domain:parrhesia.co
hydroacetylene
5hr ago
That's tautological, surely? I'm asking why is it female gendered.
Because of conditions on the ground in ~1950 when it was one of the few acceptable female jobs?
AmericanSaxeCoburgGothic
Happy to be here! Goal is to post the most exclamation points.
5hr ago
Have you played any of them? Are they fun? I've played the Crusader Kings Board game (just solo) but really enjoyed it.
Magusoflight
5hr ago
Adoption studies have already debunked those other explanations. Why are people always forgetting those exist? Environmentalist arguments have been DOA for decades now
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
5hr ago
That said, you need to know what you take, when, how, and why - otherwise you are at significant risk of increased bad outcome (although this obviously depends on what conditions you have).
Quick, what blood thinner are you on? Adoxaban? No, I'm sorry, it's apixaban, no gun for you.
FiveHourMarathon
Wawa Nationalist
5hr ago
The Bell Curve Meme strikes again, cinema history edition!
I had long known of the Reddit midwit, clickbait anti-American, hipster propaganda factoid that Sergio Leone's seminal A Fistful of Dollars, the film which made Clint Eastwood a star, was nothing but an unlicensed ripoff of Kurosawa's Yojimbo. headlines tell us that Leone "ripped off" Kurosawa, or "Plagiarized" his movie. Notably, Kurosawa would get a 15% stake in Dollars after a lawsuit, and made more money off that 15% than he had off of Yojimbo. I'd long accepted this as a fact: the superior Japanese Samurai film was ripped off by the inferior Western cowboy movie!
But, then I started an audiobook of Dashiell Hammett's 1929 noir Red Harvest, one of his Continental Op books. And what is Red Harvest about? A Mercenary protagonist, middle aged and experienced, nameless, hired or co-opted by crooked criminal warlords in an oppressed town, who plays them off against each other to clean up Personville (Poisonville). It's Yojimbo! Kurosawa acknowledged the influence of another Hammett novel/film adaptation, The Glass Key, in his creation of Yojimbo, but when you read Red Harvest it's obvious that the plot is the same. Dollars might be Yojimbo in the Southwest, but Yojimbo in turn took Red Harvest out of the 1920s Southwest and moved it back in time and across the Pacific.
And it's interesting to me for a few reasons.
The universality of Western culture and globalization of culture earlier and earlier. I've said before that Don Quixote is the proper recipient of the title First Novel, in that it is the first book with a novelistic structure that everything afterward was influenced by, there is no author anywhere after 1945 writing novels who hadn't either read Cervantes or was influenced by people who had; where something like The Tale of Genji can't make a similar claim (though arguably one could make that claim about Genji for authors born after 1985 or so). Kurosawa is iconically Japanese, and iconically among westerners a sort of saint of foreign art film vs Hollywood schlock; but his ideas were often influenced by Western originators. Everything is much more intertwined than people would have you believe.
The way this claim has been used as a bludgeon by a certain kind of cinema hipster, to point to the originality and superiority of Kurosawa over the cowboy movies made in the West. How is that claim impacted by Kurosawa in turn taking Hammett's Noir and turning it into Samurai fare? Hammett in turn was original, in that he drew directly from his work with the Pinkerton's and his involvement in leftist politics for his inspirations. But is anyone really original? Dostoyevsky said that there were only two stories: a man goes on a journey, or a stranger comes to town. So at some level nothing is ever going to be original-original, that's not the nature of human culture. Not that I question the Kurosawa-Leone monetary settlement, hey he deserved it for the shot-for-shot remake, that was worth some money. But the cultural credit he receives, and the subsequent scorn heaped on the Westerns, seems excessive.
Just one of those clever factoids that's missing the "fact."
Magusoflight
5hr ago
You can sort of have designer babies
Just pick your mates carefully! Ideally for multiple generations.
The_Nybbler
In the game of roller derby, women aren't just the opposing team; they're the ball.
5hr ago
After losing this expungement case, the next step is probably to go for a second amendment challenge in federal court.
No point. The appropriate District and Circuit courts uphold all gun regulations and the Supreme Court has said they don't want to hear it. We've hit the end of the line for gun rights; in as much as they exist they exist in Red states only.
HereAndGone
5hr ago
Unhappy marriages were (and are) often complex tangles. Men taking advantage of their wives' beauty, social position, and often connection with high status lovers to advance their own careers were not uncommon (take the (in)famous mistresses, later in the century, of the Prince of Wales, later to be Edward VII, whose complaisant husbands were often rewarded for their discretion and tact). Unsuccessful men living off the earnings of their wives (often the women wrote for a living, hence the increase in women novelists so that now novels are nearly primarily a female art form) also happened. Take famous 19th divorce cases such as that of Caroline Norton:
In 1827, she married George Chapple Norton, barrister, Member of Parliament for Guildford, and the younger brother of Lord Grantley. George was a jealous and possessive husband given to violent fits of drunkenness. The union quickly proved unhappy due to his mental and physical abuse. To make matters worse, George was unsuccessful as a barrister, and the couple fought bitterly over money.
During her early married years, Caroline used her beauty, wit and political ties to set herself up as a major society hostess.
...Despite his jealousy and pride, George encouraged his wife to use her ties to advance his career. It was through her influence that in 1831 he was made a Metropolitan Police Magistrate. During these years, Caroline turned to prose and poetry as means of releasing her inner emotions and earning money.
