TheBailey
soapy mop
No bio...
User ID: 3254
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
As long as I or any of my siblings alive, my parents will obviously be “my parents”, though they are now also approaching “empty-nester” status once they're no longer boarding a pack of minors.
When/how does this even come up? When it comes to preferred-reference-terms, at least pronouns by contrast are a part of nearly every sentence... if I'm introducing a coworker to a new contact, I won't say “and here is Dr. Michael, a parent and our cybersecurity lead” 🤨
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
would an introduction to the phenomenon in some other way [than self-directed unsupervised internet research] have been less appealing to you?
I pretty much learned everything I could about it as quickly as I could; I doubt there was any kind of manipulation of the order of evidence being presented by parents that would have affected my ultimate conclusion. I spent about as much time as I did on math homework in the basement on my PC reading PubMed and Sci-Hub and forum articles from all sides of the political divide, on that specific topic.
However, to this day it's a small negative facet of interaction with my mother is that she occasionally makes some rueful comment about how I've “bought into this delusion”, since I have explicitly never made any kind of politically disputable claims that I “am I woman” or anything like that.
If you try to take the approach using political rhetoric like “trans people can't accept reality” — remember, one of the aspects of being on the spectrum is taking things literally, and there is an implicit “every/∀” on unqualified general statements in English — or selective facts like “the [genital] surgeries have a high regret rate” (which is relatively undisputed, but for that very reason most trans people don't get those kinds of operations), you may end up briefly getting the kid on board as an ideologue, but when he eventually finds out that you essentially “lied” to get him on board with your particular perspective, you risk ending up strictly worse off from a relationship perspective than had you not broached the topic at all, and having had no impact on his actual outcome.
My model for how this works for most people is they are depressed for some reason that can’t be pinned down. Despite mental health messaging, it’s still low status to be mentally ill.
That may be true. It may even be common. But — if you grant that there are any legitimate cases of gender dysphoria — depression is a symptom of it, so “Joe has depression” does not on its own preclude “Joe has gender dysphoria”.
I live across the country from my family; I see them on Christmas and whenever one of them has occasion to fly out to my city for a business trip. In summer of 2023, when I went back on HRT after an (in retrospect) very ill-advised 18-month experiment in desistance, my father, who would generally invite me out for lunch whenever he was in town, did so again and was astonished at how much I seemed to be “thriving” compared to the last several times he'd seem me; he even took a picture to send back to the family to capture what he saw as he was so struck by it. He was not informed of my having gone back on HRT, and would have disapproved had he known. I have many, many similar anecdotes of people who happened to be against Transgenderism noticing and commenting on marked improvement in my well-being as broadly construed as could be seen from the outside when I first went on HRT seriously around age 17.
Setting aside any bad vibes you're catching from his queer behavior and presentation per se, has your nephew improved academically, intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, or socially since getting on HRT?
Despite mental health messaging, it’s still low status to be mentally ill.
As a quick tangent: if you're not a single parent, have you and your spouse talked about your approach to Shiri's Scissor childcare topics like antidepressants? Being on the same page, or at least knowing what page you each are on, before a storm hits will make things much easier.
For example, if one of you thinks that “trying whatever the doc recommends for a few months” is a great first-resort for a kid who's been acting funny, while the other views any psychotropic prescriptions as the absolute last resort only after ruling out any reasonable possibility of lifestyle changes fixing it, finding that disagreement out only when it's time to choose is going to make things much, much harder and more stressful than they need to be.
(And of course, an alleged GD case would be just one somewhat central instance of the general case of “things like antidepressants”.)
At some point they go down an internet rabbit hole on trans and realize it’s a way of transmogrifying their mental problems into something … avant-garde
Circling back around: does your son have a large fraction of queer people, same-sex-attracted people, or “allies” in his sphere of influence, which I assume is mostly his cohort at school plus the school staff? Is there any “clout” to be got?
You mentioned your nephew was 22yo; is he in college, or a NEET, or somehow in a workforce that's got him to to this, or do you think it's only to look cool for the apocryphal “strangers on the internet”?
Has anyone put the bug in your ear of the concept of autogynephilia yet? That seems to be a larger and more insidious “threat” than social contagion, at least for males.
