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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34498 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 6, 2023

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A late tangent, but I was warming my hands next to last week's heated exchange between @DaseindustriesLtd and @gemmaem and one thing that popped out at me was @f3zinker's chart representing women's messaging behaviour towards men in different positions of the attractiveness distribution, depending on their own. I've seen variants of this data - introduced here with the unambiguous line "Women just about exercise dictatorial demand." - on the internet for a long time (since the days of the OkCupid blog), and it always struck me as strange, insofar as it did not seem to mesh at all with the reality I perceive around me. The points of disagreement are numerous:

  • I believe I'm personally around the 60〜70% mark of the male attractiveness distribution, and have always been extremely passive about dating. Nevertheless I've been approached by women in the 50〜90 range of their distribution (as perceived by me), and had those approaches convert into relationships (some of them very long-term) in the 60〜80 band. This would put me smack dab in a pink area in that chart, repeatedly. I do not get the sense that any of those relationships were unequal in terms of effort or resources invested.

  • People around me, including unattractive ones, of either gender match up all the time, and there is no obvious bias in terms of which side initiates. It's not that unattractive and involuntarily celibate men don't exist (especially from the 70th percentile downwards), but the correlation between involuntary celibacy and attractiveness is actually seemingly quite low.

  • My entire academic and academia-adjacent blob has very low attachment to existing social conventions around dating. I know several people who are poly, and the most disapproval they meet is being the butt of the occasional jokes. Contrary to the stereotype, the ones I know do not strike me as unusually unattractive. Yet, the most attractive poly guys are not pulling massive harems, and in fact I've observed the most attractive poly girls reject repeated advances from the most attractive poly guys (in favour of less attractive ones).

So what's going on here? After reflecting on it for a bit, it seems to me that there's actually an obvious answer: the very framing of the question being charted ("do you 'like', with the implication of interest in a sexual relationship, this person, based on their picture?") only captures meaningful data when asked of men, because men are the only ones for whom look is a dominant term in the value function that estimates whether they want a sexual relationship with someone. Rewording this question slightly in a way that I don't think actually changes the meaning to "Given that this person looks like that, would you provisionally agree to having sex with them?", what's actually going has an alternative explanation that I think rings more true than "women have unrealistic standards": if looks are only a small term in your value function, you don't know enough about the value of the other terms, and the median answer to "would you provisionally agree to having sex" is no, then the looks have to be exceptionally good to shift the answer to "yes".

Importantly, this model does not require the original preference against sex with an unspecified man to be unusually strong: for any given expected utility -epsilon that women assign to having sex with a completely random man, no matter how close to 0, there exists a delta such that if looks are only at most a delta-fraction of women's value function for sex partners, then a random man would have to be top 10% in terms of looks for the expected utility for women of having sex with him to turn positive.

As an intuition pump, imagine we created the same chart for men, using some quality that men don't value particularly highly (but perhaps women do), and a base distribution of women that you(r people) are just slightly skeptical of as sex partners (your pick, based on preference: Some ethnicity you don't like? BMI >25? Cat owners? Age >40?). Take a dating app where you can't post your picture, but instead publicise your monthly income, and also all women are at least slightly chubby. Would you be surprised to find a chart like the above, but for men towards women, where the top 60% earners among men only are willing to "like" the top 10% earning women? Would this reflect men exercising "dictatorial demand"?

I'm not sure why you expect your experience as an older gentleman to have much to do with the experience of twenty somethings which is more central to the original point, family formation. Things change greatly as you age.

your experience as an older gentleman

Oh come on, I'm barely in my 30s. If you called me that to my face, I'd have a premature midlife crisis.

I may be confusing you with another mottezans who had mentioned being an academic much later in life with a similar perspective.

I seem to recall SCCReader talking about waitresses throwing themselves at him or something after being widowered in his 40s-50s?

The repeated insistence by posters of all stripes and their refusal to engage with the central argument, the crux of the matter is really making me just about fed up with this body of ideas.

Post about young male sexlessness -> Post about TFR

Post about young male sexlessness -> Post about older male sexfullness

Post about young male sexlessness -> Post about women's rights

Post about young male sexlessness -> Post about how to pick up ladies

No one wants to discuss what can be done about the fact that young male sexlessness and datelessness have both gone up by 100% compared to the historical base rate (female remains roughly same with a slight increase recently), and what are the implications of this.

Seriously let's go back to the fucking basics. Refute the central point, not some weakman or weak proxy of it.

I'm about to get real uncharitable here but here's my true unfiltered thoughts on the matter;

My cynical side says that no one but the group getting fucked actually has any incentive to fix it. And by that I don't mean the obvious personal incentive, but all of the other groups greatly benefit in the short term from not fixing it, at least on a superficial level. Old men have a wider pool to choose from, younger women don't want to temper their expectations, older women also don't want to temper their expectations. So all you are left with is token condolences and strawmen just getting beaten often brutalized to absolute shreds. This asymmetry in incentives doesn't allow ones minds to honestly tackle with the arguments (even if their hearts are in the right place) because that would be a stupid way to operate for a human. Why understand something if your livelihood relies on you not understanding it. I also think there is a signalling play here, you make a post about widely discussed {problem} and feign disbelief or obliviousness, it's letting everyone know you are high status enough to not only not have that problem, but to not be able to comprehend its existence.

remains roughly same with a slight increase recently

As cimarafa pointed out, incorrect: https://imgur.io/HGlnCTJ?r

....and no confidence intervals. Might be a fluke. Or it might be valid, but temporary due to extreme COVID quarantines. We know that women like to underreport quantity of sex.

Women have been underreporting the whole time.

On the other hand, from Pew:

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2023/02/08/for-valentines-day-5-facts-about-single-americans/

I'm very curious about what the next GSS has to say: my expectation is returning to trendline, but we'll see.

Ctrl f sex zero results

It really depends on which plot you look at which is a simple google search away.

Hint: They all ask marginally different questions.

This graph is about sexlessness and your claim is about sexlessness. Provide another graph, but don't vaguely gesture.

I reviewed all the plots and IFHS compilation of the different reports and you are correct. Post 2018 data shows that young female sexlessness increased, and male sexlessness decreased.

However, this data runs counter to the relationship data which shows 2x as many single young men than women. So what gives?

Here are my uncharitable unfiltered thoughts on the matter: something is seriously wrong with you and other people like you, and you're either unaware of it or willfully ignoring it. Maybe your standards are too high, maybe you lack social skills and weird people out, maybe you're fatter than you think, I don't know. But something isn't right.

I'm not really singling out you specifically, but I just don't understand where these posts come from. I'm a barely above average person. I'm 5'7"/170cm (!!!), face is maybe a 7/10 though under age 25 or so I often got called "cute" (never handsome or hot), body is... I dunno, 6/10? I'm not fat and not ripped, just "normal" I guess. I come from rural nowhere America from a middle-middle class family, went to an average college in a rural state, and prior to marriage made a below average salary. I'm not particularly witty or suave, though I am friendly and genuine and perceived as non-threatening. Never was athletic or played sports, but was also never overweight (until my mid 20s). I'm definitely less intelligent than many people on this board and I only did reasonably well in school, definitely wasn't near the top of my class. I majored in an uncool liberal arts subject and currently work in an unsexy part of tech and make a meh salary for a tech worker.