...In 1836, Caroline left her husband. She managed to subsist on her earnings as an author, but George claimed these as his, arguing this successfully in court. Paid nothing by her husband and her earnings confiscated, Norton used the law to her own advantage. Running up bills in her husband's name, she told the creditors when they came to collect, that if they wished to be paid, they could sue her husband.
Not long after their separation, George abducted their sons, hiding them with relatives in Scotland and later in Yorkshire, refusing to tell Caroline their whereabouts. George accused Caroline of involvement in an ongoing affair with a close friend, Lord Melbourne, then Whig Prime Minister. Initially, George demanded £10,000 from Melbourne, but Melbourne refused to be blackmailed and George instead took the Prime Minister to court.
Lord Melbourne wrote to Lord Holland, "The fact is [that George] is a stupid brute, and [Caroline] had not temper nor dissimulation enough to enable her to manage him."
...At the end of a nine-day trial, the jury threw out George's claim, siding with Melbourne, but the publicity almost brought down the government. The scandal eventually died, but not before Caroline's reputation was ruined and her friendship with Melbourne destroyed. George continued to keep Caroline from seeing her three sons and blocked her from receiving a divorce. Under English law in 1836, children were the legal property of their father and there was little Caroline could do to regain custody.
For an Irish example, there's Charles Parnell and Kitty O'Shea, where a prominent Anglo-Irish politician had a long-running affair, her husband was aware but, as long as he gained advantage from it, didn't rock the boat (the O'Sheas were waiting for Kitty's wealthy aunt to die and leave her an inheritance, which would not have happened if she was involved in a public scandal, and there's some evidence that Parnell tried to help advance O'Shea's career in politics). Although the O'Sheas were separated, the husband did not seek a divorce (and the accompanying scandal which blew up and wrecked Parnell's career) until much later:
Parnell's leadership was first put to the test in February 1886, when he forced the candidature of Captain William O'Shea, who had negotiated the Kilmainham Treaty, for a Galway by-election. Parnell rode roughshod over his lieutenants Healy, Dillon and O'Brien who were not in favour of O'Shea. Galway was the harbinger of the fatal crisis to come. O'Shea had separated from his wife Katharine O'Shea, sometime around 1875, but would not divorce her as she was expecting a substantial inheritance. Mrs. O'Shea acted as liaison in 1885 with Gladstone during proposals for the First Home Rule Bill. Parnell later took up residence with her in Eltham, Kent, in the summer of 1886, and was a known overnight visitor at the O'Shea house in Brockley, Kent. When Mrs O'Shea's aunt died in 1889, her money was left in trust.
On 24 December 1889, Captain O'Shea filed for divorce, citing Parnell as co-respondent, although the case did not come to trial until 15 November 1890. The two-day trial revealed that Parnell had been the long-term lover of Mrs. O'Shea and had fathered three of her children. Meanwhile, Parnell assured the Irish Party that there was no need to fear the verdict because he would be exonerated. During January 1890, resolutions of confidence in his leadership were passed throughout the country. Parnell did not contest the divorce action at a hearing on 15 November, to ensure that it would be granted and he could marry Mrs O'Shea, so Captain O'Shea's allegations went unchallenged. A divorce decree was granted on 17 November 1890, but Parnell's two surviving children were placed in O'Shea's custody.
In 1867, Katharine married Captain William O'Shea, a Catholic Nationalist MP for County Clare from whom she separated around 1875. Katharine first met Parnell in 1880 and began an affair with him. Three of Katharine's children were fathered by Parnell; the first, Claude Sophie, died early in 1882. The others were Claire (born 1883) and Katharine (born 1884). Captain O'Shea knew about the relationship. He challenged Parnell to a duel in 1881 and initially forbade his estranged wife to see him, although she said that he encouraged her in the relationship. However, he kept publicly quiet for several years. Although their relationship was a subject of gossip in London political circles from 1881, later public knowledge of the affair in an England governed by "Victorian morality" with a "nonconformist conscience" created a huge scandal, as adultery was prohibited by the Ten Commandments.
Out of her family connection to the Liberal Party, Katharine acted as liaison between Parnell and Gladstone during negotiations prior to the introduction of the First Irish Home Rule Bill in April 1886. Parnell moved to her home in Eltham, close to the London-Kent border, that summer.
Captain O'Shea filed for divorce in 1889; his reasons are a matter for speculation. He may have had political motives. Alternatively, it was claimed that he had been hoping for an inheritance from Katharine's rich aunt whom he had expected to die earlier, but when she died in 1889, aged 97, her money was left in trust to cousins. After the divorce the court awarded custody of Katharine O'Shea and Parnell's two surviving daughters to her ex-husband.
Who's in the right? Who's in the wrong?
No_one
5hr ago
Iain McGilchrist comes across to me as a religious mystic and obscurantist. Yes people find it exceptionally easy to delude themselves for entirely explicable reasons (see e.g. Hanson & Simler's book) and science is hard, but entirely mechanical phenomena can create incredible complexity without major problems.
McGilchrist is very ready to make sweeping conclusions that veer into outright hallucinations (metaphysics etc).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Matter_with_Things
In Part III, "What Then is True?", McGilchrist asks and attempts to answer the question "what is truth?", before turning to a wide-ranging exploration of the nature of reality: the coincidence of opposites (the idea that at a deeper, higher or transcendent level, apparent opposites may be reconciled or find union); the one and the many; time; flow and movement; space and matter; matter and consciousness; value; purpose, life and the nature of the cosmos; and the sense of the sacred. McGilchrist further argues that consciousness, rather than matter, is ontologically fundamental.[5]
That all seems like someone who doesn't understand that 'believing you are the center of the universe and somehow matter' is an adaptive psychological mechanism you'd expect to find in any vital organism, but unlikely to be actually true in the sense that 'the universe came into being to create humanity'.