Gender and the Brain with an AGP Neuroscientist - Benjamin Boyce on YouTube
… [and] sympathetic …
It may be worth noting: something that has exploded in either popularity or awareness over the past few years is arguably the opposite of that — not people chasing any kind of attention, but just staying in the closet and not drawing attention to themselves while quietly medically transitioning:
It may be the case that … simply dressing and acting a minimally surprising way while trying to find a partner, will prove a huge waste of [time], and that my only actual shot at finding [a good spouse] is to embrace some more flamboyant identity than [my current approach,] the absolute-maximally conservative option … [which] feels the most natural to me
That word was not even a blip on Google Trends all the way up thru December 2019, yet I saw that very word in use in forum and imageboard culture around 2010, as I guess some kind of sleeper strategy.
https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/antimemetics-division-hub
SCP-3125 is an extremely large, highly aggressive anomalous metastasized meme complex originating externally to our reality and now partially intersecting it. … Because humans have no natural exposure to ideas as aggressive as SCP-3125, human minds have no protective evolutionary adaptations against it. Individuals possessed of SCP-3125 become incapable of entertaining weaker, "conventional" ideas, and become instead wholly bodily subordinate to the purpose of serving and disseminating the core concepts of SCP-3125.
Christopher Robin
Got up in the morning,
The sneezles had vanished away.
And the look in his eye
Seemed to say to the sky,
“Now, how to amuse them today?
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
Not to put too fine a point on it but are you saying that you [do] consider yourself a woman
No; I don't consider myself a woman. I consider myself a male who takes estrogen and bicalutamide more or less as a cosmetic procedure and/or mental health intervention, while acknowledging the tradeoff that this will make it much more difficult for me to woo a physically and mentally hale wife. I have had this perspective unchanged since I first learned what transgenderism was and realized the category seemed to fit me (modulo the actually-being-on-HRT aspect, of course).
but wish [to] be involved in a relationship with a woman?
While I'm sure a same-sex committed relationship would have plenty of potential to be both fulfilling and mutually beneficial, I've always been absolutely sure that I want to have and personally raise my own biological kids. If a suitable man were to actually pursue me and be willing to accommodate the whole Dave Rubin style high-effort surrogacy thing, I guess I could in theory be open to that — I believe am “meta-attracted” enough to be on par with my fundamental gynephilia, not that it's a practical thing to compare anyway — but if I have to put in the effort to be the pursuer, then I want to at least be pursuing a relationship that has some inherent potential for the whole “having kids” thing to be relatively straightforward.
Of course, every straight male has the fantasy of being actively wooed by a suitable woman; but you don't need to plan for the case where everything simply falls into your lap and works out perfectly; it's the genuinely likely positive outcomes that need to be harvested on purpose.
"presenting as" […] whatever that may mean...
I have medium length hair kept clean and brushed out but broadly unstyled, and I always wear men's button-up shirts with either slacks or jeans. I am currently undergoing laser facial hair removal so I don't have to shave as often; but I don't wear makeup, I go by a conventionally male name, and I don't engage in “voice training” or any other kind of intentional attempts at acting “Queer” or performing femininity. While occasionally I will so-called “male fail” (people mistaking me for a woman, at least until I speak,) I'd like to think I barely even register on “gaydar”.
^I don't know whether that addresses your confusion. If it doesn't, I think I'll need a more specific question. If it seems like I'm intentionally dodging your request for my underlying ethos with an incoherent stream of nominally relevant but disconnected facts, I promise that I am not trying to be obtuse.
This seems as if it should inform a great deal about your dating strategy.
It may be the case that this “false advertising” strategy — that is a quote; I have been accused of it IRL, though not by anyone I actually dated — of simply dressing and acting a minimally surprising way while trying to find a partner, will prove a huge waste of both my own time and my prospective partners' time, and that my only actual shot at finding an excellent, willing life partner (of either sex) is to embrace some more flamboyant identity than the absolute-maximally conservative option, but I want to at least shoot my shot with this approach first as it feels the most natural to me.
