Zephyr
22m ago
I think the way that it works is that it provides an outlet for sexual frustration. Imagine that the old paradigm worked something like this:
- Be a teenaged boy; think of sex pretty much 100% of the time.
- Be sexually frustrated because you are single.
- Be unable to relieve this sexual frustration (because masturbation is a sin, and the best pornography you can get is like, a swimsuit magazine).
- Become more desperate and try harder to get a girlfriend, until it eventually succeeds.
Whereas the current framework is more like:
- Be a teenaged boy; think of sex pretty much 100% of the time.
- Be sexually frustrated because you are single.
- Look at pornography online; we have very hardcore pornography available now, so it satisfies the sexual frustration you are feeling.
- Repeat.
I think it's fairly easy for someone to be using a pornographic website to get their rocks off, and see something in the sidebar that is like, 90% of what they like, and something they don't know if they like or not; they 'try' it, and if it works, it starts featuring more and more in their sexual interests.
To take a (very) simple example; there are a large number of men who enjoy being dominant in bed; this is fairly normal. In a normal relationship, this looks like taking the lead, and a bit of dirty talk. In the world of internet pornography, this can involve things like semi-rape behaviour, inflicting pain, using bodily fluids to degrade, etc. The underlying desire is still the dominance; but the ways of seeking it are out of whack with what someone would do in real life. There's also a degree to which people aren't really that aware of their desires; they know they find it hot when the woman is in pain, but they don't necessarily get that the part they're fantasizing about is the woman submitting to their sexual desires.
You then run into the 'toaster fuckers' problem; whenever there is a large community online dedicated to a sexual fetish, it becomes easy to identify it as a legitimate orientation, which makes becoming involved in it much easier. If you aren't aware, the 'toaster fuckers' originated from an old meme (I want to say a 4chan greentext, but I'm actually not certain); the gist of it was that back in the day, if you wanted to fuck toasters, you were on your own; society would condemn it, and you'd never find another person who would admit to liking it. Nowadays, you can go online and find people who are telling you that it's okay and they're just another persecuted group. But say you're the person from my example: you go online and discover that there is a huge community dedicated specifically to inflicting pain as part of their sexual expression; and further, they actively want more members for their group. You now don't have to deal with lots of women rejecting you; you have a group that wants you, and your mind is already oriented towards the 'inflicting pain' as being the important part of the sexual experience. In that sense, it may matter less that you have a physical woman in front of you, as your brain is saying to you 'pain is sexual'.
So the reason that obtaining a girlfriend short circuits the whole process for a lot of people is that the original fetish is something that they can explore with a partner without getting all the weird extra stuff that the algorithm is pushing on them. Before I got a girlfriend, the above is actually super similar to what I went through; I didn't 'get' that my underlying desire was for a woman to submit to me, all I knew is that I found some of the more degrading pornography to be super hot. When I managed to get a girlfriend, what I realized was that I found her wanting me, and being willing to do whatever I wanted to be even hotter; it meant that paradoxically, all the things I thought were true about my sexuality were wrong, and what I really liked was just having someone who desired me.
If I'd been a bit less of an antisocial curmudgeon, I could easily have seen myself falling into this sort of community (probably the BDSM community instead of the furries, but I think it applies there). Sexual frustration can make you do weird things, because it's hard to be lonely.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
33m ago
Non-commandeering says otherwise, with respect to public officials.
VoxelVexillologist
Multidimensional Radical Centrist
42m ago
communist pamphlets
IIRC they were anti-draft pamphlets.
its quite possible Des Moines Public Schools has an unofficial policy of not complying with immigration law. there is presumably a lot of this going on in the private sector i guess it should not be surprising if its happening in the public sector as well. also this seems to be a failure of the federal government. the federal government is able to coerce banks into acting as policeman for all their crazy money laundering laws. if the federal government were seriously interested in cracking down on immigration then they could just coerce private and public employers in a similar manner.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
54m ago
The story here is: illegal immigrant given job as head of DMPS. Apparently the weapons charge he had was bad enough that he was given a deportation order by the Biden administration in 2024. Maybe that was a legit gun charge?
