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FtttG  Gheobhaidh mé bás ar an gcnoc seo.  9hr ago (docs.google.com)   Edited 7hr ago   607 thread views

The Motte infidelity survey

docs.google.com

In yesterday's small-scale questions thread, @cjet79 asks why the song "Mr. Brightside" by The Killers has had such staying power, famously staying in the UK singles charts decades after its initial release. Some explanations (including my own) point to its compositional elements; others focus on its lyrics and subject matter. @100ProofTollBooth argues that it's a very universal and relatable song, as "The experience of infidelity (to some degree) is common to many (most? idk) people."

I'm curious if this is really the case, so I decided to go Aella mode and created a simple survey to find out about people's experiences with infidelity. It consists of a few demographic questions (age, sex, sexual orientation, relationship style), then asks you if you've ever had an unfaithful partner, then asks you if you've ever been unfaithful to a partner.

Completely anonymous, and I've set it up so the form doesn't collect email addresses if you're logged in.

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Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Isn't it against the rules? When I suggested to do something like that, I was booed. But it's just me.

Btw, your sample is likely to be even more volunteer biased than Aella's

I'm broadly in favour of surveys on here. I want to find out more about our weird little community.

While these type of self-reported surveys may be reliable in the statistical sense (eg people will respond the same way no matter how many times they're asked) in validity terms I wouldn't expect much (eg I wouldn't expect to learn what it is you may be hoping to learn, whether and to what degree folks are cheating cheaters) even with the stated clause that responses are anonymized. For all the same reasons as Aella's "research."

I would be at least mildly surprised if we didn't have at least one or two trolls dropping giant infidelity bombs to set ripples going. People aren't honest or particularly good at self-reflection, and often even when they are, aren't truthful.

The above is my opinion of course so who cares, but decades of indecipherable noise in survey research suggests I am not simply cynical.

It's not against the rules.

Though I suppose I would have preferred it go in the SSQ thread.

Noted, if I ever do one of these surveys again.

I’ll say I didn’t have any real reason for that; hence the approval. But we’ve always been vaguely bemused when people want to do top-level posts. Odds are you’ll get better visibility this way, at least?

I was of the mind top-level posts were solicited, that we wanted more top-level posts. I presume people don't do standalone posts because it puts you out there. Like standing up and dinging your fork on the wine glass, as opposed to just commenting at length on some esoteric point like Uncle Fred during the meal, which would be the comments in the usual Weekday Whatever threads. That the mods are "bemused" by top-level attempts is interesting to me. Why would that be?

So there are a couple main groups of post.

  1. Regulars who want to do something different. This is welcome, even encouraged, subject to the “CW in the CW thread” rule.
  2. Rat-adjacent posters who want to repost their own substack, or occasionally a related essay series. Less encouraged, since there’s a real risk of engagement bait and general unsavory tactics. It’s much harder to enforce the CW and politeness rules in a one-off interaction. Still, we approve a decent number of these, especially from users with any sort of presence in the SSC community. KulakRevolt or felipec would be examples.
  3. Complete randos who want to post their (usually AI-heavy) manifesto. We have flirted with these before, since posters tend to appeal to the spirit of free debate. This has rarely panned out. The current policy is not to approve.

The catch is that there are an order of magnitude more #3 posters. Excluding outright commercial spam, 90+% of what we get for top-levels are people asking to debate their earth-shattering new theory of everything. When we see someone known and respected like @FtttG in the queue, we’re a bit surprised. “Wait, people actually use this thing?” Then we check for CW, etc., and most likely approve.

I see. Not how I had read your post. Thanks for the clarification.

known and respected

Aww bae <3

Isn't it against the rules?

If it is, mods feel free to delete.

Btw, your sample is likely to be even more volunteer biased than Aella's

I have no intention of using this as hard data, it's just a bit of fun.

I don't think it's hard data to universalize to gen-pop, but I'm curious because I'm curious about my own community.

If it is, mods feel free to delete.

Stand-alone submissions start removed by default. If anybody other than the submitter can see it, it's already been approved by the moderators.

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