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
No apology needed; you responded to my question exactly as I asked it. I am currently presenting as a more or less regular guy as I'm seeking an essentially “traditional” heterosexual relationship. I may have forget to explicitly say that in my post, but I (it seems correctly) assumed that that's the implicit default and was supported by subtext of my message. It's not hard to hide breasts, and when people dote on my complexion I always tell them it's “just” from a low-carb diet and collagen supplementation, which I'm sure are also contributing factors.
I figure that politics and health issues are a “3rd date or so” topic, so I plan to disclose this around then; I'm not actually trying to “trap” anyone or do the classic boomer behavior of waiting 15 years into a marriage and then acting out by cheating.
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
The biggest gains will probably come from the income side. For new grads there is often a path of increasing job titles … each jump is usually a minimum set amount of [seniority] and the pay bump is often somewhat fixed based on your current salary.
Yeah, I've been working at the same company since graduating HS 7 years ago, and been arguably under-compensated. My boss has all but guaranteed me that my pay will approximately double immediately upon graduation; if it doesn't, I'll be rezzing up the resume right away to start shopping around for when the brief no-quitting-allowed period expires after my current company reimburses me for this last 1 or 2 semesters of school.
Mostly, I just want to get through this last stretch a bit easier.
There are a very small number of cases of kids claiming to be trans and being taken away from parents who don’t ‘affirm’ … I’m not aware of any parents losing custody for opposing transgenderism when the child is cis.
How do you factor out / mitigate the toupée fallacy there?
I’ll concede that it’s possibly a legitimate danger to lose a trans child for being opposed to transgenderism.
My recommendation was a specific instance of the general case of just giving your (non-abused) kids yearly don’t talk to the police training, a great first step towards keeping them out of the clutches of the poorly-run infrastructure that's supposed to target other people. Admittedly the technique isn't exactly “asymmetric”, but to the extent it's cheesing the system — well, if the good parents don't use it, it won't stop bad parents from using it anyway.
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
The only context I can think of where being negative about casual sex — per se, in an unqualified way, not “oh you should really use a condom/PrEP/thepill/etc.” — is remotely OK is literally at church, or when the perpetrator is someone you know who goes to the same church as you (and of course even that's only if your local group happens to be conservative-ish).
TheBailey
soapy mop
1mo ago
All this is specifically with… what, Adobe Photoshop? Or a different program?
A 5 year old is very likely to go "Dad says you're mentally ill!" at some inappropriate time.
@Highlandclearances Do you talk politics with the kid at all? Is he mentally developed enough to understand the idea that “there are some things we could get in big trouble just for believing”, & to grasp the severity of “big trouble means that they might even take you away and you'd never get to see us again”?
Since you take the social contagion stance, you will need to “vaccinate” him against the idea.
Have “the talk” where you explain clearly and directly and honestly — especially since you say he's somewhat on the spectrum, I remember when I was his age I could always smell when I was getting a sideways explanation — what you want him to understand about the situation from your own perspective, putting it at the appropriate level for the kid, for example for a 5yo it might be something like:
> Some people aren't happy with being born a boy or a girl.
> Sometimes, these people will use makeup and costumes to disguise themselves as what they *want* to be seen as.
> Sometimes, they'll even use drugs and surgeries to try to change their bodies to look more like a boy or more like a girl.
> When they try to do that, it usually doesn't work out so well, because you *can't* actually change a boy into a girl. [Go into detail here about what exactly *you're* worried about going wrong!]
> If that's something you ever start to worry about, remember that you can always talk to us about it. [Aside: Do you have a trusted spiritual leader you could direct the kid to, such as a pastor or youth study group leader that shares your beliefs and has competence is handling issues age-appropriately? If so, maybe brief that spiritual leader about your concerns beforehand so he knows whether to answer or to tell the kid to “ask your parents”.]
If you don't feel comfortable having that talk, but you're concerned that others are going to take the talk to him and present the wrong premises, or present the premises in the wrong order, in order to effectively “infect” him…
My primary concern is to minimize the odds my son becomes trans, or becomes confused, exposing us to questions from his school, etc.
