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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 13, 2024

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If I were a woman, I would take tinder et al any day over a random pre-1900 mating system.

And that is what they are doing, but as with many of the things modernity has produced, it feels good but is actually bad for you and society.

Tinder basically only selects for looks and short term fun, but unlike your parents, it's not going to pick someone who will want to make you an exclusive partner. So female you is going to suffer from the common malady of the situationship era, she's going to pine for guys out of her league hoping she can lock one up, fail to do so and grow into a leftover woman who resents men and insults them with bear analogies.

Whether that's a better or worse fate than marrying a brutish viking warrior that still provides, I don't know. Maybe it is actually better, it's certainly more comfortable. But the battered viking's wife has children, and the bitter wine aunt does not. Surely that enters into the calculation.

Maybe your parents don't care that much about your feelings when it comes to mate selection, but they do care about important things that are now excluded from the process, to everyone's expense.