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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 14, 2024

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Well, taken as a realistic depiction of a speed date, it's ludicrous. Certainly my experience dating has been that you don't talk about politics at all, especially not when first impressions are on the table. Occasionally it is worth soberly reminding ourselves that most people find discussion of politics actively unpleasant, and avoid it wherever possible. There are minorities who are interested in politics, and I'm sure that the sorts of people who make and approve political ads are disproportionately drawn from those minorities, but most people don't like politics, and don't bring it up unless they feel they have to.

Aside from the realism of the scenario itself... I suppose I think there's potentially an interesting strategy here, particularly in light of the increasing gender gap on politics. Women do swing a bit more to the left on average, and men a bit more to the right. But men and women usually want to attract each other. "Come over to my side, it'll make you more attractive to the opposite sex" is a crass but perhaps effective strategy. You can see the echo of this strategy in those "don't be weird" ads, portraying right-wing men as repulsive and unattractive to women. Insofar as being attractive to women is something a lot of men value, is it a useful tactical approach? Perhaps.

(One might wonder a bit about the opposite, but I think female attractiveness tends to work differently to male, and certainly is presented or constructed differently socially, so it's not a mirror image. And in general I'd expect to see less of this just because there's less conservative media in general, and significantly less of it aimed at women. Evie is trying her best, but it's a different field, and in general I think women's attractiveness tends to be more self-focused, more you-are-the-belle-of-the-ball, whereas men's attractiveness tends to be more other-focused, look-at-all-the-people-you-can-attract. So strategies have to be different.)

I think the core issue with this ad (at least if intended to target men) is that men typically fall into one of two groups: those who don't struggle with dating (either from great success or being in a monogamous relationship) and those who do and are frustrated. Men in the former category have no real reason to want to shift their political activities for greater sexual access, and the latter might, but they really aren't gonna like a gaggle of women salivating over a tall, fit, (moderately) successful man and then rejecting him for the minor sin of not caring about politics. Going with a short, chubby cashier who suddenly starts getting all the attention would better target the category who cares, but it'd strain realism too much, I guess.