…then it seems like you will have to eliminate his contact with any sources of that information. You could, for example, order the trans nephew (under threat of either trespass or you and yours leaving) to “dress like a man” at family gatherings to avoid raising questions, and if you actually think he's going to overstep the bounds of parental authority and share information about gender identity with your son without your oversight, then that needs to be addressed as well; if you think that someone at his school is going to expose him to that information, then look into homeschooling or changing school districts, if you're not up for making a news case out of yourself; etc.
Disclaimer: I was homeschooled by parents who have essentially the same perspective as you do; I turned out trans (MtF) anyway once I found out about it around age 12~13 when I got unsupervised internet access, though none of my 4 siblings did, despite them all getting unsupervised internet access younger than I did.
I'm 26yo, single, no dependents, in Alabama. My gross income is currently 71% of “Area Median Income” according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. I'm currently paying 17.4% of my gross income in rent. I'm working a W-4 job at 75% FTE and enrolled in undergraduate at 9CH/semester (75% my school's definition of full time) as a Senior graduating with a bachelor's of science this December or May.
Are there any kind of “gibs” that might be available to me in this situation?
- I looked up “housing choice vouchers”, but it seems that while I do technically qualify, those require you to (a) spend thirty freaking percent of your income on rent; and (b) move into a housing authority affiliated property. Paying more money for less safe housing is of course no advantage.
- I looked up food stamps, but it seems that I don't even qualify for those, as after taking the standard deduction, rent, renter's insurance premium (required by landlord), and Earned Income deduction, I'm still grossing about 164% of the Eligibility Limit.
- My employer offers a 401(k), in which I am putting all my spare income into a Roth account, so low-hanging fruit of the Saver's Credit is definitely already got. I'm also in generally excellent health so I'm just taking the Obamacare-Certified HDHP which my employer pays two-thirds of the premium on, and stuffing a bit of HSA money to get myself out of the higher tax bracket.
- Day-to-day expenses are already about as low as they'll get, aside from a $100/mo cash allocation for social activity.
- My GPA of ~2.1 (already exercised retroactive withdrawal cleanup) and my
white malestatus together I suspect make fishing for scholarships a waste of time.
Because when you are doing sex acts with a partner, as two men, unless you are kissing or 69ing, there is fundamentally an alpha and a beta position. Because you have to, usually subconsciously and even unknowingly between the two of you, work out how the act is going to go, and to violate the order can hurt both of you if you don't understand that it's happening as a violation of the order between you two.
What “hurt” can come from “violat[ing] the order”?
You opened your original post up claiming that you only meant “alpha” and “beta” as referring to who'd win in a fight, saying that you didn't want to import the “connotations in the meme world”[sic] of those “loaded terms”, but that claim — that “hurt” can come if the “[physical superiority] order” is “violated” (whatever that means) — is not at all self-evident unless you're importing prison rape power dynamics, even if I grant* that there are certain pleasures available from physical and behavioral asymmetries in a same-sex relationship.
*And even this, I don't understand your position on so I'm not even sure if I'm granting exactly what you meant to communicate. If you think somehow acting in accord with the “order” of a same-sex relationship — which you define in relation to physical power / force — is so desirable, then why does your highest-ranked relationship prototype involving any serious power asymmetry between the partners have one leg ranked as not even “positive”?
I appreciate your bold desire to express your perspective from a clean slate, but that means that you need to specify your axioms. I see that you clarified in a later post that you think any kind of physical penetration is “essentially a degrading act that you must accept or reject”[sic], but why do you claim this? Do you claim it by analogy from the assumption that heterosexual penetration is “degrading”, or from some other line?
What exactly is wrong with a “beta” contributing a shy, smouldering consent & an “alpha” contributing a bright, doting energy into a bridal chamber of ecstasy, affection, non-judgement, and mutual trust that happens to include sex acts that violate your prescribed “order”?
If it's just not your cup of tea, and you would simply prefer to homoerotically wrestle out your unresolved parental conflicts with a self-confident middle-easterner who's approximately the same strength as you despite a sizeable age gap, then I'm glad you found something you like, but that doesn't seem to be any kind of “motte”.