My point is that my stats are thoroughly mediocre except for some minor strengths here and there (and one big weakness). And yet, after turning 18 I dated continuously for 8 years (4 different women) until getting married at 26. I never had trouble finding a girlfriend, there was always someone in my social circle who I thought was cute and vice versa. I'd rate these women as 7/5/6/8, so I want knocking it out of the park looks-wise, but it was better than being alone and thirsty. I'm only in my early 30s, so this isn't advice in the vein of "just ask to speak to the manager and give him a firm handshake." Perhaps your standards are just too high?

tl;dr as a mediocre person I was able to pull it off, so anyone should be able to pull it off barring serious handicaps.

maybe you lack social skills and weird people out

This is almost certainly it (for me at least). I have sometimes flattered myself with the thought, "oh, I'm just too honest for the dirty, lying, backstabbing tricks required for success in the dating market." I typically dismiss this as egoistic rationalization, but I am again starting to wonder if it is true. I think I am the only regular in the culture war thread who has identified himself as basically an incel. I also notice that the dating/gender war/sexlessness threads do NOT read like they are written by men who are getting healthy amounts of sexual satisfaction, yet every poster takes care to mention that of course they aren't having trouble getting laid and have had multiple deeply fulfilling relationships, they are speaking hypothetically about the 20-30% of young men which they are of course not a part of.

I think some of you are lying.

Typical-minded fallacy is the one fallacy I've noted with alot of Motte posters.

Hint: If you're posting on the Motte, you're very likely nowhere near mediocre.

(I'm exempting myself from this, I will point out. If we plotted every poster out on a bell curve measuring various factors, I'd definitely end up in the shallows, and not on the far end thereof.)

I think I've lost count regarding the number of posters who've made commentary over the years about their dating experiences, only to end with the commentary of 'It's not so hard!' All the while seemingly glossing over their blatant advantages as if they somehow don't count, to the point where I wonder if I'm being gaslit or they're so privileged that they've never stopped to think why their dating experience was so painless.

It's gotten just a little bit tiresome. But hey, that's life...

I had an incel phase but it was mostly related to obesity.

I lost the weight, can now pull pretty well but would still consider it hard to find a stable committed relationship with somebody who I'd consider real wife material, but I'm very aware I've got a stack of privileges that the vast majority of people don't (White, 6'3, muscular, 99th percentile income, blonde etc.) that can outweigh the mild autism and even that I've mostly eroded as a disadvantage through sheer repetition and scripting.

I also notice that the dating/gender war/sexlessness threads do NOT read like they are written by men who are getting healthy amounts of sexual satisfaction, yet every poster takes care to mention that of course they aren't having trouble getting laid and have had multiple deeply fulfilling relationships, they are speaking hypothetically about the 20-30% of young men which they are of course not a part of.

It's a preemptive defense mechanism: the usual way of responding to someone concerned about the topic is to call them an incel, but if they're an uberchad, not only do they avoid that attack but also are taken more seriously, as they've been validated by real life women's attention.

People aren't neatly divided into incels and normies; it's more of a continuum, and most straight men have had to navigate the dating scene. None of the troubles that afflict incels are unique to them: they just take different forms once you actually get laid and interact with women. That, along with extended dry periods, is enough to give men some empathy for the situation.

I've gotten more black pilled after getting laid.

There are certain stereotypes about women that I used to classify as bitter incel talking points. I eventually found out there was some truth to it and more.

The most fundamental one being that I actually dont believe women give much heed to physical material reality at all. The social reality, or the dimention space of words and ideas and feeling and vibes are what women navigate in as a default. Its hard to describe this but

the women I saw just had a spotty relationship with what I consider the truth. Dont get me wrong, they pay heed to physical reality but its just a token. There were so many discussions where the framework of the past was change on "because I feel that". And that "feel" wasnt intuition, it was emotion. I have noticed that the "repeat a lie enough times.." technique is used a whole lot, and it makes perfect sense if reality is just a bunch of word vectors.

None of this made thise women bad people. But it did inform me that hundreds of civilizations for thousands of years keeping them out of thr adults room were perhaps onto something. I dont propse this gets done but the mind does wander.

I think @DaseindustriesLtd wrote about something to a similar effect in the old country, I cant find it.

What you are alluding to can be better explained by "not understanding something since their job depends on not understanding it".

For example, opinions that toe the line on gender issues, even if poorly supported receive no push back when expressed by women. Hence, they have no incentive to think about them critically when the conclusion may not benefit them in the short term.

Plenty of people including men have shown this tendency on other issues when their privilege hinges on not addressing it.

I'm not precisely alluding to this. I am talking about situations that are far less obviously tribal.

For example, if a person starts being disliked, not only is that person disliked from that current point in time but the past is retroactively changed such that that person is terrible from the beginning. This behavior repeated enough times compounds into a total fantasy world. And keep in mind, these are not done with Bayesian logic, they are done based on feelings and vibes.

deleted

Honestly as I wrote the post I had the same intuition. Maybe I'm undervaluing how important social skills are, especially whatever you call the highly situational "reading the room" skill. I am pretty good at reading people and intuiting their motivations.

I have a cousin who is in his mid 20s, 6'0", thin, reasonably handsome face, has a CS degree and a good job. He could probably do modeling. But he's kind of weird, lacks confidence, and dresses like a dork (he goes for a hipster look that was edgy 10 or 15 years ago, which is about as uncool as you can get now). He's really sensitive to criticism and shuts down if he feels people aren't taking him seriously or are making fun of him (even if it's good natured).

You hear all this talk online about how only looks matter, but I think we all know at least one ugly dude who was so charismatic, confident, and/or cool that he never had problems getting laid, making friends, or getting into leadership roles. He always seemed to have a girlfriend and was often chatting up other girls on the side. To me, the existence of these people (and to a lesser degree people like me) is a fatal blow to all this lookism stuff.

And the good news is that unlike your looks, you really can work on your social skills. Before age 16 or so I was a shy little wimp who was all but ignored by girls. I had a "fuck it" moment around 16, and started being a lot more assertive and aggressive towards other people in what I thought was a self-destructive way... only the destruction never came. Instead, people just listened to me more and took me more seriously. The sky didn't fall, I didn't get my ass kicked. And girls started to think I was worth their consideration.

Obviously my epiphany isn't something you can replicate in a lab. Perhaps it's a point that everyone has to reach on his own. But my point is that it's at least possible, and without the need for shoe inserts or mewing or whatever.

And the good news is that unlike your looks, you really can work on your social skills.

People always seem to say this, but I find it to be the exact opposite. There are aspects of looks that can't be changed, such as height or ethnicity, obviously, but IMHO changing looks is much easier than changing social skills. Changing looks is almost entirely a biological/physical engineering problem, of adjusting diet and exercise to change body composition, changing the chemicals one puts on one's skin and hair, changing the clothes one puts on, and such. And these physical engineering problems are mostly pretty well solved and well publicized, and implementing them is a matter of choice and will.

Changing social skills is a much murkier problem with very few well understood solutions, with the space almost entirely dominated by misinformation. It's also a social engineering problem rather than a physical one, which makes it more costly to perform experiments - which are more required due to the aforementioned lack of information about solutions - along with higher costs when experiments go wrong.

Obviously, both can be changed to various extents, and I've personally experienced changing both of them for the better, but, again, when I compare both the difficulty of enacting changes and the magnitude of the changes involved, the difference is stark. Changing my appearance for the better by a significant amount was almost trivial compared to making even a very minor change in my social skills.

You are very much undervaluing the importance of social skills.

People tend to ignore or gloss over that there's a horrendous amount of skills and capabilities that contributes toward being dateable. And if you're skilled enough in one area(say, social skills) this can make up for alot of deficiencies.

