FtttG
User ID: 1175
FtttG
7hr ago
Thank you. I had a much more innocent interpretation of the adjective "one-handed". I thought it might be a form of constrained writing in which one can only use the keys on one side of the keyboard. Bless my foolish heart.
FtttG
7hr ago
Everyone gushes about In the Mood for Love. Myself and the missus tried watching it but found it painfully slow and ended up turning it off after about forty minutes. Maybe I should give it another try.
New year's resolutions check-in:
- Posted my ninth blog post of the year last Thursday, about the reflexive urge to assume that apparent public gaffes or mishaps were deliberately engineered as publicity stunts. Lightly edited from a comment originally posted here.
- Went to the gym three times last week, focusing on cardio. I've realised I've been neglecting cardio for the last few months, which is having a negative impact on my energy levels, mood and waistline. For the last few weeks I've spent my lunch breaks working on my novel, but having now completed a fourth draft, I think my time might be better spent exercising. My plan is to do strength training in the gym three times a week, then run at least 5k on my lunch break, at least twice a week. Did my first 5k on Monday and felt energised in the afternoon, and my good mood carried over to the next day. Went to the gym again last night. Can deadlift 1.84x my bodyweight for 3 reps, squat 1.15x for 7 reps and bench press .87x for 6 reps.
- Have not consumed any pornography since waking up on January 1st.
How goes it, @thejdizzler, @birb_cromble, @falling-star, @Tollund_Man4 and @self_made_human?
I wouldn't even have minded the cetology digressions if the information contained therein was actually correct. It felt profoundly demeaning reading information I knew to be inaccurate just so I could honestly say I'd read the whole book.
FtttG
10hr ago
Zhang Ziyi
I had such a crush on her when I saw Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and House of Flying Daggers as a child. Still would today, honestly.
The story of Mulan for example dates to around 400 AD and involves a woman serving in the army masquerading as a man.
It was my favourite Disney movie as a child, and probably a major contributing factor to my taste in women.
I do think our men and women look more alike than Westerners.
During Covid I binge-watched Silicon Valley, an American sitcom featuring a minor character played by Jimmy O. Yang. I took a screenshot of him and sent it to my brother with the caption "I think my thing for Asian women is getting out of hand, because he's kind of cute?" Obviously I meant it in jest, but if Yang were to troon out I do think he'd have a much easier time passing than most white men.
Agreed on 2, 3 and 6. I have noticed that Chinese men seem to favour a more androgynous look.
I once dated a woman from Taiwan who would be considered slim by Irish standards. She told me that, back home, the beauty standard is for women to be exceptionally thin and flat-chested, to the point that her classmates in secondary school teased and mocked her for her comparatively big boobs. (Needless to say, I wasn't complaining.)
Had a sexual relationship with someone in HR at a workplace.
Now here's a man who likes to live life on the edge.
Regarding the double reality thing, do you think there might be a partisan element to it? Richard Hanania had an article last year discussing how conservative women who work in politics tend to be very overtly feminine (right up to Mar-a-Lago face) and conspicuously flaunting their assets, whereas progressive women tend to dress more in a more modest and androgynous style. Going through the AAQCs, Sizzle50 made a similar point comparing female newsreaders for Fox News vs. MSNBC.
Not that every woman who dresses provocatively is promiscuous and vice versa. In fact I'd hazard a guess that most Dem-voting women would be more receptive to the idea of open relationships than GOP women.
FtttG
11hr ago
Sometimes a smile and an arm touch is just a smile and an arm touch.
Oh Lord. Years ago I was having lunch with three female colleagues, one of whom I had a slight crush on (she was engaged). I told a joke, whereupon the girl I was crushing on burst out laughing and placed her hand on my forearm. In my head I was just like "be still, my heart". I'm sure nothing was implied by it – unless...?
FtttG
11hr ago
FtttG
11hr ago
Then girls do make-up together.