It’s easy to imagine that these frightening males caused a fawning response in my adolescent brain that developed into homosexuality as I aged. Indeed I see a lot of fawning from gay men, especially younger gay men toward older gay men. I even catch myself fawning at stronger more dominant men though I feel some shade of disgust toward myself when I do this as it triggers memories of earlier years when I felt stuck as only a beta and primarily tried fawning at older men for affection/sex. That said it’s an effective strategy when a beta man fawns to you it’s very attractive but when an alpha fawns at you it’s rather irritating and awkward.
physical power is essential to understanding relationships between people. As I’ve grown older, my parents have naturally waned in their power over me and among the entire family. Of course when I was a child they were able to make all my decisions, … in my early 30s, my father had a health problem, he became quite weak and frail, and I was his caretaker … He continued to treat me like I was a child, not respecting my adulthood and the power I held in the situation. … at some point it became so degrading that I had to assert my power over him. He didn’t like it but after I stood up for myself he had more of a respect for me that I hadn’t been given previously. I had a similar experience with my mother a few years later. … men need to assert their power and strength, see themselves for who they are, respect themselves in their position in the world and respect those around them for who they are too.
very few people today have any experience in the exercise of power … My father failed to do that, my bosses all failed to do that, my friends fail to do that (and it has a very obvious negative effect on their kids). Nobody over the age of 40 gets it.
when I think of my own relationships and those of friends, as well as non-romantic relationships, they all seem to fit the power dynamic I've outlined. Even relationships with friends, parents, other family members, and so on. I suspect if you don't see it you're shielding yourself from seeing it, … once the pattern emerged I can't unsee it now.
Dating today in the US is like meeting a million men who act like they're Brooke who thinks she's fat and ugly when really they're hot and nice and need to see themselves as hot and nice in order to share their hotness and niceness with the people around them who want to enjoy it as well, and this can't happen when they're stuck feeling badly about themselves. (And before someone accuses me of acting entitled to someone else's hotness or niceness or whatever, I try to practice what I preach and share my good traits with those around me too.)
This complaint is completely comprehensible and I have no objections to it, but it seems almost totally orthogonal to your power dynamics model.
I could grant that the U.S. is full of neurotic bottoms who are refusing to accept themselves as sexually worthwhile, and grant that that's hamstringing them in their ability to “be happy and have healthy relationships with themselves and the people around them”[sic], without granting your much more specific claim that the cure for this is for them to “see themselves as tops”[sic].
The fact that other gay men don't like to hear anything I have to say and "clap back" at me further illustrates the frustration I feel with gay men, I am not here to sugar coat the experience or present the mainstream homosexual view of love and relationships and sex but rather point out the difficult aspects that underlie the entire situation. … my post isn't really about gay sex at all but rather I am using something I think about all the time … to make broader points about power and relationships.
If you're struggling with finding enjoyment and fulfillment while viewing gay relationships through this weird power dynamics lens and seeing recurrent “clap back” at your ideas whenever you verbalize them, the obvious implication (which might or might not be correct) is that the “difficult aspects” are actually with your perspective.
For what it's worth, I don't know that I “like” the limited preview of your model you've shared so far, but I do “wish” to see it explained in enough detail to be able to actually evaluate it.
TheBailey
soapy mop
2mo ago
Ideally in [your example], the boy who loses at wrestling is not being forced to pleasure the winner, he is pleasuring the winner because the winner deserves it. I do not want to pleasure a man who would coerce me into having sex, but I would respectfully pleasure him if I felt he deserved it. … In romantic relationships I've had in the past where I've been the top, the bottom usually isn't that pleased … He'll go along with it for a while if he really respects the top enough or disrespects himself too much … Most of my friends I've grown up with who were in long term gay relationships where both partners were in their 20s seem to break up when the bottom gets older and stops wanting to be the bottom. … It takes a lot of confidence to feel like you deserve to top another guy.
Based on what you've said, it sounds like you imagine that even in the ideal situation, a long-term gay relationship with partners in stable sex act roles isn't possible, or couldn't continue to be mutually beneficial?
Why is it that you (and apparently your past sexual partners) think someone has to "deserve" particular sex roles? How much of that is just contingent on you and them happening to physically not enjoy being the passive partner?
Basically I think men who see themselves as bottoms need to see themselves as tops to be happy and have healthy relationships with themselves and the people around them.