No_one
6hr ago
Nobody is saying that. Nobody can even alter fifty places in the genome safely today, certainly not in a human embryo.
No_one
6hr ago
So... even though the twin studies can't really be proven, despite two decades of intensive, worldwide research focus and ungodly amounts of funding, he still argues they are "mostly right."
80% of the people whose job theoretically is to determine the validity of twin studies are psychologically invested into finding them not true.
If twin studies are correct and most outcomes are due to 'lack of abuse' and 'genetics', as theorized by people such as fascists or authors of the 'Nurture assumption', then the bulk of policies liberals like are going to be found wanting. Scientists are generally left of center (won't punch left) and sometimes hard left (Gould, for example, who probably falsified evidence in the Morton case or was deliberately sloppy)
I have little confidence that these studies are being carried out by impartial parties and in good faith.
I'm pleasantly surprised that Scott said this much.
Let's dig in to the history of divorce to see how we got to where we are today. The alimony and property division subjects seem to be different from state to state, so it's not automatically "she will take half your stuff and your future income". Historically, divorce was obtained solely, largely, and more easily by the wealthy; men were the major earners, work opportunities for women were much more limited; a divorced woman (especially one with children) would often be socially ostracised and would find it difficult to impossible to remarry and marriage was the main form of maintaining/obtaining income and status (widows were also often in reduced circumstances); men might/would remarry more easily and form new families. Therefore there was an expectation (for the better-off) of maintaining a similar standard of living to what they had enjoyed, and the duty to provide for the abandoned wife and children so they would not be destitute. Men of high status might disinherit children of a former marriage when contracting a new (and better, trading up) marriage for reasons of inheritance rights (see Henry VIII legally changing the status of his daughters Mary and Elizabeth to that of bastards so they had no claims on the throne), so this was important to provide for such children.
So the power in divorces swung gradually, over time and with the fights for rights of women, from men (who could more easily divorce their wives and often used the threat of "I'll take custody of the children and you will never see them again", as legal custody used to be automatically granted to the father, to force their wives into either remaining in the legal marriage or to accept worse settlements in the case of divorce) towards women - automatic or nearly so granting of custody to the mother rather than the father, 'palimony' cases and the likes.
Was this abused? Sure. Just as the previous state of affairs had been abused when the power lay with men. 'No fault' divorce came about because the old procedure was long-drawn out and often difficult to prove (hence the fake adultery cases). It was supposed to be quicker, easier and cheaper when the marriage had irretrievably broken down and both parties agreed they wanted to end it. Of course, the social views at the time (divorce will be last resort) then eroded over time as divorce became more and more acceptable and commonplace, to now where one party can get a divorce even if the other party doesn't want to end the marriage.
This is, after all, the point of the slippery slope argument: you can't fossilise attitudes to be the same forever as at the time you make the changes in the name of compassion or inclusivity or whatever. You start off with the hard cases and the view that "of course this will always be last resort, we just want to help those genuinely suffering" and as the 'last resort' moves from "socially unacceptable" to "tolerated" to "accepted" to "the new normal", or course it will no longer be the 'last resort'.
The Society for Promoting the Amendment of the Law in the 1850s published proposals suggesting that divorce should be dealt with in a separate Court and should be a cheaper process. These proposals were accepted and by the Matrimonial Causes Act 1857, the Court for Divorce and Matrimonial Causes came into existence and the Ecclesiastical jurisdiction over divorce was abolished. The 1857 reforms only changed procedure and adultery remained as the only ground available for divorce. If a wife was the party claiming a divorce, she had to prove cruelty or desertion, in addition to the act of adultery by her husband.
Abuse of the new procedure by wealthy Victorian families, combined with clashes between the Government of the time and the Church, meant that further reform was slow in coming. A Royal Commission in 1912 suggested that cruelty or 3 years’ desertion should be introduced as separate grounds for divorce and that the rights between wives and husbands should be equalised. The Church was opposed to anything that widened the possibility of divorce and the recommendations of the Royal Commission were defeated in 1914. A further Royal Commission in 1923 attempted the same reforms but only succeeded in equalising the rights between wives and husbands. As a matter of practice, married couples often contrived to stage an act of adultery by the husband to achieve a divorce ‘by consent’. In 1935 a committee within the Church finally agreed to the proposals originally suggested by the Royal Commission in 1912. Further reform suggestions were delayed until post-Second World War and in 1951 a bill was presented in Parliament to permit divorce by consent after separation for 7 years. A Royal Commission argued against this proposal in 1955, however Lord Walker in the arguments of that 1955 Royal Commission dissented and suggested divorce should be permitted where a marriage had irretrievably broken down. After a further 10 years, this approach was endorsed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and was brought into law by the Divorce Reform Act 1969.
The current position is set out in the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 and the sole ground for divorce is that the marriage has irretrievably broken down. This breakdown can be proved by the fact of adultery by one of the parties, unreasonable (abusive) behaviour, 2 years’ separation if both parties consent, 2 years’ desertion or 5 years’ separation if only one party consents. Originally under the 1973 Act, the parties had to wait until 3 years into the marriage before a divorce could be applied for but this period was reduced to 1 year by the Matrimonial and Family Proceedings Act 1984.