For example, if you're skilled in the social sciences, you can get a girlfriend while looking like a small mountain(and not in a good way). Or living with your girlfriends family while not having a home of your own, and somehow this is perfectly fine(wtf?). Or, or, or...

Yeah, no. Not everyone has this skill set. Either through lack of chance to naturally develop such a thing, or simply not gifted with the intrinsic capability. Half the time when people bring up 'I'm socially retarded yet I got a girlfriend' and when they describe their circumstance as to how that occurred, it comes across as pure, blind luck.

Still, you're correct. Social skill is very much a skill that can be learned and developed. The trick, however, is finding a safe space that they can learn these skills, with strict rule sets(because if you know the rules ahead of time, it gives you confidence of how to act within the confines of those rules). And, the arena has to atleast allow for a little forgiveness for when you inevitable screw up.

Nowadays, that's a very tall order. Moreso if you live in an area that doesn't have alot of social arenas to break into in a natural, organic fashion.

I know, I'm speaking from experience. Not that there aren't options, mind, but when alot of these options start costing money, that brings up a whole other set of issues...

Yup, this is the thing. Would it be even worse for your friend if he was overweight, etc. Absolutely. But, I think, unfortunately, too many people actually believe an SNL skit is actually real life. Also, the secret is that a lot of people are coded as 'assholes' because they're good-looking, charismatic, and dress well (for their subculture/etc.).

Yes, there are the typical a-hole guys in a club, or horny drunk guys late night at a bar, but they're nowhere as successful as people think they are. OTOH, yes, they are more successful than somebody who basically spends all their time either in male-dominated spaces or by themselves.

I’ve spent way too much time drafting and discarding responses, mostly on account of excessive snark. Ultimately, I’m left asking:

What is it you want from us?

If you were hoping for society-wide solutions, the TFR and gender roles threads had plenty of attempts. If instead you wanted personal advice, try the pickup threads. Getting upset at the lack of birds-eye discussion of a “central point” strikes me as…unproductive. The people who just want to talk about dating markets are assuming your conclusion, not ignoring it.

What is it you want from us?

I suppose I was pretty explicit in what I wanted, discussion on the matter that doesn't fall into those pitfalls. Those are red herrings and I also pointed out that they have the failure mode of massaging your ego or whilst also throwing off your inner status compass enough that you might not be under the control of your higher faculty.

Despite the fact that I do bring a horse to this race, I don't want anything at all because I have checked out of those discussions given I have taken the maximally doomerist position, I implored everyone to leave their status anxiety and ego at the door when this discussion comes up to not shit it up for those who want to have it and outlined how the shitting up happens.

No one wants to discuss what can be done about the fact that young male sexlessness and datelessness have both gone up by 100% compared to the historical base rate (female remains roughly same with a slight increase recently), and what are the implications of this.

Fuck it, let’s think outside the box.

The way natural fertility rates are going, at some point governments will have to implement state-run conception and child-rearing facilities. In theory, we could use IVF (or even artificial wombs) to select only XX chromosome embryos to be raised. The few remaining couples conceiving naturally would still have a 50:50 chance at XX or XY. Needless to say, the dating market for young men 30-years after the implementation of Project Solomon (named for the wisdom of course) would be much improved.

The key selling point of this plan is that at no point were anyone’s natural rights infringed. All you libertarian-minded folks get to keep your free love and consent-alone sexual ethics, and the feminists get to celebrate that the future is female after all. Everyone wins (except unattractive trad girls I guess).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolbachia method.

The way natural fertility rates are going, at some point governments will have to implement state-run conception and child-rearing facilities. In theory, we could use IVF (or even artificial wombs) to select only XX chromosome embryos to be raised. The few remaining couples conceiving naturally would still have a 50:50 chance at XX or XY. Needless to say, the dating market for young men 30-years after the implementation of Project Solomon (named for the wisdom of course) would be much improved.

Funnily enough I expect the majority of people on "Team Woman" would be absolutely against such an idea, even though it tracks perfectly with everything they profess to believe in. And the objection that this idea "hurts women" can be snapped back with in exactly the same way progressives snap back against MRAs complaining the modern societal system hurts men.

No one wants to discuss what can be done about the fact that young male sexlessness and datelessness have both gone up by 100% compared to the historical base rate (female remains roughly same with a slight increase recently), and what are the implications of this.

Andrew Tate seems like an archetype that is comming back. In the 400s there were was an abundance of Andrew Tates, strong men with a proclivity for fighting and short term hedonism. Men who didn't really care all that much about their society but wanted to go out with a bang while on a major bender through all of Europe. Andrew Tate is the modern day Vandal. The fact that he was the most googled man implies that he struck a chord with young men. Young men aren't going to be given status, money or women, they have to figure out a way to get.

Mexican drug cartels could very well gain popularity north of the boarder by offering the narco lifestyle as a modern equivelent to joining a viking horde. Piracy and mercenary work have been popular historic alternatives.

I don't see how this is going to end in any other way than loser men being organized by some men in the middle who see it as a high risk strategy to reaching the top.

Mexican drug cartels could very well gain popularity north of the boarder by offering the narco lifestyle as a modern equivelent to joining a viking horde.

People keep saying things like this. But the men of the past who went to go wage jihad or kill Persians for women are not the obese, neurotic, more socially anxious types today far more likely to fall into the unsuccessful bucket.

Not the sort to work with or be wanted at all by literal mafia. There's a reason criminal organizations discriminate racially and otherwise even when you'd think they're closing off options: due to basically being defacto under siege it matters way more how sturdy an employee is.

I'm sure many boys and men will absorb Tate-like oppositional/sociopathic behaviors but the mujahideen will be few and far between. Groups of frustrated young men will be Proud Boys-tier or below.

I would be interested in hearing what your proposals to "fix it" are. I think the reason few to no people offer solutions to the issue is that there are not any solutions people operating in a broadly liberal framework would find permissible.

From my own liberal perspective, nobody is owed a girlfriend, or relationship. If you (or a lot of young men) are unable to get someone you want to be in a relationship with to also want to be in a relationship with you, that's a you problem. Relationship formation is that good old double coincidence of wants. It's not enough that you want to be in a relationship with someone, you need to find someone who also wants to have a relationship with you.

And from my own capitalist perspective nobody is owed a job, or a well paying career. If someone is unable to find a job paying them enough to live a comfortable life that's a you problem too. Besides it's not difficult to get a seriously high paying job, I'm surrounded by people who started out their careers earning 6 figures and you'd be surprised how absolutely dumb some of them are. Jobs are also like a coincidence of wants, it's not just you who has to want that well paying job, but that job also needs to want you.

And who cares that nowadays capital is getting a far higher share of the total rewards of work than 50 years ago (see productivity vs pay charts since the 1970s) this is just how the structure of the job market has shifted towards greater automation thus reducing the relative value of labour to the final product; if you really have the skills employers want they'll still bend over backwards for you (compare to comments about how men now need to offer more to get a woman than 50 years ago).

And yet, despite this following the same strain of thought as your comment, modern "liberals" (they are no such thing) would absolutely not agree with this assessment of the job market.

Sure, nobody is saying you can't organize a political program around giving men boyfriends. Just like the couple thousand actual Communist's in America (as opposed to the vast majority of "socialists" who just want a Nordic welfare state) can try to organize a worker's revolution. That doesn't mean it'll work, but you free to try.