That seems like a very bold claim; I'd be interested to see you expand more specifically on why you think that is true.
TheBailey
soapy mop
2mo ago
I dunno, maybe we like cuddling more than “acting like” the other's “superior”?
@aiislove To expand on that a bit: From my own perspective, a gay relationship is supposed to be a pleasant escape from the Red Queen’s Rat Race. As someone who doesn't seem to be eligible for the runner's high, strength training is fucking miserable; the only enjoyable part of strenuous exercise is being massaged while sore afterwards; why would I bother for anyone who isn't packing gametes capable of co-producing an actual child with mine?
Positive gay sex experience[:] You are both acting as alphas. You may not be perfectly matched on the hierarchy, but you both believe you are strong powerful men who are good choices for sexual mates. You lift each other up, the real alpha feels secure in his position lifting up the lesser alpha who feels like he is able to learn from and enjoy the other alpha’s sex. It is equally positive for both of you.
If you think that this relationship is really such an underrated delight, and vastly superior to the asymmetric relationship you're “frustrated” at seeing Americans, Western Europeans, and the Japanese bidding en masse for one particular side of, why not make the case for that per se, leaving out the speculative tangents about racial trends in sex roles and your own power struggles with your father?
It seems like the case would need to be made in 2 legs, which are separate and each quite a hard sell:
- What the case is for being the “real alpha”, especially vs. just getting a wife who's into fitness plus making male friends who are into competitive sports
- What the case is for being the “lesser alpha”, especially vs.* just being a regular “bottom”
most of the homosexual relationships between men that you’ll find [in the middle-east] are intergenerational. It is nearly always an older man with a younger male. Anecdotally I think these are the strongest types of gay relationships that there can be. Increasingly as the older I get, the less I want to be with someone my own age. What would I as a full grown man want to do with another full grown man living in my house? It really doesn’t sound great, even as a homosexual.
*So you might consider making a case against all the low-testosterone Americans, Western Europeans, and Japanese…
https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/02/18/typical-mind-and-gender-identity/
I am probably one of the people Ozy calls “cis by default”. I obviously can’t be sure, but I feel like if I woke up tomorrow magically transformed into a (hetero) woman, my first [thought] would be “Huh, cool, this probably makes it much easier to find a mate” … then I’d get into some very rational comparisons to my personality, like … “Nice, now it’s attractive for me to project my standard vibe of passive lack of interest in my surroundings, instead of having to try to appear dominant and take-charge all the time.”
“I think it’s a really exciting new opportunity and a way to learn about sex that a lot of men never had before. The feeling of something bigger and stronger just overpowering you and doing whatever it wants. I love it.”
…and convincing them for, maybe, a renaissance of “real”, spiritually-charged, Greek-style homosexuality?
https://www.greek-love.com/general-non-fiction-pederasty/the-symposium-by-plato
“But they who are a section of the male follow the male, and while they are boys, being slices of the original male, they are fond of men and enjoy going to bed with men and embracing them. These are the best of boys and youths, because they have the most manly nature. Some indeed assert that they are shameless, but this is not true; for they do not act thus from any want of shame, but out of courage, manliness and masculinity, and they embrace that which is like themselves. And these when they grow up become our statesmen, and these only, which is a great proof of the truth of what I am saving. When they reach manhood they are lovers of boys, and are not naturally inclined to marry or beget children,—if at all, they do so only in obedience to custom; but they are satisfied if they may be allowed to live with one another unwedded.
“One of this nature is inclined to love boys or (as a boy) inclined to have a lover, always embracing that which is akin to him. And when a lover of boys or a lover of another sort meets with his other half, the actual half of himself, whether he be a lover of youth or a lover of another sort, the pair are lost in an amazement of love and friendship and intimacy, and can hardly be induced to be out of one another's sight even for a moment. These are the people who pass their whole lives together; yet they can not explain what they desire of one another. No one imagines the intense yearning which each of them has towards the other is simply the desire for sexual intercourse, or that sex is the reason why one gets such enormous pleasure out of the other's company. The soul of each evidently desires something else which it cannot express, and of which it has only a dark and doubtful presentiment.