And that's in England, the USA has gone its own way and introduced, state by state, its own laws. Take the Nevada divorces, where the state purposely made it as easy as possible for people to come to Nevada, fulfil the six month residency requirement, and get a divorce - all in the name of money-spinning for the local economy. That's got little to nothing to do with the rights of women or helping men get divorce-raped because they believed Women Are Wonderful. In this particular case, if you look at the formal notice issued, you have to admit it's some cheek to claim the wife deserted the husband, as he took up with a married woman and they fecked off to America where he then deliberately contracted a bigamous (under British law) marriage with her so his English wife could divorce him at home:
Russell became infatuated with Marion (known as Mollie) Somerville, who was at that time married to George Somerville, with whom Russell had become friendly during the campaign in Hammersmith. ...She campaigned for Russell; the two became close and were seen together at several events. When she fell ill early in 1899, Russell let her use one of his residences, and the two went away together, travelling via France to America. Russell planned to use laxer American divorce laws to end his marriage to Mabel Russell.
Russell and Mollie Somerville journeyed to Chicago, but learned that local laws had recently been tightened, and required a year's residence, with other restrictive provisions. North Dakota and Arizona Territory were also considered, and in the latter case visited, but also required living there a year. Nevada, with only a six-month requirement, was more practical. They settled in Glenbrook, on Lake Tahoe, for the winter of 1899–1900. On 14 April 1900 both Russell and Somerville were granted divorces. Their marriage ceremony in Reno before Judge Benjamin Franklin Curler took place on 15 April. They honeymooned on the way to America's East Coast, including at Denver's Brown Palace Hotel, where Russell told a reporter that a charge of bigamy would never stick. The couple returned to Britain the following month.
Russell knew such a divorce was invalid under English law, which refused to recognise foreign divorces obtained by British subjects; his intent was to allow Mabel Russell to obtain a divorce on the grounds of bigamy following adultery, which would also free him to marry again: he deposited £5,000 that would go to her upon a divorce to ensure her cooperation.
Beginning when Russell wired news of his Nevada marriage to appear as a notice in The Times, there was considerable press interest on both sides of the Atlantic in what had occurred. Both Mabel Russell and George Somerville filed for divorce, and each gained them uncontested, subject to the usual waiting period before the decrees became absolute. Russell, on his return, took his seat on the LCC as if nothing had occurred. There was, initially, no other official reaction, society accepted them as a married couple, and Mollie appeared on the 1901 census as "Mollie Russell".
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
6hr ago
None of that is necessary to keep a car at home.
Primaprimaprima
...something all admit only "TRUMP", and the Trump Administration, can do.
6hr ago
· Edited 6hr ago
But I quoted your passage upthread, re: male sexual desire conferring an aura of importance and seriousness on its object, because that seems interestingly different.
Yes, you're correct about all this. There is something qualitatively different about male sexual impulses (their "seriousness", and all the downstream effects thereof that you mention) that sets them apart from other basic biological drives.
I think this seriousness stems from the fact that a man's sexual impulses (and the fulfillment thereof) are closely tied to his sense of self-worth and self-actualization, in the same way that a career or other major life project might be. When he has sex with an attractive woman, he gets more than just the raw physical pleasure of the act: he gets a sense of holistic contentment, he feels that everything must actually be going quite swimmingly right now, he feels like he's exactly where he needs to be. Threatening the fulfillment of his sexual impulses is the same as threatening the fulfillment of his life project as a whole. This extends, albeit in a limited or distorted sense, even to fetishes that are shameful or harmful. The crossdresser might be ashamed of his crossdressing and try to hide it, but he still feels like he's expressing something vital by crossdressing, he's exploring an integral part of himself that might otherwise remain obscure. Asking him to give up his crossdressing is the same as asking him to give up part of his soul, even if it's a part of his soul that he's ambivalent about.
Now you might reasonably ask: can't you see, in a moment of sober reflection, that this is all a bit silly? Can't you see that there are plenty of other sources of meaning in life (friends and family, career, creative projects, etc) that obviate the need for this obsessive sexual drive? And the answer is, well... no. No matter how much I reflect on it, I can't disavow the importance that men place on sex and their particular sexual fetishes. Perhaps that's just the testosterone-induced delusion that I can never extricate myself from (it's a bit like saying "I've shown that love is just a chemical reaction, so now you can discard love as nothing but a useless illusion, yes?" -- the biology is whatever, but the feeling remains real regardless). But from a certain perspective, it also kind of just makes sense. Objectively speaking (not subjectively/psychologically), it's more difficult for men to reproduce than it is for women. Significantly more women than men throughout evolutionary history have reproduced. He's competing against an army of other men who are all offering large quantities of the same commodity (sperm cells) at very cheap rates. If he's able to enter into a normal and healthy (not talking about extreme fetishes here) sexual relationship with a woman, where she gives herself not just willingly but enthusiastically, then that is an accomplishment that he should objectively feel proud of.
Evolution had to instill men with a strong drive towards sexual competition (complete with that whole "all reward centers firing at once, total-soul-actualization" feeling) because otherwise they would be out-competed by other men. And the extreme fetishes that you bring up (necrophilia, self-mutilation, etc) are a result of this basic drive going haywire and becoming misdirected. The drive is, by necessity, strong enough and all-encompassing enough that its behavior becomes unpredictable.