By the way, as a left-wing social democrat, I do agree that currently, the job market is a seller's one, but that doesn't mean we should repeal any worker's protections.

A "nordic social state" is the equivalent of a situation where while no woman is forced to pair up, it is it very hard for her to get by independently unless she does. No different to how it's very hard to become wealthy in a nordic social state unless you're born into it, in fact accruing wealth is made so hard that somehow the Netherlands have managed to achieve greater wealth inequality than the entire world as a whole, with Sweden hot on its heels at no.3.

Same here, there are very few people literally asking for government mandated girlfriends, but a vast amount of men who want the current social situation tiled away from women's favour and into men's.

  1. Nationally allow covenant marriage (which removes no fault divorce as an option). Phase current legal marriage benefits to only this type of contract.

  2. Create an award for mothers who have their 6th child with the same (legally recognized) father. it carries significant benefits (my first thought is her social security benefits become the legal max, funded by a payroll tax on anyone with fewer than two children

  3. Colleges are immediately restricted an administrator count of no more than 20% of the count of FTE instructors.

  4. All states will define 12 zoning 'zones' allowed for use in that state. A jurisdiction must allocate all their land into one of these 12 zones or multi use zones that allow multiple zones definitions. Any construction in that jurisdiction approved if it is no more intense than the zone limits and complies with national building codes.

The goal of the first is to greatly restrict serial monogamy. The second is to create prestige for motherhood that ideally exceeds corporate prestige. The last two are intended to dramatically reduce family formation costs.

From my own liberal perspective, nobody is owed a girlfriend, or relationship.

This is, from my perspective, an absolutely reversed framing of what is happening. Its like observing a young girl cutting herself and thinking, "well no adolescent is entitled to have classmates with intact wrists." Yes, it is damaging to people around a cutting girl to see her in a damaged state, similarly, it is incidentally bad for men the way modern women arrange their sexual affairs. But, it is still more damaging to the women themselves. This is shown in basically every statistic available. Happiness in women has plummeted since the 1960s. They have far fewer children than they want. And, lo and behold, all these trends are much much smaller in what we'd think of as "tradwife" communities. Mormons, devout Catholics, etc. All their women are far happier.

So yes, if you frame it as men not getting a thing, that can make the problem appear to be one of losers complaining about losing, but if you think about it at the next level, it is much more about self sabotage because of hyper-stimuli.

Ok. Even through a lens of self-sabotage I think people are almost never justified in coercing someone else to do something because, in the judgment of the individual doing the coercing, it would be in the coerced individuals best interest.

Well, there is currently a large propaganda campaign encouraging the self-sabotage. We should step 1 shut that off. And step 2 do the opposite. Coercion would be a last resort.

Can you clarify how you intend to "shut that off" and "do the opposite" in a way that doesn't entail coercion?

Well first we should eliminate all subsidies, state and federal, for the academic fields such as gender studies, etc. We should also stop allowing unfettered feminism to pervade K-12 public schools with implementation of proper curricula and policing of rebellious teachers who use their classrooms for leftist indoctrination. Indeed, if we need to (and we probably do not), the curricula enacted in k-12 may need to be explicitly traditional and espouse the virtues of motherhood and demonize the thought of women in law firms and other such institutions. As stay at home motherhood currently is.

I would be interested in hearing what your proposals to "fix it" are. I think the reason few to no people offer solutions to the issue is that there are not any solutions people operating in a broadly liberal framework would find permissible.

This is also true of the same argument for men not dating trans-identified males, fat women, black women but it never stopped anyone from finding...circuitous routes to basically arguing for those things.

The real reason is that men aren't considered [charitable] an oppressed class worthy of special consideration or [less charitable] people that deserve moral priority, even when they are clearly the group suffering disproportionately*

* Tell me about all those women stopped from leaving and drafted to die for Ukraine?

This is also true of the same argument for men not dating trans-identified males, fat women, black women but it never stopped anyone.

I don't understand what this has to do with my comment? In any case see here for what I think is the best take on it.

I don't understand what this has to do with my comment?

I'm saying that, if we go strictly by what liberalism allows, there's no solution to those "problems" either.

The exact same line of argument you raised could be raised against those groups and their interminable complaints.

But, imo, the sort of utter obtuseness about even the basic fact - let alone the solution - that OP is decrying is imo not that common in those cases when discussing with progressive liberals . They face the problems and can't seem to stop talking about them, even if many think solutions have to be slower (e.g. via "education", that great liberal panacea) since liberalism does place constraints.

So why does this happen for some groups but not others? Well, they simply don't care about certain groups. Clinton's brazen myopia was just an extreme example to illustrate the phenomenon: one side simply doesn't care and others...well, they apparently don't have Clinton's in-group loyalty.

tl;dr: Liberalism or limited solutions doesn't mean you can't care or discuss this. Not caring means you can't.

I'm saying that, if we go strictly by what liberalism allows, there's no solution to those "problems" either.

I agree, in the sense it would be just as immoral for those groups to employ various coercive measures to get others to form relationships with them.

But, imo, the sort of utter obtuseness about even the basic fact - let alone the solution - that OP is decrying is imo not that common in those cases when discussing with progressive liberals . They face the problems and can't seem to stop talking about them, even if many think solutions have to be slower (e.g. via "education", that great liberal panacea) since liberalism does place constraints.

Sure, I don't disagree that liberals are often more sensitive to issues impacting historically marginalized groups.

There are plenty of things that could hypothetically work, depending on one's analysis of the causes. If it's only the outcome of online dating/social media norms, you could regulate their negative characteristics. If it's porn and vidya, same. If it's economic inequality, you could push policies to reduce economic inequality. If it's a lack of masculine role models for young men, you could encourage the presence of fathers. Etc.

There is a massive space between discussing solutions or giving empathy to people struggling and wanting to pass a "incels can enslave women" law. And there doesn't even need to be a solution for it to be a problem worth discussing and analyzing, but people turn to the implication that anyone wanting to discuss it wants to implement that kind of illiberal law.

As a point of comparison, consider a group afforded sympathy in the social and political discourse: women. Particularly, let's look at the "wage gap." The large majority of it isn't due to discrimination, but to the choices women make with regard to mate choice. Single, childless women face virtually no wage penalty, and it's later intramarriage economic specialization choices that lead to what we call the wage gap. Those choices can be and are constrained, and many women reasonably want partners who'll support their careers and do more housework. But that runs afoul of the "nobody is owed a relationship" perspective; why is it that women who can't find the partners they want are given sympathy and deserve political and social activism to remedy the ill (unequal earnings due to gendered division of household labor), but men who can't find the partners they want are monstrous?

If it's only the outcome of online dating/social media norms, you could regulate their negative characteristics. If it's porn and vidya, same.

What does "regulat[ing] [the] negative characteristics" for dating, social norms, porn, or video games look like in a way that is compatible with liberalism?

There is a massive space between discussing solutions or giving empathy to people struggling and wanting to pass a "incels can enslave women" law.

I agree, but somehow I rarely see things in this space proposed and much more often see the "we need to take away women's rights" kind of solution.

But that runs afoul of the "nobody is owed a relationship" perspective; why is it that women who can't find the partners they want are given sympathy, but men who can't find the partners they want are monstrous?

I'm not sure I understand. I can be, and often am, sympathetic to men who have trouble finding someone to date them. Being sympathetic to someone in such a situation is quite distinct from thinking that this is a problem that demands a social or legal or political response. Where that sympathy ends is where those individuals advocate violating liberal principles to get what they want. I suspect women generally get more sympathy with their inability to find a partner because they are less likely to promote forcing society to provide one for them as a solution. Certainly less likely than similarly situated men are.

