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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   25593 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 18, 2025

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Evolutionarily speaking, a woman's worth is largely dependent on immutable physical characteristics (modulo things like plastic surgery), so these sorts of stories tend to psychologically resonate with women.

"worth is largely dependant on immutable physical characteristics" is true evolutionarily speaking about all forms of life

Well sure from a deterministic perspective this is trivially true, but the sense we are using it is that a woman doesn't have to do anything in order to be wifed up and have a decent lower-middle-class family life except excercise judgement over which specific suitors she ought to choose. In this frame, far from being slop, Twilight is actually the core female struggle heightened by supernatural fantasy elements.

@self_made_human's recent posts about the pretty-but-dim model from this week's thread are a sad counterexample. You might get no shortage of men wanting to sleep with you, but it was the social technology of enforced monogamy that made them commit. Identifying who will stick is a prerequisite to choosing a suitor, and seems like a much harder question.

Consider the number who become obese, refuse to socialize, or are just unpleasant and offputting, there's clearly a 'something' she has to do.

Unpleasant and offputting to some extent = "picked no suitor, which is by definition not the correct suitor".

I think my limit on "significantly loses attractiveness due to weight" is about BMI 35 or so (100kg/220lb at 168cm/5'6''), which is significantly into the "obese" range.

She just has to avoid failing; she wins by default. It's completely different from a man, who can be nice, safe, reliable, and still end up completely overlooked.

There is a reason Fluttershy is the most popular of the mane six. Butterscotch would have ended up FA.

There is a reason Fluttershy is the most popular of the mane six.

Since when? If we accept the sheer number of works involving a character as a proxy for popularity, and look at Twibooru, Fluttershy is in third place (nearly tied with Pinkie Pie, at 295K and 291K respectively), far behind Twilight Sparkle (1st, at 410K) and Rainbow Dash (2nd, at 318K).

It's completely different from a man, who can be nice, safe, reliable, and still end up completely overlooked.

Rather humorously, the same dynamic is true for Worst Pony Applejack (227K), behind Rarity at 247K.

Anecdotally from someone who's never watched any of it, I have actually heard of all the other ponies you named save Rarity, but not Fluttershy.

The default for secular western women is an obese woman too unpleasant to hook the men she does manage to attract, but that's ok because she has no way of knowing if she can trust him anyways.

You’re overestimating the effect weight has on a woman’s desirability. The most unattractive aspects of the median secular modern woman are tattoos and piercings, which are things she had to actively do to herself.

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