It’s all a bit difficult to talk about because there are multiple types of sexual impulses (everything from “normal” relationships to extreme harmful fetishes) directed at different types of objects, and multiple levels of explanation (objective “marketplace” dynamics, biologically-mediated instincts, and the internal-phenomenological experience) all interacting with each other.
I'm absolutely not saying that men are crazy
No worries! Those were my words, not yours. I really do think that men are crazy (for good and for ill).
But I'd also be curious if this resonates, if testosterone-based sexual desire feels to most men as it does to the hand-freezing-off guy
On the one hand, a desire that extreme (plus the will to actually act on it) is foreign to my own experience, so in some sense I can only speculate. But on the other hand, I think I can say that, yes, I do get it. At least on a theoretical level. I could see a path where, if you kept turning up the dials on my currently existing sexuality, I could end up in a place like that. It's just that the vast majority of men don't have the dials turned up that high.
HereAndGone
6hr ago
And if we're getting into sex within marriage, see the thorny questions in the Summa:
Article 5. Whether the marriage act can be excused without the marriage goods?
...Objection 2. Further, he who has intercourse with his wife in order to avoid fornication, does not seemingly intend any of the marriage goods. Yet he does not sin apparently, because marriage was granted to human weakness for the very purpose of avoiding fornication (1 Corinthians 7:2-6). Therefore the marriage act can be excused even without the marriage goods.
Objection 3. Further, he who uses as he will that which is his own does not act against justice, and thus seemingly does not sin. Now marriage makes the wife the husband's own, and "vice versa." Therefore, if they use one another at will through the instigation of lust, it would seem that it is no sin; and thus the same conclusion follows.
... Consequently there are only two ways in which married persons can come together without any sin at all, namely in order to have offspring, and in order to pay the debt, otherwise it is always at least a venial sin.
...Reply to Objection 2. If a man intends by the marriage act to prevent fornication in his wife, it is no sin, because this is a kind of payment of the debt that comes under the good of "faith." But if he intends to avoid fornication in himself, then there is a certain superfluity, and accordingly there is a venial sin, nor was the sacrament instituted for that purpose, except by indulgence, which regards venial sins.
Reply to Objection 3. One due circumstance does not suffice to make a good act, and consequently it does not follow that, no matter how one use one's own property, the use is good, but when one uses it as one ought according to all the circumstances.
So sorry, gentlemen, the fact alone that you're horny and so want to fuck your wife is not good enough, and no, she's not property or at least you are property, too 😁
On the other hand, St Thomas Aquinas is less strict than St Jerome (not a high bar to cross, admittedly):
Article 6. Whether it is a mortal sin for a man to have knowledge of his wife, with the intention not of a marriage good but merely of pleasure?
Objection 1. It would seem that whenever a man has knowledge of his wife, with the intention not of a marriage good but merely of pleasure, he commits a mortal sin. For according to Jerome (Comment. in Ephesians 5:25), as quoted in the text (Sent. iv, D, 31), "the pleasure taken in the embraces of a wanton is damnable in a husband." Now nothing but mortal sin is said to be damnable. Therefore it is always a mortal sin to have knowledge of one's wife for mere pleasure.
Objection 2. Further, consent to pleasure is a mortal sin, as stated in the Second Book (Sent. ii, D, 24). Now whoever knows his wife for the sake of pleasure consents to the pleasure. Therefore he sins mortally.
Objection 3. Further, whoever fails to refer the use of a creature to God enjoys a creature, and this is a mortal sin. But whoever uses his wife for mere pleasure does not refer that use to God. Therefore he sins mortally.
Objection 4. Further, no one should be excommunicated except for a mortal sin. Now according to the text (Sent. ii, D, 24) a man who knows his wife for mere pleasure is debarred from entering the Church, as though he were excommunicate. Therefore every such man sins mortally.
On the contrary, As stated in the text (Sent. ii, D, 24), according to Augustine (Contra Jul. ii, 10; De Decem Chord. xi; Serm. xli, de Sanct.), carnal intercourse of this kind is one of the daily sins, for which we say the "Our Father." Now these are not mortal sins. Therefore, etc.
Further, it is no mortal sin to take food for mere pleasure. Therefore in like manner it is not a mortal sin for a man to use his wife merely to satisfy his desire.
I answer that, Some say that whenever pleasure is the chief motive for the marriage act it is a mortal sin; that when it is an indirect motive it is a venial sin; and that when it spurns the pleasure altogether and is displeasing, it is wholly void of venial sin; so that it would be a mortal sin to seek pleasure in this act, a venial sin to take the pleasure when offered, but that perfection requires one to detest it. But this is impossible, since according to the Philosopher (Ethic. x, 3,4) the same judgment applies to pleasure as to action, because pleasure in a good action is good, and in an evil action, evil; wherefore, as the marriage act is not evil in itself, neither will it be always a mortal sin to seek pleasure therein. Consequently the right answer to this question is that if pleasure be sought in such a way as to exclude the honesty of marriage, so that, to wit, it is not as a wife but as a woman that a man treats his wife, and that he is ready to use her in the same way if she were not his wife, it is a mortal sin; wherefore such a man is said to be too ardent a lover of his wife, because his ardor carries him away from the goods of marriage. If, however, he seek pleasure within the bounds of marriage, so that it would not be sought in another than his wife, it is a venial sin.
Reply to Objection 1. A man seeks wanton pleasure in his wife when he sees no more in her that he would in a wanton.
Reply to Objection 2. Consent to the pleasure of the intercourse that is a mortal sin is itself a mortal sin; but such is not the consent to the marriage act.