I agree, but somehow I rarely see things in this space proposed and much more often see the "we need to take away women's rights" kind of solution.

Empathising with struggling guys happens so much here that some people now have the idea that motters who say they aren't incels are just incels lying about being gorgeous hunks.

Edit: I'm not suggesting I think they're wrong.

I agree, but somehow I rarely see things in this space proposed and much more often see the "we need to take away women's rights" kind of solution.

I think part of the problem here is that you do sometimes need to restrict women's rights in order to protect men's, just as men's rights are sometimes restricted to protect women's. Framing "taking away women's rights" as incompatible with liberalism is a female supremist position, as it is equivalent to saying that men's rights must always give way to women's when they conflict.

I'm curious where you perceive their being a conflict between men and women's rights within a liberal framework.

It's quite common that the exercising of one's rights infringes in some way on the rights of others. Society then comes up with rules to balance the rights of one versus the other, usually putting some restrictions on both. As an example, consider sexual harassment. A man asserts his right to freedom of speech. A woman asserts his exercising of that right infringes her right to not be subject to unwanted sexual stimulation. Similarly, a woman asserts her right to wear whatever she wants. A man asserts her exercising of that right infringes his right to not be subject to unwanted sexual stimulation.

EDIT: Grammar.

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What does "regulat[ing] [the] negative characteristics" for dating, social norms, porn, or video games look like in a way that is compatible with liberalism?

Ban porn or heavily restrict access on the grounds of it being obscene or a harm to children.

Obviously, this is problematic in the view of many liberals today but more onerous and socially damaging restrictions can and have been imposed in the long reign of the ideology.

At worst, it's a constitutional amendment away.

much more often see the "we need to take away women's rights" kind of solution.

Perhaps I've missed them, but I've never seen anyone here propose any laws that take away women's rights to choose their sexual partners.

Being sympathetic to someone in such a situation is quite distinct from thinking that this is a problem that demands a social or legal or political response.

To be more succinct, we offer women social/legal/political responses to remedy problems that arise due to their inability to create a particular interpersonal relationship. We don't offer men social/legal/political responses to remedy problems that arise due to their inability to create a particular interpersonal relationship.

Perhaps I've missed them, but I've never seen anyone here propose any laws that take away women's rights to choose their sexual partners.

Not this week, but a couple of weeks back there was plenty of talk of explicitly limiting women's access to higher education, etc. along with banning birth control, etc. Now, no, this isn't explicitly taking away women's right to do so, but come on.

Perhaps I've missed them, but I've never seen anyone here propose any laws that take away women's rights to choose their sexual partners.

Fair enough, I'm not sure I've seen it so explicitly here but I feel like plenty of people have Darkly Hinted in that direction.

To be more succinct, we offer women a social/legal/political responses to remedy problems that arise due to their inability to create a particular interpersonal relationship. We don't offer men a social/legal/political responses to remedy problems that arise due to their inability to create a particular interpersonal relationship.

What are the responses we offer to women? Outlawing gender based discrimination in pay? That seems... fine to me? Again, I'm open to hearing what kinds of responses we should offer to men, but the people oft complaining about this seem light on actionable solutions.

What are the responses we offer to women? Outlawing gender based discrimination in pay? That seems... fine to me?

One has to not be paying attention in order to believe that that is the only response offered to women. Governments around the world have devoted significant amounts of resources towards rectifying the supposedly problematic gender pay gap and resolving women's underrepresentation in STEM and leadership roles.

For example, in my country (Australia):

Noting that the gender pay gap remained significant, the government announced a $1.9 billion package to improve women’s economic security. The sum takes in $1.7 billion over five years for increased childcare subsidies, as well as $25.7 million to help more women pursue careers in science, engineering and maths.

The package also includes $38.3 million to fund projects that assist women into leadership roles.

https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/childcare-subsidies-make-up-half-of-new-spending-for-women-20210510-p57qjk

Some quotes from the relevant budget statement:

The Government’s Boosting Female Founders Initiative provides co-funded grants to majority women-owned and led start-ups, and facilitates access to expert mentoring and advice. The Initiative, announced in the 2018 and further expanded in the 2020 Women’s Economic Security Statements, provides $52.2 million in competitive grant funding plus $1.8 million in mentoring support. The program commenced in 2020, with round one of the Initiative providing approximately $11.9 million in grant funding to 51 successful applicants. Round two closed on 22 April 2021.

And:

To further grow the pool of women in STEM, the Government is investing $42.4 million over seven years to support more than 230 women to pursue Higher Level STEM Qualifications. These scholarships will be provided in partnership with industry, to build job-ready experience, networks and the cross-cutting capabilities to succeed in modern STEM careers. This program will complement the Women in STEM Cadetship and Advanced Apprenticeships Program announced in the 2020-21 Budget, which targets women to enter industry-relevant, pre-bachelor study.

And:

The Australian Government is committed to supporting more women into leadership positions and to further closing the gender pay gap. The Government is providing $38.3 million over five years to expand the successful Women’s Leadership and Development Program. This builds on the $47.9 million expansion to the Program announced as part of the 2020 Women’s Economic Security Statement. This program funds projects such as Women Building Australia run by Master Builders Australia to support more women into building and construction. These initiatives form part of the Government’s response to increasing gender equality, extending leadership and economic participation opportunities for Australian women, and building a safer, more respectful culture.

https://archive.budget.gov.au/2021-22/womens-statement/download/womens_budget_statement_2021-22.pdf

That's from the 2021-22 budget statement, what has Australia been doing in 2022-23? Let's have a look:

Further measures in the Budget are focused on helping women into higher-paying and traditionally male-dominated industries. To boost the number of women in trades, the Government is investing $38.6 million over 4 years from 2022‑23. Women who commence in higher paying trade occupations on the Australian Apprenticeship Priority List will be provided additional supports, such as mentoring and wraparound services.

And:

The Morrison Government is making a further investment, building on the success of existing initiatives to improve leadership outcomes for women, by providing an additional $18.2 million for the Women’s Leadership and Development Program.

This includes $9 million from 2023-24 to 2025-26 to expand the successful Future Female Entrepreneurs program to develop and grow women’s core entrepreneurial skills. Funding will continue the successful Academy for Enterprising Girls (10-18 year olds) and the Accelerator for Enterprising Women, expanding it to include all women aged 18+, as well as adding a new Senior Enterprising Women program.

To support women facing unique barriers to leadership and employment, the Government is also investing $9.4 million to expand the Future Women’s Jobs Academy and to support gender balanced boards.

https://ministers.treasury.gov.au/ministers/jane-hume-2020/media-releases/2022-23-budget-boost-support-australian-women-and-girls

Governments are not the only ones who have done this. Blackrock, the world's largest asset manager, is explicitly using their voting power as shareholders to force gender diversity in boards of directors.

We voted against one or more directors at over 3,400 companies globally. Corporate governance concerns - including lack of board independence, insufficient diversity, and executive compensation - prompted most of the votes against directors' elections," BIS stated."

According to BlackRock, insufficient board gender diversity was the main reason for voting against a director in the Americas region, where it voted against 1,554 directors at 975 companies - or 61% of the votes that the firm cast against directors in the region - for board gender diversity-related reasons.

https://web.archive.org/web/20210721080157/https://www.investmentweek.co.uk/news/4034687/blackrock-cites-corporate-governance-concerns-voting-directors-elections

When women complain, they receive commiseration, help and often outright preferencing. I can't say that I see the same thing occurring when men complain.