“Suppose Hephaistos, with his instruments, to come to the pair who are lying side by side and to say to them, 'What do you mortals want of one another?' they would be unable to explain. And suppose further, that when he saw their perplexity he said: 'Do you desire to be wholly one; always day and night to be in one another's company? for if this is what you desire, I am ready to melt you into one and let you grow together, so that being two you shall become one, and while you live live a common life as if you were a single man, and, after your death, down in Hades, still be one departed soul instead of two—I ask whether this is what you lovingly desire, and whether you are satisfied to attain this?'—there is not a man of them who when he heard the proposal would deny or would not acknowledge that this meeting and melting into one another, this becoming one instead of two, was the very expression of his ancient need.
Your terminology here seems a bit confusing.
You start out defining “alpha” and “beta” for the scope of this post as comparative terms based purely on fitness, which seems ambiguous... I guess that since reproductive “fitness” obviously isn't on the table, you mean rather health? Specifically strength and non-obesity?
For simplicity’s sake, from here on out I will refer to any male who is more fit[sic] as “alpha” and any less fit male as “beta.”
But then you imply that the comparison isn't between the partners, as you say that a relationship between two “alphas” would be positive... so I guess that you only mean that an “alpha” is fit relative to the population? Or at least relative to their own genetic and environmental potential?
I rank [a beta’s non-abusive relationship with an alpha] as neutral because if you [the beta] aren’t trying to be the top you will feel on some level slightly melancholic about the experience afterwards, that you should have tried harder to push your desires further during sex.
That seems weird. Surely a “beta” (unfit person) would feel even more melancholic after “trying to be the top”? Or would you consider that necessarily an attempt at “taking advantage of” a fit partner?
Gay dating today in America is pretty frustrating because the vast majority of men do not see themselves as alpha. It does not bother me just when American men are my alpha, it bothers me when they are my alpha but see themselves as not an alpha at all.
So, is whether someone is an “alpha” based on their fitness, or their mindset? If someone is “your” “alpha”, but they don't “see themselves” that way, and that's a significant and “frustrating” part of your experience of the world, why did it not factor into the model you introduced at the start of the post?
You enumerate out seven different prototypes of gay relationship:
- PoV “alpha” × “alpha”, no abuse
- PoV “alpha” × “beta”, no abuse
- PoV “beta” × “alpha”, no abuse
- PoV “beta” × “beta”, no abuse
- PoV “beta” × “alpha”, you abuse him
- PoV “beta” × “alpha”, you are abused
- PoV “alpha” × “beta”, you are abused
but you conspicuously leave off several possibilities from your enumeration:
- PoV “beta” × “beta”, you abuse him
- PoV “beta” × “beta”, you are abused
- PoV “alpha” × “alpha”, you abuse him
- PoV “alpha” × “alpha”, you are abused
are these just not relevant? Do you think they statistically don't occur that much versus the seven cases you highlighted? (The claim would seem astonishing to me that two fit men getting together in a healthy, mutually fulfilling relationship is more common than two unfit men getting together in an asymmetric, somewhat dysfunctional relationship...)
If you have sex with a man who is your [physical] superior but doesn’t act like it, you are either going to come away feeling like you’re taking advantage of him or no sex is going to happen at all. Imagine a younger boy who wants to play a game with a bigger boy, but the bigger boy is depressed or doesn’t feel like playing, either the younger boy irritates the bigger boy or they just don’t play a game at all and both parties are sad. This is what it’s like to try dating among men with low self esteem who don’t realize the position they hold. … in the Middle East I was overtly hit on by men everywhere I went … In my opinion Middle Eastern men are very masculine, handsome, and alpha, more so than anywhere else in the world.
Really, this feels like it could have been the whole post, and even it seems ultimately subjective — 3,200 words to ask “Why aren't there any REAL Man's Men / psychological tops in the United States?” — I dunno, maybe we like cuddling more than “acting like” the other's “superior”?
TheBailey
soapy mop
2mo ago
the people in charge who say they're in debt the moment they're born
In the U.S., taxpayers are already each born into $269k of debt, yet there isn’t any popular sentiment to lynch old people, welfare recipients, or the politicians who arranged this.