Reply to Objection 3. Although he does not actually refer the pleasure to God, he does not place his will's last end therein; otherwise he would seek it anywhere indifferently. Hence it does not follow that he enjoys a creature; but he uses a creature actually for his own sake, and himself habitually, though not actually, for God's sake.
Reply to Objection 4. The reason for this statement is not that man deserves to be excommunicated for this sin, but because he renders himself unfit for spiritual things, since in that act, he becomes flesh and nothing more.
So, see the reply to objection 1. You must respect your wife, so "lie back bitch and open your legs, it's my right as your husband and you have no right whatsoever to refuse" is - surprise, surprise! - a sinful attitude.
HereAndGone
6hr ago
I think the Orthodox churches also had/have similar rules, because they tend to be even less relaxed than pre- and post-Vatican II Catholicism (e.g. rules around fasting, where the Western church leaves a lot more wiggle room and is much less stringent on what counts as fasting).
For a fun historical look on the history of marriage, according to the American 1903 Catholic Encyclopedia, see here:
[Marriage] is usually defined as the legitimate union between husband and wife. "Legitimate" indicates the sanction of some kind of law, natural, evangelical, or civil, while the phrase, "husband and wife", implies mutual rights of sexual intercourse, life in common, and an enduring union. The last two characters distinguish marriage, respectively, from concubinage and fornication. The definition, however, is broad enough to comprehend polygamous and polyandrous unions when they are permitted by the civil law; for in such relationships there are as many marriages as there are individuals of the numerically larger sex. Whether promiscuity, the condition in which all the men of a group maintain relations and live indiscriminately with all the women, can be properly called marriage, may well be doubted. In such a relation cohabitation and domestic life are devoid of that exclusiveness which is commonly associated with the idea of conjugal union.
Divorce This is a modification of monogamy that seems to be no less opposed to its spirit than polyandry, polygamy, or adultery. It requires, indeed, that the parties should await a certain time or a certain contingency before severing the unity of marriage, but it is essentially a violation of monogamy, of the enduring union of husband and wife. Yet it has obtained among practically all peoples, savage and civilized. About the only people that seem never to have practised or recognized it are the inhabitants of the Andaman Islands, some of the Papuans of New Guinea, some tribes of the Indean Archipelago, and the Veddahs of Ceylon. Among the majority of uncivilized peoples the marital unions that endured until the death of one of the parties seem to have been in the minority. It is substantially true to say that the majority of savage races authorized the husband to divorce his wife wherever he felt so inclined. A majority of even the more advanced peoples who remained outside the pale of Christianity restrict the right of divorce to the husband, although the reason for which he could put away his wife are, as a rule, not so numerous as among the uncivilized races. ...The Oriental Churches separated from Rome, including the Greek Orthodox Church, and all the Protestant sects, permit divorce in varying degrees, and the practice prevails in every country in which any of these Churches exercise a considerable influence. In some of the non-Catholic countries divorce is extremely easy and scandalously frequent. Between 1890 and 1900 the divorces granted in the United States averaged 73 per 100,000 of the population annually. This was more than twice the rate in any other Western nation. ...So far as we are informed by statistics, only one country in the world, namely, Japan, had a worse record than the United States, the rate per 100,000 of the population the Flowery Kingdom being 215. In most of the civilized countries the divorce rate is increasing, slowly in some, very rapidly in others. Relatively to the population, about two and one half times as many divorces are granted now in the United States as were issued forty year ago.
The USA does seem to have been unusual in both the rate and in the sex of the parties seeking divorce; up until the end of the 19th century, it was generally men who divorced their wives as it was very difficult both to get a divorce and for women to prove grounds for divorce if the husband was unwilling (hence in cases of mutual agreement about divorce, the husband would arrange a fake 'adultery' that could be 'proven' in court so as to provide grounds for divorce).
The fact that in the United States more women than men apply for divorces proves nothing as yet against the statements just set down; for we do not know whether these women have generally found it easy to get other husbands, or whether their new condition was better than the old. The frequent appeal to the divorce courts by American women is a comparatively recent phenomenon, and is undoubtedly due more to emotion, imaginary hopes, and a hasty use of newly acquired freedom, than to calm and adequate study of the experiences of other divorced women. If the present facility of divorce should continue fifty years longer, the disproportionate hardship to women from the practice will probably have become so evident the number of them taking advantage of it, or approving it, will be much smaller than today.
The social evils of easy divorce are so obvious that the majority of Americans undoubtedly are in favour of a stricter policy. One of the most far-reaching of these evils is the encouragement of lower conceptions of conjugal fidelity; for when a person regards the taking of a new spouse as entirely lawful for a multitude of more or less slight reasons, his sense of obligation toward his present partner can not be very strong or very deep. Simultaneous cannot seem much worse than successive plurality of sexual relations. The average husband and wife who become divorced for a trivial cause are less faithful to each other during their temporary union than the average couple who do not believe in divorce. Similarly, easy divorce gives an impetus to illicit relations between the unmarried, inasmuch as it tends to destroy the association in the popular consciousness between sexual intercourse and the enduring union of one man with one woman. Another evil is the increase in the number of hasty and unfortunate marriages among persons who look forward to divorce as an easy remedy for present mistakes. Inasmuch as the children of a divorced couple are deprived of their normal heritage, which is education and care by both father and mother in the same household, they almost always suffer grave and varied disadvantages. Finally there is the injury done to the moral character generally. Indissoluble marriage is one of the most effective means of developing self-control and mutual self-sacrifice. Many salutary inconveniences are endured because they cannot be avoided, and many imperfections of temper and character are corrected because the husband and wife realize that thus only is conjugal happiness possible. On the other hand, when divorce is easily obtain there is no sufficient motive for undergoing those inconvenience which are so essential to self-discipline, self-development, and the practice of altruism.