There is little gender discrimination based on pay; it's a gap that opens up when women choose to enter into relationships with men, have children, and enact gendered labor norms. My objection is to the idea that women who do choose to do just that are entitled to the same income as men, despite e.g. working fewer hours or in more flexible jobs than men in order to care for kids. The "pay gap" is largely a relational issue, driven by personal choice (and unfortunately constrained by gendered norms).

More broadly, we make a big deal of women doing more housework than men, but why should that be a social or political concern? It's a purely relational issue, similar to how men not being able to find a partner is a purely relational issue. We can very easily say to women, "get better!" and attract a mate who'll do equal amounts of housework; but we never do that and instead start hurling invective at men. But when a man can't attract any kind of mate, we stop at "get better!"

I've no objection to purely economic anti-gender discrimination laws. When laws and social attention get into the realm of structuring interpersonal relations, either everyone is worthy of protection by them (with equal emphasis on different gendered protections) or no one is.

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We could stop digging the hole would be a good start. It can't actually be that hard to vilify men less.

Who is "we"? By what mechanism do you propose to stop this "we" from digging?

By whatever mechanism feminism has used to advocate for women and criticize every piece of media that doesn't adhere to feminist values. "this is a sexist conspiracy theory against men" should be a biting criticism that is taken seriously. People who whinge on about pay gaps should be looked at like 911 truthers.

Then I encourage you to do this! Call out sexist conspiracies against men in your life. Push back on people who go on about pay gaps like you would a 911 truther. Are you under the impression it was never difficult for any woman to advocate for the range of social changes they have advocated for and achieved?

I do. And I'm sure those early feminists had to enduring sneering pestering like this as well. What even is your angle here?

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It could be less acceptable than it currently is to casually vilify men.

I have a suspicion that women are over-exposed to media and memes that shit on men for cheap hurrahs, and the young ones in particular never actually get the firsthand experience of men that might justify the shitty attitude; the equivalent would be a bunch of 16-year-old boys who think their female classmates plan to marry them then divorce them and take away their money and children that they don't actually have.

But women aren't magnetically, viscerally attracted to men the way men are to women, and women also dictate what status IS; if you tell women that men are low-status simply for being men, they'll believe it, and enforce it, and then be confused as to where all the "good men" are.

Surely any epidemic of male sexlessness is due more to (examples, not my claims) internet-caused loneliness, a lack of organized IRL cross-sex socialization for dating, or more general social changes rather than explicit 'casual vilification' of men. The TRP people don't even claim that more women don't want sex from men, because that's visibly false.

It could be less acceptable than it currently is to casually vilify men.

I probably agree.

I have a suspicion that women are over-exposed to media and memes that shit on men for cheap hurrahs, and the young ones in particular never actually get the firsthand experience of men that might justify the shitty attitude; the equivalent would be a bunch of 16-year-old boys who think their female classmates plan to marry them then divorce them and take away their money and children that they don't actually have.

I think this is plausible. Certainly I've met (and even been) the latter kind of person.

But women aren't magnetically, viscerally attracted to men the way men are to women, and women also dictate what status IS; if you tell women that men are low-status simply for being men, they'll believe it, and enforce it, and then be confused as to where all the "good men" are.

Citation needed.

Citation needed.

The last time you made this request, and have it answered, you ghosted the poster (@anti_dan) who put it in the effort.

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What mechanism led to the promulgation of ideas like "black girl magic" or that men should "shut up and listen"?

They seem like the result of fairly organic social phenomena to me, but I confess I had not heard of "black girl magic" until this comment.

  • -13

An organic phenomenon in circles of varying levels of progressiveness that is exported via mass media to circles that find it distinctly inorganic - because it's practically an alien signal from a foreign reality that doesn't reflect or align with theirs. And you may have noticed that a sizable part of our culture war is spilling-over resentment towards and reassesment of these memes; either due to being fed up with them to the point of dropping politeness or in some cases betrayed by what they feel were implicit lies sold through them.

Like, half (if not most!) of the argument around these issues is that critics find them largely inorganic and astroturfed! And all you can do is serially post strings of words amounting to:

"OK, but so what?"

"OK, but what could you even do?"

"OK, but like, doing anything would be coercive, no?"

You remind me of a friend who talks this way whenever we have a political discussion that trails into something he's either plainly uninterested in or (frankly) unable to seriously defend a pet position of his - his tack of course totally changing when, say, the conversation turns to Roe v Wade. He's a great guy, pretty sharp, makes a good debate partner to keep me on my toes, and so I look past that stuff.

This is just boring and low effort.

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We've banned leaded gasoline, even though it was certainly economically advantageous for every individual driver, and our liberalism calls for less market regulations. We've outlawed OTC cocaine, and made sexualization of minors taboo, with a rather expansive definition too. It's not inconceivable that we could prohibit OnlyFans, Tinder and TikTok. Maybe some more elegant approach is preferable. New problems are born of new clever exploits and profit-making schemes, and after the cost of that profit becomes clear, they call for still newer solutions (which are often enough illiberal on their face). The first step, inescapably, is to allow that a problem be recognized as such, as a problem worth discussing; which is why the space of allowed concerns is so bitterly contested.

If you (or a lot of young men) are unable to get someone you want to be in a relationship with to also want to be in a relationship with you, that's a you problem.

Suppose applying this reasoning to literally any other consensual relationship with high stakes, like employment. Do you think it isn't a «poors problem» when working class people feel they've got a raw deal in the contemporary economic arrangement? Do you think it's a «youths problem» when higher-status Muslims build harems and watch contently as the red-hot madness sizzles underneath their feet?

Ultimately it doesn't matter what you think. Either the dissatisfied party can intimidate you into concessions – or wreck your neighborhood, or tank your economy, or straight up burn your McMansion together with your family – or it can't, and the point is moot.

Rights are merely an issue of negotiation via credible threats. There's a fake oath attributed by Russian bloggers to 15th century Catalan nobility: Nós, que valem tant com vós per separat, i junts més que vós, us investim sobirà i us jurem lleialtat per tal que ens protegiu, defenseu i treballeu pel nostre progrés, i si no, no. Allegedly it means something like this: «We, who are worth as much as you separately, and together more than you, invest you as sovereign and swear loyalty to you so that you protect us, defend us and work for our progress, and if not, then no». This probably wasn't the case in Catalonia. This is definitely the premise of representative democracy (rationalizing the democratic way is the intent of this fiction), and of your liberalism today. People who are not represented by the operating system of the society, who are not protected, defended and aided in their progress, can just say: i si no, no, withdrawing their pledge. It is valuable to minimize the frequency and magnitude of this second «no». There are various means to that end. It is possible to delude them into thinking their problems are negligible or shameful (just as it is possible to provoke a group with no legitimate complaints into a righteous fury), drive them to suicide, prevent their self-organization. Up to a point.

I think the reason for this performative callousness is precisely the intuition that men who don't cut it in the sexual market are pathetic non-threatening worms (at worst, some outliers will become school shooters or rapists) and can be safely utilized as fuel for minor self-affirmation in glib offhand remarks. This has worked well enough in Western polities, historically. I posit that when the cutoff is at 30% and climbing up, and in the context of there being essentially no other self-actualization tracks in a postmodern society, this tactic isn't quite as sound. Sexually frustrated young men are a moral problem, but even if you don't agree, they are a well-known political problem. Your problem too. You are playing with fire.