The earlier weapons charge anyone has been able to find is a penny-ante summary offense about having a loaded deer rifle on the seat of his parked car. It's not clear whether that charge had anything to do with his deportation order, nor whether that is the February 5, 2020 weapons charge that ICE is claiming exists. ICE is implying he last entered the US in 1999 on a student visa, but this clearly isn't the case since he competed in the Sydney, Australia Olympics in 2000. It does seem clear that either ICE has screwed up big time, or Des Moines Public Schools has.
NullHypothesis
59m ago
So your evidence that the "Anti-ICE" shooter feeling like a school shooter and having no apparent motive is an interview with old friends of his that haven't had contact with him for likely at least 5-6 years? If anything, considering he withdrew from social life and got seeped more and more into the dark trenches of the internet, this story to me provides some evidence that he likely became more and more political and radical. Combine this with other evidence that had come out, and it paints the picture of someone radicalized by far left and anti-trump ideology.
It's easy to conveniently ignore evidence to the contrary and put zero effort into even explaining why that evidence might be flawed or invalid, but not even attempting that will do nothing to convince people on the other side that you may have a point, and makes you come off as intellectually dishonest.
as someone who moves through leftist circles, which are mostly extremely disorganized and very dedicated to specific issues (climate change, homelessness, worker empowerment)
You know, your experiences of moving through leftist circles could something really interesting to read about if you actually provided some details.
That being said, you're attacking a straw man. Who's claiming every leftwing organization/group is actively encouraging violence? Have you gone through a randomly selected sample of leftists groups (hint, you haven't) to be able to determine they are all in fact, actively disavowing political violence and banning people who do show any support for political violence?
How do you reconcile your personal experiences with the data indicating that 24% of very liberal individuals that say it's okay to be happy with the death of a public figure they oppose, or 25% of very liberal individuals that thing political violence can be justified? When prompted specifically with figures like Elon Musk or Donald Trump, that number rises to over 50% of people left of center. Is it possible that you are in fact, not really engaging with this segment of the population?
How about you provide some examples of people here "foaming at the mouth of some grand leftist move towards violence" instead of attacking an uncharitable strawman? If you are unable to summarize your opponent's position in a manner they find charitable, I don't think you actually understand what their argument or reasoning is. Or you're being intellectual dishonest.
Edit: Reviewing this thread and FoxNews over the past few days has made me realize that the red tribe has gone full retard and will believe anything the retards and losers in the White House say. Guess I'm just going to become a normie and hypernormalize like the rest of the people in my life. Been nice commenting here. Your boos have always meant nothing to me, because I've seen what makes you cheer.
This is a statement that says nothing. Here, let me replace some words
Edit: Reviewing Reddit, BlueSky, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, TikTok, (Insert your whatever social media/political space you want here) and MSNBC, CNN, (Insert your whatever news media you want here) over the past few days has made me realize that the blue tribe has gone full retard and will believe anything the retards and losers opposing those in the White House say. Guess I'm just going to become a normie and hypernormalize like the rest of the people in my life. Been nice commenting here. Your boos have always meant nothing to me, because I've seen what makes you cheer.
See how this did nothing to move your thoughts and position?
Stellula
1hr ago
a loaded handgun, a hunting knife, and $3000 in cash.
Iowa is a constitutional carry state.
What percentage of men have hunting knives in their car? 100%? I've had some sort of knife on my person at all times where it was legal and practical since I was like 12 years old. A pocket knife is as much a part of my pants as my wallet is.
$3000 cash? Who cares?
If you pulled me over and tried to write this story about me it would be like: "man found with a loaded handgun (normal where I live), multiple tactical knives (a leatherman in my pocket, and the one that fell between the seats and I never found), spotting equipment (binoculars I keep in the glovebox for monitoring the situation), and hundreds of thousands of dollars of untraceable cryptocurrency (my coinbase account viewer on my phone).
I hate that this is highlighted on these stories.
The story here is: illegal immigrant given job as head of DMPS. Apparently the weapons charge he had was bad enough that he was given a deportation order by the Biden administration in 2024. Maybe that was a legit gun charge?