This explains to me the jokes about the frequency and ease of divorces in America in British late 19th/early to mid 20th century detective fiction, and the attitude in American crime fiction of the same period (e.g. one story had a dissolute wastrel husband openly engaging in an affair with a stage starlet, who was impatiently awaiting his divorce so she could marry him, and the attitudes expressed were that the wife was being unreasonable in refusing to get with the plan, there was little or no hint of social sanction about this). Of course, the excuse there was 'she's Catholic so she won't divorce him' and it's surprising how often this becomes a plot point: murder happens because X wants a divorce but Y is Catholic so won't grant it.
Anyway, on to low marriage rates in 1903!
Abstention from marriage With a very few unimportant exceptions all peoples, savage and civilized, that have not accepted the Catholic religion, have looked with some disdain upon celibacy, Savage races marry much earlier, and have a smaller proportion of celibates than civilized nations. During the last century the proportion of unmarried persons has increased in the United States and in Europe. The causes of this change are partly economic, inasmuch as it has become more difficult to support a family in accordance with contemporary standards of living; partly social, inasmuch as the increased social pleasure and opportunities have displaced to some degree domestic desires and interests; and partly moral, inasmuch as laxer notions of chastity have increased the number of those who satisfy their sexual desires out side of marriage.
Do you actually know anything about the circumstances under which a man can "lose most of his assets and future income" in a divorce? It is not common. In fact alimony is pretty rare nowadays (and almost never close to "most" of his assets and future income), child support is to support the children, and the number of men paying "unreasonable" child support (however you define that) is exceeded by the number of men not actually paying their child support. The worse case scenario you will usually see is an equal distribution state where a spouse can claim 50% of marital assets, even those he or she didn't bring into the marriage. (This can and sometimes is the man who benefits, though usually it's the woman.) And not all states do a 50/50 split like that.
You guys seriously need to update your notions of how divorce works from the 1960s, or the 19th century.
Amadan
Enjoying my short-lived victory
6hr ago
Every society everywhere on Earth for all history up to the 20th century exerted sufficient intrasocietal controls on male avarice and female caprice or else it collapsed.
You know, I see this argument quite often: "Every society ever did things in the traditional (read: my preferred) way, because the Ancient Wisdom of Our Ancestors told us this was how things should be. Societies that failed to do this collapsed!"
Can you actually point to any societies that collapsed as a result of, say, not exerting "sufficient intrasocietal controls on male avarice and female caprice"?
Most "collapsing societies" either did so over a long period of stagnation (Rome, several Chinese dynasties, the Soviet Union) or they did so very abruptly as a result of war or invasion. I can't think of any that did so because they were too libertine and failed to control their menfolk and womenfolk.
This is a just so story.
Your other arguments, about "deep biotruths," are likewise just so stories. Now it is possible (and likely, to my mind) that our current social mores are detrimental to human happiness, that the much-discussed imbalance in sexual relationships in the modern world is harmful to society and putting additional stresses on it (though if we do "collapse," I maintain that "women being whores and alpha-widows and a few chads forcing other men into inceldom" will be like reason #57 on the list), and you can certainly make a good argument that, as you say, "sex doesn't mean anything, it can be just for fun" is not true and not a good principle to encourage.
But whenever I see someone pull out the "Societies collapse if they don't control their females!" argument, I never see any actual evidence of this, just vague handwaving (and the waving is never in the direction of actual societies that do "control" their females - I mean, most Muslim societies are not collapsing right now, but they are not exactly what I'd consider a healthy model in any way, least of all in their sexual relations). Reminds me very much of KulakRevolt's current schtick where he argues that the deep wisdom of his ancestors tells him that worshipping Odin was the best way to ensure the survival of his race and Christianity is a destructive pussification cult. It's entertaining to read, but does anyone not just looking for a reason to dump on Christians (and pussy concepts like mercy and forgiveness and coexistence) actually take it seriously or think it's based on research or even actual inductive reasoning? So it is with arguments about how the Sexual Revolution was a revolt against "deep biotruth" and/or the ancient knowledge of our ancestors (who believed in humors, nature gods, ghosts, aether, a four or five element model of the universe, and so on-this is not a flippant reference to superstition, but pointing out that they made up just so stories to justify their own preferences and to explain things they didn't actually have the ability to investigate or test).
dr_analog
top 1% of underdog fetishists
7hr ago
What if you're a single woman living alone going to college and some guy keeps breaking into your house while you're asleep and he keeps trying to throw acid on your face? And you report it to the police and they think you're crazy and don't investigate?
Can you have a gun in less than 3 months in that case?
mrvanillasky
Indo Aryan Thot Leader
7hr ago
Ufc 317 this weekend and highly encourage you all watch it. @Tanista comment on lat weeks thread about Jon Jones, one of the better mma fighters, behind only the likes of GSP, Fedor etc retired after holding up the worst division, heavyweight, for two years has made people who watch the sport happy.
Ilia Topuria, Payton Talbott and Joshua Van are three entertaining young fighters who are blockbuster entertainment whilst also being extremely talented.