For the record, I guess I'm roughly in the same place as @4bpp, in that this isn't a pain point for me. I don't much care about how I look or score on some bullshit «you must be this tall to ride» plot: to eventually receive sexual attention even from fairly attractive women in the vicinity (of course, not exclusively attractive… and not only women), I've only ever had to start speaking. (I speak roughly in the same manner I write, although lacking the edit option for typos and l'esprit d'escalier is a bummer; then again, my voice has its own perks). Naturally this works best in dense mixed-sex environments where long-winded conversations are not frowned upon. So that's education and less male-biased sections of the academia, and adjacent gatherings. (In fact I believe that's what many women seek in higher ed in the first place, even if they've been gaslit into thinking otherwise). Not fucking Tinder, which is the go-to platform for matchups now.

Of course, inflating the educational pipeline even more would be insane for a whole host of other reasons. Also, «I got mine» is a not an argument even if true.

@f3zinker is correct that the effect of online dating is already disastrous and we've only began to feel it, and that you all are intent on dodging, downplaying and misrepresenting the core issue. Last but not least, it's frankly disheartening that I feel the need to write this disclaimer to preclude another tedious discussion about personal frustrations, inadequacies and attractiveness scores.

I mean, the actual problem with your argument is the vast majority of the 30-ish percent of men who didn't get laid last year aren't all that radicalized, nor will they be. Speaking personally, I'm part of that thirty percent, and I don't feel some great hatred toward women, or whatever, that leads to me wanting to limit their educational choices or banning no-fault divorce.

It's sort of the same reason there's never going to be the great reactionary turn among white voters that some right-wingers wish and hope for. Because a lot of white people disagree w/ other white people far more than SJWism or whatever, just like most people who have been sexless find incel/MRA/redpill types (and yes, I know they're different, but it's all the same wing of reaction) far more upsetting than swiping on Tinder and not being successful.

Will there possibly be some violence? Sure, but every incel shooting hurts the incel cause.

@f3zinker is correct that the effect of online dating is already disastrous and we've only began to feel it, and that you all are intent on dodging, downplaying and misrepresenting the core issue. Last but not least, it's frankly disheartening that I feel the need to write this disclaimer to preclude another tedious discussion about personal frustrations, inadequacies and attractiveness scores.

I honestly think that it's hard for people who haven't experienced the current post-COVID, online dating ascendancy market to really understand exactly how skewed it is. Even pre-COVID online dating hadn't really settled in with the same level of jadedness, and somebody who's been married for 10 years might as well be from Mars.

the effect of online dating is already disastrous and we've only began to feel it, and that you all are intent on dodging, downplaying and misrepresenting the core issue.

I've been wanting to write an effortpost about how TheMotte (or at least, a significant subset of it) falls into many of the same traps that the mainstream does when talking about sex relations, but haven't really gotten around to it and also realise that post is inevitably going to draw an utterly exhausting flood of dismissive rhetoric and criticism.

Even in heterodox communities like this one there's still quite a bit of dodging and downplaying when it comes to many topics surrounding sex relations, specifically those topics that relate to men's issues and especially those with an element to them that doesn't make women look fantastic. It's a thing that's very emotionally charged and controversial even for a community whose purpose is to discuss topics outside of the Overton window, and bringing up these topics seems to elicit from people quite a bit of pearl-clutching and emotional appeal and fervent attempts to justify their knee-jerk reactions to things they'd rather not confront. Hell, I've seen more pushback here on this than HBD. (Meanwhile in the broader public sphere female claims of victimisation are constantly treated as a pressing social issue even when the core claim is incredibly questionable.)

Really, the discomfort ultimately just seems to come down to something deeper and much more instinctual: "Men who complain about their situation as men (and especially those who do so at the expense of those who possess a greater social claim to protection, like women) are inherently low status". In the case of the dating market, that disgust is further amplified by the stigma that already attaches to sexually unsuccessful males. And my posting and engagement with people on the topic has slowed partially because it's really started to hit home that the asymmetry in discourse surrounding sex relations might be unfixable.

EDIT: clarity

also realise that post is going to draw an utterly exhausting flood of dismissive rhetoric and criticism.

Which is why I dropped the bomb before leaving my house for the day out lol.

Frankly, comments like this decrease my sympathy for men who have issues getting a relationship substantially. It seems little different from the incel fantasizing about the "day of the rope". The sexless men will rise up! And take what's theirs! And all the Chads and Staceys who have wronged them will get whats coming to them! Yawn.

SO there is a certain...manner of speaking that certain men adapt when talking about thing that are difficult, or challenging, or make them feel a feeling that they dislike etc. They want to position themselves as a serious intellectual but also someone who is wrestling with some kind of inner demons, making them even more intelligent and mysterious. it is particularly pronounced when they are trying to position their own pain or discomfort as the most important thing in the world while using very flowery language, the kind one might find in an overwrought fantasy novel.

Overworked vocabulary? Centering their feelings? Thinking they are smarter than they are? Can you imagine Rastling Majere from Dragonlace saying exactly those words?

Dying Wizard.

  • -20

Well, and, if we're repeating ourselves,

I think the reason for this performative callousness is precisely the intuition that men who don't cut it in the sexual market are pathetic non-threatening worms (at worst, some outliers will become school shooters or rapists) and can be safely utilized as fuel for minor self-affirmation in glib offhand remarks.

If not for your predictable, inflexible exercise in glib remarks about Chads and incels and shiet, signaling being a higher-status male in an environment where it's a pointless tactic (has anyone ever found a mate through The Motte, or founded a gang?), this would have been an «inflammatory claim without evidence» I guess.

Now that we've established that we both see each other as cringeworthy posers, do you have anything to say on the object level?

Your explanation of my actions evinces a quite poor theory of mind on your part.

Now that we've established that we both see each other as cringeworthy posers, do you have anything to say on the object level?

Sure. I think your analysis of the motivations of the parties involved and the causal forces at work is far too simplistic. Many groups in society have gotten their way by methods other than threatening violence. Similarly the notion that the current crop of young sexually frustrated men would burn down society for not giving them a girlfriend is absurd. Maybe there are some vocal incels/MGTOWs/whatever online that believe something like that but most people, including single sexless men, like society and all the benefits that flow from it. I think a very small percentage (<1) entertain anything like this idea and it will be very difficult for them to convince others to join them.

  • -11

Similarly the notion that the current crop of young sexually frustrated men would burn down society for not giving them a girlfriend is absurd.

Why are governments like Ireland's (IIRC) dedicating resources to "incel terrorism," then? Why did the PLO marry off their armed wing that carried out the Munich Massacre?

It seems you’re denying the entire category of legitimate claims. If it all comes down to power relations, there is no fundamental difference between single women complaining about fatphobia, black activists threatening to burn down cities if they don’t get handouts, incels, and groups genuinely wronged.

I don’t think a threat makes a right. You’re going to need more than that. At present, on that issue, the case for why their interests should take precedence over those of others is unclear to me. And even if you’re the hardbitten realist and my beliefs are false, those ideals will determine my actions in the political struggle.

It does matter what people think. After all, women didn’t attain what we believe to be a privileged position in society by threatening to burn it down, did they? And it wasn’t the power and threats of the slaves that brought about their emancipation.

It seems you’re denying the entire category of legitimate claims.