Learning how to make oneself look more attractive is but one component of learning how to seduce someone. In courtship, men are traditionally expected to take on a more active, agentic role compared to women (e.g. women expect to be asked out, not to do the asking), so the skills associated with seduction are not generally ones that women learn by default.
FtttG
19hr ago
I think, once again, you're interpreting me as making an anti-abortion argument when I'm really not. I'm not saying that every woman who gets pregnant should be forced to carry to term. I'm simply saying that it's dumb and facile to argue "I may have consented to sex, but I never consented to pregnancy" as some kind of automatic get-out-of-jail-free card. If Y is a likely and foreseeable consequence of X, and you know that Y is a foreseeable consequence of X (i.e. you are informed when you make your decision), then voluntarily consenting to X entails voluntary consent to Y. Abortion is the only case I'm aware of in which people claim otherwise. I would genuinely love to see a second example of a situation in which consenting to X is not taken to consenting to Y where Y is a likely, foreseeable consequence of X. Actually, even "foreseeable consequence" is underselling the point I'm making: pregnancy is the purpose of heterosexual sex! It's like claiming you consented to aiming and pulling the trigger, but never consented to firing the gun.
If pro-abortion activists argued "when I had sex, I implicitly consented to getting pregnant, but I didn't fully appreciate the gravity of that decision until after I actually got pregnant, and now I've changed my mind", I would find that line of reasoning perfectly coherent. When they argue "I consented to unprotected sex but never consented to pregnancy, therefore abortion should be legal", this just strikes me as a complete non sequitur.
FtttG
19hr ago
True. From paintings, Cleopatra doesn't look like much to write home about, but her seduction skills are the stuff of legend.
he got caught up in a Chinese Honeypot
Awhile ago, someone had a post talking about feeling oddly disappointed by the bribes people associated with the Trump administration had been caught taking, as many of the dollar amounts seemed pitifully small. Scott made a similar point in Too Much Dark Money in Almonds: when you consider the power and influence afforded to the executive and legislative branches, the amount of money invested in campaign donations and PACs seems impossibly small.
I feel the same way looking at photos of the Chinese honeypot in question. I'm not saying she's ugly or anything, but she seems decidedly... mid? And this is coming from someone who has a thing for Asian women! There are plenty of Asian women who aren't even famous for their looks who are more attractive e.g. Tiffany Fong, Yvette Young, Jia Tolentino. I've personally met Chinese women who were hotter than her.
For reference, I voted in favour of legalising abortion in Ireland. This is one of those "there's nothing I hate more than bad arguments for views I hold dear" situations.
Regardless of whether one believes a fetus is "alive" – unlike a tumour in one's lungs, it has the potential to develop into a sentient human being. Removing a malignant tumour presents no moral quandaries even if the presence of the tumour is the direct result of actions you freely undertook. You can't escape the moral quandary associated with abortion just by saying you never consented to getting pregnant.
Maybe lung cancer is a bad example. Supposing Alice has a lot to drink and knowingly gets in the driver's seat of her car, fully cognisant of the fact that she's too inebriated to drive safely. Predictably, she has an accident in which a pedestrian, Bob, is killed. Upon her arrest, Alice defends herself by claiming that, while she did drive drunk of her own volition, she never consented to hitting Bob with her car, so she can't be held responsible for it.
No one would be persuaded by this reasoning: the entire reason drink-driving is illegal is because it makes motor accidents vastly more likely. Choosing to drive drunk entails choosing the likely consequences of driving drunk. Choosing to have unprotected sex entails choosing the likely consequences of unprotected sex. As a society we might still determine that abortion should be legal, but the idea that we can just dissolve the ethical dilemma by announcing "I never consented to getting pregnant, so you have to let me do whatever I want" strikes me as exactly insane as letting Alice off the hook because she never consented to hitting Bob with her car.
Years ago I read an article breathlessly discussing how female Uber drivers make less money than male even when controlling for hours worked. Muh wage gap, institutional sexism etc.
What they didn't control for was the fact that female Uber drivers drive slower than male (because men have a vastly higher risk tolerance), resulting in fewer accidents but also fewer fares per hour.
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