"Had gun in car" is a pointless non-fact.
quiet_NaN
1hr ago
If that was all that was required, there would be a thousand times as many shootings.
I think that most people who commit mass shootings are functionally insane. But the form their insanity takes is still dependent on cultural factors, see Scott's review of "crazy like us". Schools are popular sites for mass shootings even for non-students because school shootings are very much in the cultural water supply.
But anything which occupies space in the mind of the population can direct crazy violence. Politics, sports teams. There is probably a WH40K nerd somewhere who murdered because he thought that his opponents were agents of Chaos.
Somewhat separate from that is organized political violence, though I admit that the line is blurry in some cases. If two or more people conspire to murder, that is a different thing.
Fun exercise, but I’m not sure why you’re so dismissive of “amateurs and historians.” Surely they could price in the same factors you’re considering?
A translation of the edict can be found here. You’ll want sections VII, XIX and XX.
I suspect the 12-16d number comes from “women weavers of tunicas,” the only wool worker listed with a daily wage. It’s hard to line up the terminology, but this seems to be a different job than either the linen or wool weavers in the next section.
Wool weavers are paid 15d/lb for the lowest quality fiber. If the weights and times further down the page are remotely accurate, that pound is closer to a week’s work than a day’s. Maybe it doesn’t include spinning? But that raises its own set of questions.
This tracks with my experience in a roughly similar age bracket. I'd guess you were in accelerated tracks and likely took AP courses. This is the basic way we teach history: start with basic myths then add nuance as a child develops. Myth making has taken a backseat to nuance at earlier ages, but your mileage may vary. There's a lot of districts with a lot of different teachers and schools. If I had to guess, your experience with history is still the modal experience of American children that attend adequate schools.
Most kids don't get much out of history. Girls, especially, consider history boring and irrelevant. History is old and they are young. Which is why I think you deploy my brainwashing program in a national civics curriculum. That's my thought anyway.
Capital_Room
rather dementor-like
1hr ago
If you have a good majority (say 60%) of the citizens behind you, then you do not need to shoot at the feds, you can simply elect one of your own as the next president.
Except I'd argue that the past decade and change serve to illustrate why that doesn't work, because the president isn't actually in charge of the Executive any more (see basically everything MacIntyre talks about here, or this from Jim). FBI JTTF goes after the "domestic terrorists" it wants to, not the ones the President directs them at — as we saw when Bush the younger tried to redirect them from chasing specters of the Klan to Muslim jihadis.
Our democracy is a sham. It's as fake as pro wrestling.
aqouta
1hr ago
and (the textbook example) shouting "fire" in a crowded theater.
I feel compelled to point this out every time it comes up but this is not a true exception. It was briefly law as an example to justify banning handing out communist pamphlets but it was struck down as plainly unconstitutional.
fmac
Ask me about bike lanes
1hr ago
It's the only other place on the internet (aside from here) I regularly interact with as the users don't immediately make me want to scream.
Best I got lol
faceh
1hr ago
Actually that right there is a use for AI.
Read the notifications pouring in, mute the unimportant, queue up the actionable but not urgent, and only let you see ones that read as actually important (not just "flagged" as important).
fmac
Ask me about bike lanes
1hr ago
Quite literally the old school definition of left but I admit at this point "left" means "shitlib" and not "Marxist" despite the old dictionary definition
faceh
1hr ago
Okay, went ahead and put a selection of them in a playlist.
https://suno.com/playlist/d8348313-aa62-4474-b272-75d4dbabf641
Note these took me <20 minutes to generate, counting time setting up prompts (I used ChatGPT to fill out the prompt descriptions a bit).
And less than $2 worth of credits, I'd guess.
I don't have an ear for music but these pass as the sort of classical songs I listened to on CD growing up.
The playlist has an "inspire" button that would let one use these songs as the basis for future generations.
Lest I pretend it does it perfectly every time, it did ALSO produce THIS monstrosity on the same prompts:
VoxelVexillologist
Multidimensional Radical Centrist
1hr ago
I'd bet a decent chunk are idiots with cheap DJI or equivalent drones not following the rules. But probably not all of them.