Is that an oblique way to refer to the microtears that occur during hypertrophy (as an element of well-adjusted cis males’ and trans men’s “gender-affirming” lifestyle), or do you mean “severing” as part of a satirically proposed surgery to decrease over-all strength as part of an MtF transition — not as a genuine part of the personal expression project that is the medical sex/gender transition process, but as a security control, medical harm per se applied prophylactically to male prisoners seeking cross-sex asylum?
> Requests for advice
What's a reasonable "ghosting" protocol when it comes to online dating, assuming that I do want to rescue the conversation if-and-only-if the counterparty dropped the convo accidentally due to Universal Zoomer ADHD?
Trying out OLD recently, finally found what seemed to be a great match locally last weekend, but she went radio silence about 24h before a nearly-scheduled date. Not blocked, still "matched" on the site, and she shows up as "online" occasionally.
Current plan — asking in part for a sanity check on this — is to wait just under a week, maybe till Friday morning to allow for scheduling, then ask something upbeat and understanding like “hey, did you survive this week?” as the last outbound contact before writing it off as an intentional ghost.
Friday Evening
Me: … Well, let me know if the [local rock] concert next week sounds interesting or if you'd rather just grab coffee — or even lunch at a Chinese buffet? 😋
(I like rock music a bit, but not enough to bother going to a concert alone, so let me know either way!)Her: Coffee would be amazing too I love iced coffee and I’m sorry but I can’t eat in front of someone new for awhile I’m very self conscious about that😂
I like to try new places that aren’t popular there’s this [very interesting cafe about an hour's drive away] I wanna visit but I can’t this Saturday however I can Sunday! I work a 9-5 Monday-Friday so I have money while I’m getting my business off the groundMe: hmm, a drive up to [other state] this Sunday? 🤔Could be fun! I'm always down for obscure and interesting places.
What's the address, and have you got a specific timeslot in mind?
I was looking at checking out a church this Sunday (11am service), but could push that ahead a weekHer: Ooo which church I would love to go if that’s okay?
Me: Sure, I was looking at [nearby church] — it's a bit nontraditional (rather, they say they follow a non-mainstream tradition, Theosophy)
of course, as I said, I haven't actually been there yet so don't judge me if they turn out to be 100% crazy 🙈Saturday morning
Her: I’ll look into! It might be interesting
Me: OK, I guess I'll see you tomorrow at 11am at [nearby church] and then maybe visit the obscure [other state] restaurant after?
*or 10:45 more like, so we can say "hi" beforehandSunday Morning
Me: OK, I'm heading out now to check out the church.
I don't have [dating site] on my phone, so if you want to tag up today — [cell#]Me: (few hours later) Are you still interested in going to [that obscure cafe you mentioned] today?
It's an hour's drive there and an hour's drive back; if we leave around now, that would give us enough time for about a half-hour to eat and chat before I need to be back in [our town] by 4pm.
I hate how Twitter stops playing the video as soon as I scroll away from it to read the replies
There is a public video-enabled Nitter instance at https://elon.cucked.me/Bigfoot_USA/status/1834305378621730851 ; it doesn't have infinite-scrolling replies, but it does allow you to keep the video playing in the background when you open subsequent pages of replies in a new tab.
EDIT: wow, just after I posted that the instance died. Another mirror that seems pretty reliable and includes the video option is https://nitter.poast.org/Bigfoot_USA/status/1834305378621730851 — sometimes they pause public access during periods of high load but even then they allow public access with the ts in the sub-domain replaced with gs.
I have a sizeable fraction of my retirement allocated to
IAUM. But the boomer on my shoulder[proverbial] of course nags me that “not your wallet, not your coins”, and it feels inevitable in the long run that one of these will happen:Am I correct in thinking that paying to maintain a ladder of moderately long-dated (say
1y), moderately OTM (say15%) PUTs onIAUis the only way to really insure against those risks?For example,
-IAU260116P42had an Ask of $0.60 today — does that mean that it would have cost 100×$0.60 = $60.00 to buy a “16-month insurance policy with a 15% deductible” on 1.88 troy ounces of BlackRock’s gold IOUs, or am I dangerously misunderstanding how options work?More options
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