Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.
Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.
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Notes -
So, what are you reading?
I've finished The Handmaid's Tale. It's a book I'll have to read again sometime, since there's clearly a lot which I haven't noticed. Can't say it ever came together for me, but maybe that's because I didn't really understand its thrust. The tone throughout was sterile, which was probably intentional, given the motifs of waiting and idleness. The world itself never made a convincing dystopia; it was way too lax in just about everything, and the sense of fear of reprisals or of other people never became more than a literary suggestion. The writing was quite good.
It proved as curious as Atwood, who has not been a predictable simpleton when it comes to politics. On the one hand, it could be read as a screed against the religious right, but the picture is always muddled by something, like the quoting of the communist from each according to his ability. The last chapter muddies the picture even further, making us wonder to what extent this is to be taken as history or myth. As a myth, it may be something of value, something worth a closer look. As a history, it is laced with what seems like old arguments among old activists which seems to limp on eternally, even up to paranoia over viruses.
Going to try some Agatha Christie next, which perennialy seems to be collecting dust on my shelf.
Mishima's Runaway Horses.
I unexpectedly ended up enjoying Spring Snow, so I quickly picked up the next part of the tetralogy. It's also quite good, though I can understand why people generally praise the first book over the second - having a conspiracy instead of a romance as the main plot probably didn't have as wide an appeal, and right-wing terrorist as the main character was probably a bridge too far for many. I can more easily identify with the protagonists in Runaway Horses: Reactionary fencers obsessed with death and middle-aged white-collar profressionals, and everybody's an autist. Yeah, that's my cohort alright, more so than the effete noblemen of the first book.
Haven't quite finished it yet, so please don't spoil it.
Also from it, RE everyone's favorite culture war topic:
I think relatively intelligent women are also aware of this and it is a source of frustration and resentment for them. A beautiful woman has innate value to society pretty much no matter what she does – that’s rather obvious. But the thing with innate worth is that, well, it’s innate and constant. You’ll be valued as a beautiful woman for sure, but not for anything else or anything more. You can try proving your intelligence and abilities but everyone will just assume that it’s only your pretty face that gets doors opened for you. You’ll never be more than you already are. This does not apply to men who, on the other hand, have no innate worth to society.
True in a romantic way, but in real life I think the difference is less than is suggested by Mishima.
To be a man is mostly to be born, work, marry, have children, and die, old and frail and weak, unless you are either unlucky and die young at the hand of fate or kill yourself, like the author. Gay men have the most romantic notion of masculinity because they both worship it and can play act an extended adolescence that lasts through to middle age, when many of them wither or sink into deep depression.
Women have more ‘innate value’ than men, given their society, class, other demographics etc, yes. But the ‘given’ is doing a great deal there. A poor man on welfare in a very rich country like Switzerland or Denmark has far more ‘value’ (in the sense of a system looking out for him, providing for him, a safety net, the ability to coast through life) than an average woman in most of the world, for example.
“You will never be more than you are” is interesting. I don’t think that’s true literally, but even if it was I think this kind of deep life satisfaction, an identity as someone who has made something of themselves, is much more psychological, internal than it is external. There are people who achieve middling success who believe they have climbed mountains, and those who have done the same who consider themselves abject failures. The difference is in the head, not beyond it.
I suggest two thought experiments.
Let's assume that Denmark goes into a serious economic crisis and consequently the government decides to cut down own welfare spending? Which demographic is most likely to lose their handouts first, if not poor men, especially single men?
Take a 20-year-old pretty single woman from the poorest region of Ukraine and take her to a Danish town. Compared to a 20-year-old poor but handsome local man on welfare, which of them do you think is more likely to receive more attention, time, money and resources from Danish society?
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Also, is your argument then that homosexual men romanticize the concept masculinity because they are unable to experience their own masculinity by being a husband and father?
This is arguing the ‘intrinsic’ point where I agree with you anyway. Stripped of all possessions, social connections, class, citizenship, wealth, and any other designator of value, the young woman has more ‘innate value’ as a womb than the young man, all else equal. So yes, if you take away a billionaire’s wealth and they’re just a penniless old man, their social capital is far diminished. But in the real world, where social capital includes all of those components, this is just a thought experiment.
Neither necessarily. If anything Denmark’s increasing conservatism on immigration means the citizen will get more support, although Ukrainian refugees have received plenty. If you mean ‘in the dating market’ then sure. But of course most pretty twenty year old Ukrainian women don’t make it to Denmark. They’re either in Ukraine or maybe Poland.
That may be the case but I think it’s a small component of it; some romanticize straight family life but far more common is as with Mishima or BAP the romanticizatiom of the warband, the troop, the master and commander fantasy of all-male life at sea. Part of its sexual, all these otherwise straight men encouraged by circumstance implicitly into male company; gay men are attracted to the most outwardly masculine men, deepest voices, bulkiest muscles. But I think when you’re attracted to something you romanticize all aspects of them, they romanticize male camaraderie too.
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