The_Nybbler
If you win the rat race you're still a rat. But you're also still a winner.
1hr ago
ICE arrests superintendent of Iowa's largest public school district
The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency arrested Ian Andre Roberts, who is the superintendent of the Des Moines (IA) public school district. If you've been following along with this aspect of the culture war, you probably figure he was arrested for abetting or protecting a student or faculty or staff member from them. But no; the guy is, according to ICE here illegally and was given a final order of removal in May 2024. ICE is strongly implying he never had any work authorization beyond a long-since-expired student visa. It seems to me pretty bold for someone here without work authorization to be in such a high-profile position. Even more surprising for him to be hired; the district claims to have done a background check on him; you would think this would result in them finding out he was not authorized to work and not being hired. Someone screwed up there.
Other aspects are that he had a weapons possession charge in Pennsylvania from 2021, but this was a pissant ("5th degree summary offense") thing about having his deer rifle on his seat still loaded. More serious is that he fled the ICE agents when stopped; his car was found with a loaded handgun, a hunting knife, and $3000 in cash. I don't much care about the illegal-alien-in-possession aspect; making a whole range of normal activities super-illegal based on a status offense is a tyrant's trick. But fleeing certainly seems to indicate a guilty mind rather than some sort of error or misunderstanding on ICEs part.
At first I thought they might have the wrong guy; there's an Ian Andre Roberts from Guyana who competed in the Olympics. But no, that's actually the same guy.
On reddit, /r/desmoines is up in arms... about the arrest, of course, not about the school district hiring a guy with no work authorization.
quiet_NaN
1hr ago
In that context, the optimal gun is nearly identical to Grandpa's full power hunting rifle, which nobody has the political power and will to ban.
I think that this depends on the killer's goal. For a targeted assassination of an unsuspecting victim from distance, hunting rifles seem obvious. But not every sick fuck is a sick fuck bent just on murdering one specific person, some want to kill as many as possible. These seem to be the ones who mostly go for semi- or full-auto weapons, if they can get their hands on them.
Semi-mandatory is a dangerous line to ride.
I consider semi-mandatory as preferable to an amendment. The US is at least relatively accommodating for conscientious objectors, although that's more a necessity determines grace deal. The cost to living in a powerful nation that likes to wage war is sometimes you're a slave for dumb and unnecessary reasons. That's a fair enough thing to object to.
Lean into sports and competition.
The US still has a relatively healthy recreational sports industry that still can create fads and innovate. Disc golf or pickleball as two examples that come to mind. Underwater hockey might yet take off for you. I'd prefer to subsidize getting the youth outside, but if video games are a reality (I like video games too) then competition e-sports are of higher value. Team based games at least provide a way to develop teamwork, communication, and leadership ability. Might even be able to route around the Hitler Youth comparisons by promoting e-sports in addition to real ones.
Tractatus
1hr ago
If you think the consequences only showed up in the last 10-15 years, you are necessarily insisting that the sky-high divorce rates of the 60s-80s, the latchkey kids of the 80s-90s, raised on "the electric babysitter" and Nintendo (who emphatically did not turn out "ok"), the rise of hookup culture and dating apps, and so on, were actually Good Things. I don't know what to tell you, other than that you're being incredibly myopic. Great evidence for Chesterton's quip about the whole world being nothing but Progressives who go about ruining the world, and Conservatives who insist you cannot undo what the Progressives have done, because they have already adopted those changes as "tradition," as being Gospel truth.
The modern buzzword du joure "Parasocial Relationship" was coined not in 2020, but in 1955; much different than the modern use (which is just describing a dysfunctional form of propinquity; if I didn't know any better, I'd suspect the definitional drift was deliberate), it described disconnected housewives who legitimately behaved as though the fictional characters on the soap operas were really their friends. The standard description was "newlywed leaves her family ties, moves out to the suburbs, doesn't really gel with the neighbors, and, with entirely too much time on her hands due to kids and school, along with modern conveniences making housework take up much less of her day, vegs out in front of the boob tube and goes haywire." This was not treated seriously because this extreme was so rare, and the solution was to get the women involved in the community; after all, it was the 1950's, everyone was having 2.5 kids and making good money, so it could not possibly be the case that cookouts with the HOA, bowling leagues, Avon parties, et al, were actually not viable long-term replacements for blood-and-soil family ties. In fact, other than Christopher Lasch, I don't know anyone that even thought to connect the dots.