Pretty much, yeah. I mean I have a sense of intuitive morality that I believe is informed by the deep structure of the world, simple things like reciprocity being objectively desirable, the first aggressor being in the wrong, etc., – but in the end, such sensibilities are arbitrary aesthetics and can only be legitimized and normalized by political fiat. The only way it could have been otherwise would be if there was a Creator whose intentions for the Universe include ranking of its elements along some specific moral axis.

I have never been able to tell if people who act as if they have access to objective morality (one that others will recognize as such, even!) are more Machiavellian, or just lacking meta-awareness (and whether there is any difference).

I don’t think a threat makes a right.

That's the neat part: a sufficient threat can make you reconsider, at least for purposes of political action – and in a generation or two, for all other purposes too. Sufficient threats effect concessions, and concessions become norms, and norms become the letter and the spirit and the legitimizing justice behind the law.

It does matter what people think.

I agree. Right now, your best bet is that 30% of young men who are effectively emasculated will think «fair enough, I am not entitled to anyone lowering their standards». And perhaps 40 or 50% next.

After all, women didn’t attain what we believe to be a privileged position in society by threatening to burn it down, did they?

I think they very much did, violence, intimidation and support of far left terrorist movements was a significant part of it. Although mainly it was still social shaming, public disturbances (shrieking, vandalism), and abuse of the male sense of pity – options obviously unavailable to young cis hetero men, who are also vastly more violent by default.

Incidentally, women have been having a pretty noisy demonstration just the other day here. I think they'll get all they want, and more, and then discover it hasn't made them any happier.

I’m unsure whether you think our beliefs about fairness affect us or not. It seems to matter for women, and you concede that we could convince incels to accept the status quo (might be sarcasm, though) like they do now, but you maintain that justice consists of nothing but threats.

I can’t help but notice the similarity to woke discourse (now I have to page @HlynkaCG ), which likewise never grants that some rights were handed over graciously. They deride beliefs as an irrelevant superstructure, which leaves nothing but identities exerting power in self-interest, leading to such crushing arguments as ‘you’re a white male’. In these discussions it’s more like, ‘My lady, due to your wonderfulness and the relative cheapness of the gametes, you could never understand my plight, thus I only have my sword’.

I’m unsure whether you think our beliefs about fairness affect us or not.

They do, and they are subject to change because of threats and other external stimuli.

and you concede that we could convince incels to accept the status quo (might be sarcasm, though) like they do now, but you maintain that justice consists of nothing but threats.

There's no contradiction here. «Incels» or like @urquan properly says young sexless men who may one day stop being incels, accept it conditional on the sense of the threat being enough to outweigh the sense of unfairness and vague promise of potential upsides from chaos that men under pressure sometimes feel (and more importantly, conditional on availability of copes, which is why wokeness in games is such an irritant).

If the pressure increases, or more capable men are demoted into incels (even if the bottom 30% on attractiveness perfectly coincides with the bottom 30% on general ability to get shit done, which it does not, the 30th percentile man is not nothing, and the 50th percentile man would be more of something). it may not be enough.

which likewise never grants that some rights were handed over graciously.

The woke are of course rational to do so, because the claim that your rights have been handed over graciously serves solely to imply that they could have been not handed over – or may be withdrawn, if you don't behave as was expected upon them being handed over. It's usually a negotiation tactic to overstate your degree of control over the situation and discourage escalation of demands.

But I also think they are correct objectively. Some people can be persuaded by peaceful means. Heck, some could even be proactively sympathetic while not sharing your burdens in any way, like white Abolitionists were.* In the end, there remains at best a minority of disagreeable profiteers of the status quo who seek to maintain it, and you should hope they will be intimidated into submission peacefully, by the new consensus. But, well, you see – when intimidation is necessary, violence is always around the corner.

This reminds me:

...Neither could the suffragists point to any laws that would be passed under the new regime, since everything on their wish list—higher education, inheritance rights, guardianship of children, divorce reform, factory laws—had already been granted. (So much for the argument that power yields only to force.) Sometimes it seemed like the antis were the only ones who anticipated any practical consequences to follow from suffrage. Of course, the effects they had in mind were things like the routinization of suffragette tactics: blowing up buildings, shouting down public speakers, pouring acid down pillar-boxes, slashing priceless paintings, horsewhipping ministers on the street.

Ultimately, though, women needn't use violence the way that men have to.

* Notice how this possibility is effortfully mocked and denied when applied to this topic. No, the only reason one could be willing to speak in incels' favor is being one, a filthy lying nig fag incel, ergo inherently undeserving of anything better than sensible chuckles and strawmen.

I think it's a completely reflexive, unthinking, subhuman reaction, just a monkey dangling his balls in the interlocutor's face because the situation feels like a natural opportunity to show the goods.

But again: it is informed by the wisdom of public negotiations, and thus rational, even if not quite helpful specifically here.

More comments

Sexually frustrated young men are a moral problem, but even if you don't agree, they are a well-known political problem. Your problem too. You are playing with fire.

Modern society has more defense mechanisms and is refining the ones it has for precisely this reason.

  1. Plentiful cheap entertainment and pleasure to blunt male aggression via degeneracy.

  2. An ever increasing system of controls and surveillance to chase for "radicalization" in any online or media space. This system can be vastly more granular than most surveillance systems in the past; corporate moderators, researchers and actual government agents can track smaller and smaller accounts and users now than someone might have been able to follow a random who only had a telephone or not even that.

  3. Related to 2: this also allows the crushing of any figure for males to rally around, from the milquetoast types like Jordan Peterson to the imo probably legitimately misogynistic and criminal like Andrew Tate.

  4. Attempts to control the academy and so to educate such men into the right mindset to blunt violence (some form of self-hating, self-blaming false consciousness).

A real gauntlet for radicalized men to run. I doubt their frustration amount to much.

Speaking personally, I'm not that worried about Andrew Tate. Partly because a lot of what Tate says was far more mainstream only a few decades ago, just in a slightly different language, and second of all, Tate's audience isn't 20-something incels. It's horny 14 & 15 years olds. Now, as a former horny 14-year-old boy, of course, they're frustrated.

But, the reality is, most of these 14-year-old boys will have some sort of relationship in high school. Guess what, once the option is a makeout session/handjob/etc. or continuing to watch Tate or some other dumb streamer, guess what the horny teenage boy is going to choose? Like, it's obviously not great, but I don't think it's the crisis people think it is.

But, the reality is, most of these 14-year-old boys will have some sort of relationship in high school.

Why do you think this? Only 35% of teens have been in a relationship and I'd assume these people are less likely to be Tate fans.

The system of anti-radicalization controls is really bad relative to what it could be. Far-right twitter users get suspended every few months, but continue to 'radicalize' people. It's certainly less effective than past forms of social control like 'exile/prison for saying something illegal', and dissent existed in those too. The first point has at least 20x the effect of the second.

The most likely outcome won't be any kind of incel revolution, but a constant drag on the economy as more and more young men permanently check out in favor of a minimal amount of wage labor to survive and spend on cheap electronic entertainment. It won't destroy the country, but it'll make it worse off, both for the limited lives those men will lead and for the missing value to society (economic and interpersonal) they won't create.

The basics of arguing? Latter half of your comment is bulverism.

OK, granting everything, what can be done? This is personal business, so liberal precepts I adhere to preclude any kind of heavy-handed intervention. Do you want government ads aimed at women imploring them to tamper their expectations, government girlfriends, or what ?

Do you want government ads aimed at women imploring them to tamper their expectations, government girlfriends, or what ?

I actually don't want anything at all.

I saw a weakness is discourse and pointed it out.

I can get behind that. All is clouded by desire.

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