not causing kerfuffle, then it should. She had sex almost twice as many times as she showered. So she did not shower before or after having sex.
Why should anyone care, exactly? It's not like any of us are having sex with her. If her partners are fine with how she is (and they seem to be, if she's still having success getting some), then good for her I guess.
I care because it is one of the many instances of how the social norms are established and before you know it, it will be your own daughter smelling around the dinner table. I am done with the "live and let live" attitude for all the craziness it brought upon us. I am now all for return of good old shaming/blaming back into town. So yeah, I have no problem calling Aella and any of her partners as disgusting people. Sue me.
Okay. And progressives will use their cultural influence to shame you for not being one of them. You want to swing a dangerous weapon around. It will predictably be turned on you and me.
Everyone already does this. A pacifist in a culture war is a fool.
I don't think that encouraging and normalizing shaming is to our advantage. Encouraging more and worse bad behavior is not a wise action.
Public shaming is a necessary part of a functioning society
I disagree and if true then our near future will be mean progressives publicly shaming wrong thinkers like you and I.
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That seems like conflict theory done only halfway.
I'd say all weapons will be used by all sides that are capable of using them, with no respect for unilateral non-escalation. Progressives will shame conservatives regardless of conservatives refraining from attempting the same, because progressives are currently in a position to quote that piece of the Melian Dialogue: "The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.".
Observing the proprieties while your enemies are biting and gouging is only a winning move if there is some powerful third party who values non-escalation.
You seem to be making the mistake that what's important is to win or lose. But as the cliche goes, what matters is how you play the game. I would much rather lose while upholding good moral behavior, than win by sacrificing morals.
It seems like a noble sentiment on the surface, but it does not seem that great when you are hiding in the bushes while the enemies behead your brothers and rape your sisters and aunts. This high-minded morality to me is just a sign of privilege, it is easy to pretend to be "moral" if one is not present with tough choices
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Sure, I too prefer to play that way. But you can only lose for so long until you're not even in the game anymore.
Now I don't mean to imply that anyone, conservative or otherwise, necessarily needs to go around shaming people. But I do mean that progressives seem to have no compunctions about it and they're currently winning the culture war so decisively that they increasingly get to dictate the conditions for social participation, and for conservatives to worry about whether shaming might be used against them if they were to attempt to employ it against progressives is, in my opinion, missing several points.
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What good moral behaviour is being maintained by avoiding the use of shaming tactics? I would be surprised if there were many people who were against the use of shaming absolutely, in all contexts.
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"If the rule you followed brought you to this, of what use was the rule?"
Have a blessed day.
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Nietzsche asked:
If your morals lead you to be devoured by the monster, for no benefit to anyone except monsters, then what good are those morals?
To quote a long-eared muppet. "That is why you fail".
This is why leftism always devolves into purity-spirals and circular firing squads, this is why utopians are incapable of building anything other than mountains of skulls. The first step to building any lasting legacy is to care about something (usually a principle, but possibly an institution or other person) more than you care about yourself.
-Thomas B. Macaulay, Lays of Ancient Rome
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For my good. It's better to be a good person, even at great material costs, than to engage in vice to get ahead.
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