This new paradigm, that you must leave behind your family, you must "find someone that's right for you" (no-one ever seems to notice the narcissism inherent in such a statement), that the friends you choose are more important than the family you had no say in, these all moulded the Baby Boomers; it should be no shock to us when the Boomers had half the kids their parents did; that they slapped bumper stickers on their overpriced RVs, proudly proclaiming how they weren't going to leave a dime to their kids, spending it all on themselves, and eagerly consumed media praising them for this choice ("It will teach them to earn it on their own, like I did!" >conveniently forgets all the bailouts his parents and/or grandparents gave the Boomer after every fuck-up); nor should it be any shock to us that they would ultimately decide that "find someone that's right for you" necessirly implies "and if this person no longer feels right for you, or if you meet someone new who feels "more right" for you, well, it's time to blow up the marriage. It'll be hard on the kids, sure, but if they loved you, they would want you to be happy."
No, inceldom is not some wholely new phenomenon that can only be attributed to technological changes, it is just the next stop on the slippery slope of the radical change to the family that has been ongoing such Industrialization. It isn't even new; mass societies destroying families is so common across history that Spengler includes it - in the form of his comparison of the City versus the Country - in The Decline of the West and that was published in 1917, long before Tiktok, Youtube brainrot, and AI slop was even a twinkle in anyone's eye
LazyLongposter
1hr ago
Much like masturbation, I'd be much happier if philosophers kept it to themselves.
Have you ever been in any "philosophy" circle? It quickly becomes unreadable because every single person will come up with their own definition for already defined words to match one of their theories, and then will use them in concert to try to make their thesis a mathematical proof. You end up with sentences that look like plain English, but are completely unintelligible. This is the antithesis of good communication and discussion.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
1hr ago
Stupidpol is not a mainstream left-wing forum, it's a forum of left-wing rejects that are routinely called fascist, who were preparing for offsite emigration themselves at one point. I used to post there myself.
ToaKraka
Dislikes you
2hr ago
Hephaestus is disabled in the lore, though.
Hephaestus is described in mythological sources as "lame" (chōlos) and "halting" (ēpedanos). He was depicted with curved feet, an impairment he had either from birth or as a result of his fall from Olympus. In vase paintings, Hephaestus is sometimes shown bent over his anvil, hard at work on a metal creation, and sometimes his feet are curved back-to-front: Hephaistos amphigyēeis. He walked with the aid of a stick. The Argonaut Palaimonius, "son of Hephaestus" (i.e. a bronze-smith), also had a mobility impairment. Other "sons of Hephaestus" were the Cabeiri on the island of Samothrace, who were identified with the crab (karkinos) by the lexicographer Hesychius. The adjective karkinopous ("crab-footed") signified "lame", according to Detienne and Vernant. The Cabeiri were also physically disabled.
In some myths, Hephaestus built himself a "wheeled chair" or chariot with which to move around, thus helping support his mobility while demonstrating his skill to the other gods. In the Iliad 18.371, it is stated that Hephaestus built twenty bronze-wheeled tripods to assist him in moving around.
As I understand it, the purpose of ICE is to make a big theatrical show of removing a few unfortunate illegals pour encourager les autres, and, even if that doesn't actually do anything on a large scale, at least make the administration look like they're taking a hard stance.
With that in mind, what better target than this guy? To others overstaying their visas: if they can get him, they could get you too. To the voting base: "Look, this guy thought he could get away with blatantly flaunting the rules for two decades. Oh, and in case you thought he was an upstanding citizen, pillar of the community, Olympian, etc. He had weapons charges and was fleeing the law"
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