Topuria was the featherweight champ and knocked the last two greats out in succession, something that is unprecedented and this was likely the greatest title run in the UFC impact wise for the division. Topuria is a pressure fighter, defensively sound, sleeps people with one punch and wants to be in the pocket. He fights a now past his prime Charles Oliveira who himself was the pressure fighting guy at lightweight, the division Topuria is fighting in now.
Talbott is a very online young guy and the first fighter to tweet about Sam Hyde incessantly making him someone I root for now. He fights at 135, a division above Van who's at 125. Mma is very stale, boring and not worth watching now. The UFC wants no big superstars to emerge as they want a total monopoly on the business so that they pay fighters as little as possible. The thinking of this kind has made the peak we saw in 2016-17 look like a different world.
The other fight in this card features 125ers who can sleep people. Lower weight classes are a treat to watch. As a long time fan, I hope you folks tune in, buy, pirate, watch it at a bar, whatever. Ufc 317 is on this Saturday, you can watch the embedded vlogs ufc produces to get some more context about the fights if you wish to.
HereAndGone
7hr ago
(or, more likely still, AI makes all of this irrelevant, but I have never liked "run for the singularity" as an exit strategy).
We are just rushing ahead to make a prophet of C.S. Lewis. 1945, "That Hideous Strength":
"Who is called Sulva? What road does she walk? Why is the womb barren on one side? Where are the cold marriages?”
Ransom replied, “Sulva is she whom mortals call the Moon. She walks in the lowest sphere. The rim of the world that was wasted goes through her. Half of her orb is turned towards us and shares our curse. Her other half looks to Deep Heaven; happy would he be who could cross that frontier and see the fields on her further side.
On this side, the womb is barren and the marriages cold. There dwell an accursed people, full of pride and lust. There when a young man takes a maiden in marriage, they do not lie together, but each lies with a cunningly fashioned image of the other, made to move and to be warm by devilish arts, for real flesh will not please them, they are so dainty (delicati) in their dreams of lust. Their real children they fabricate by vile arts in a secret place.”
Throwaway05
7hr ago
I understand that drug names are not necessarily intuitive and while they have some tricks those will be impenetrable to patients.
That said, you need to know what you take, when, how, and why - otherwise you are at significant risk of increased bad outcome (although this obviously depends on what conditions you have).
What we usually recommend the elderly do is have a sheet with that information written out and store it in your wallet so it becomes easier to read out, can be retrieved if you are not arousable and so on.
This advice is good for anybody however.
With respect to this specific patient - we see a class of older men who have a large number of medical problems and put no effort into understanding what those are for, what they are doing about them, how to avoid making them worse and so on. While some of these people are stubborn or anti-medication most just have very low conscientiousness. Not ideal for a first time gun buyer at 80 something.
But, for obvious reasons, this is a much less common problem than the opposite; the man bites dog to the dog bites man.
That is so, but I think it helps to remind everyone on here that sometimes the man does bite the dog, just so this place doesn't sound like Rapez'R'Uz when it comes to marital duties. It's supposed to be reciprocal! Indeed, it is "better to marry than to burn", but phrasing it like "the only purpose of marriage is so that the guy has a flesh-and-blood fuckdoll" is not making marriage sound more attractive to young women.
I think it's also important to remember that marital rape as a crime came about because it wasn't simply cases of "she says she's not in the mood and we haven't had sex for six months so I insisted and she gave in", but "he gets drunk and/or is angry and violent, so several times he beat me bloody then had sex so violently that yes, it inflicted physical pain and damage". We have to remember that laws get made not because of reasonable people trying to reconcile opposing views but because assholes took advantage of "well there isn't a law against it, now is there?"
All this is different to trying to reconcile differing levels of libido and interest in sex, which is often a problem too. I genuinely do think sexual desire in women is linked to the hormonal cycle so it ebbs and flows in a way that sexual desire in men does not, and that's a large part of the problem for guys who do honestly feel "if I don't get laid soon I'll explode" (blue balls) versus women who are "honestly, I'd prefer a bar of chocolate and a romance movie".
And I have to end with the anecdote, which I read in the notes to the Hollander translation of the "Divine Comedy", about a guy in Dante's time who claimed that the reason he slept with men was because his wife wouldn't have sex with him so look, he wasn't one of those sodomites really. To which I can only say, because of the social tolerance of having affairs so he could have kept a mistress, the availability of prostitutes, and the fact that he could have engaged in casual sex (paid for or unpaid) with working-class women such as the servant girls in his house, dude. Come on. You sleep with guys because you like sex with guys, and your wife has nothing to do with it.
Stefferi
Chief Suomiposter
7hr ago
A quick search turned out, in Google, at least this Jacobin article that situates Trump as something different from neoliberalism and indeed opposed to it while also situating him on the Right, yet not calling him a fascist. (This was admittedly after a quick skim, there might be some indication of the last in the other words, but I didn't spot it.) This would mean that there's at least one leftist who is able to do that.
This is exactly what you should do. If your rights can be taken away permanently by interacting with the mental health system, you should avoid interacting with it. The Catholic Church has it right in this case -- what you say to your confessor is between you, him, and presumably God, and fuck the interests of society. If mental health professionals can't live up to that, they should be avoided.
In New Jersey, being New Jersey, it's even worse. You have to tell them every interaction with the mental health system you have (not just committment, any time you ever saw one), including name and affiliation of the doctor. If you don't have that information you can't even apply for a permit; you can't challenge this because there's nothing to challenge.
More options
Context Copy link