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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 9, 2024

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All Entertainers are Terrifying People, and OnlyFans Models are no Exception

I watched McMahon some while ago, and it was kind of amazing. Basically tells the story about a young psychopath working his way up from being raised by a single mother in a trailer park, to building a multinational media empire and being friends with the President. All the same, he's still a psychopath. You can admire his unparallelled achievements and greatness, but he's still a terrifying individual you would never want to know personally. At a certain point in the documentary, I think before a slew of new allegations came out about McMahon but maybe not, a bunch of interview subjects are asked what they think McMahon's legacy will be. All but one of them choke on the question, knowing all the skeletons that man has in his closet, but not wanting to say anything because they aren't public (yet).

And McMahon was just one example. It was an industry built on people willing to make any sacrifice for fame and fortune. Putting aside the steroids, they worked at a pace that destroyed their bodies. Listening to the Undertaker go over the list of permanent injuries he's left with is a nightmare. And these people undoubtedly blew off steam in ways greater society would condemn. Drugs, alcohol, sexcapades, you name it.

With Hollywood, and all the high profile sex and crime rings that are being exposed with Harvey Weinstein, P Diddy and even old Epstein paint a nightmarish picture of an industry that paints itself in a very good light. The casting couch has always been infamous, but who knows how far the depravity goes. We catch glimpses every now and again. Brian Singer, the director of the first two X-Men movies was criminally outed as a gay pedophile.

And then there was Lily Phillips, who broke down crying after taking 100 cocks in a day. It's repulsive. But, as I sit with the knowledge of it for longer, most entertainment is made by repulsive people. Has Lily Phillips abused her body and broken with public morals more or less than McMahon, or P Diddy, or Harvey Weinstein? Or even the average wrestler or movie star willing to do anything to be famous? How was Chris Benoit doing during his career? How does taking thousands of cocks over a career, and the BPD and narcissism associated with such an act weight against CTE?

I guess if I have a point, it's that the Roman's were correct. Entertainers are all degenerates and you should scorn anyone who chooses to be one.

CTE?

CTE

Chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Basically you get so many concussions that you develop severe mental problems akin to Alzheimer's or dementia. Not entirely unlike how taking too many cocks results in severe dissociation and impaired mate bonding.

Not entirely unlike how taking too many cocks results in severe dissociation and impaired mate bonding.

I suspect you've got the causation backward; being crazy or narcissistic makes you low-value as a partner without being especially physically obvious, which coupled with high-standards-world (preventing settling for a low-value man) and free-love-world (preventing shotgun wedding) is a recipe for "taking 100 cocks".

Here, I find myself linking Wikipedia's page on "antitheatricality" and noting that it wasn't just the Romans, but a perennial bit of wisdom "as old as theater itself." And, while Wikipedia limits itself to the West, I recall periods of Chinese history with similar attitudes, as well as some interesting bits in the history of kabuki in Japan.

All Entertainers are Terrifying People, and OnlyFans Models are no Exception

While I agree with your point about the actors - it's a type of career that draws a certain crowd, OF is something else. The headline-grabbing people are just the most prominent, perhaps the best paid part of it. So sure these are going to be sociopaths who will do anything.

But there's a vast amount of 'models' who just do it as a hobby or side job, because they like showing off due to exhibitionist tendencies, or because they have a rarely appreciated look and like getting validation.

These people don' seem particularly crazy, tbh. Some, sure, but mostly... just..normal. I can always tell who is in it just for the money, and who genuinely likes doing what they do. Most porn, especially big names is.. unwatchable, I just avoid it. The former is tbh repulsive.

Wish we got system-level filtering of all porn, because I'm not resolute enough to stop pirating it regularly. There's an overrepresentation of terrifying people, but how large, it's not clear.

It's allegedly no.3 on the list of the most psychopath-overrepresented professions.

  1. CEO

  2. Lawyer

  3. Media (Television/Radio)

  4. Salesperson

  5. Surgeon

  6. Journalist

  7. Police officer

  8. Clergy person

  9. Chef

  10. Civil servant

It's allegedly no.3 on the list of the most psychopath-overrepresented professions.

Your formatting got messed up there, all of your list items are listed as #1. Which is actually hilarious, you shouldn't change it.

Was "politician" not included, or did it not make the top 10?

Was "politician" not included, or did it not make the top 10?

No idea. Would have to track down the origin. But possibly not. Politics is fake today.

Lily Philips made a simple calculation: in exchange for fucking 100 men, she becomes a millionaire through OnlyFans. I doubt she is traumatized; women cry when they are exhausted. The joke is on all the other women: the ones who post thirst traps for nothing, who are used by famous and rich men for nothing. I respect Lily for going all the way and knowing her place. She’s not hiding anything, she’s an old fashioned prostitute. She’s not trying to be anything more!

I doubt she is traumatized; women cry when they are exhausted.

Women also cry when they’re Stressed, for random trivial reasons, and to manipulate other people (especially men)—as is likely the case here.

The joke is on all the other women: the ones who post thirst traps for nothing

It’s not nothing… chicks love the sexual attention. Attention for women is like sex for men. By their revealed preferences, women love being sex objects and courting the male gaze.

She’s not hiding anything, she’s an old fashioned prostitute. She’s not trying to be anything more!

I haven’t watched any of her content—whether she’s whoring around in it or not—but sounds like she’s trying to have her cake and eat it too, in attempting to play the victim card. Women have always been the primary victims of their own coffee moments, of course. One could argue it’s just performative for increasing her viewership, but this would be verging on “I was only pretending to be retarded” territory.

Apparently, as implied by her words (which should be Believed, naturally), she’s still in touch with her parents, including her father. Obligatory “having a daughter is the ultimate and final cuck,” but in addition, girls like her provide a regular reminder as to why I understand how honor-killings are a thing in certain cultures.

Same here. A woman who knows her price and sells herself for it is much more respectable than the average liberal western woman who acts as a free prostitute for multiple men in her teens and twenties before "settling down" (they'll all deny that they were used as free prostitutes both at the time and later down the line, but I see that as just another ego defense mechanism). I wish Lily Philips all the best and respect her more than most XX westerners.

free prostitute

How, exactly, is that not a contradiction in terms‽

These women are selling their bodies (so prostituting themselves) to men they find desirable with the hope that he will stick with them long term. For a lot of these women the only thing of value they truly have to offer is their body which the man is paying nothing for. Therefore he's getting the same services as he would be if he had gotten himself a prostitute, but it's free. Hence the free prostitute.

Of course this artifice by the woman usually goes wrong and the man leaves her, after which she calls him an "asshole" to whomever will listen and within a few months moves on to the next guy where the story repeats until she becomes totally disillusioned with men/some schmuck who's willing to pay above market price keeps her long term.

If the above argument isn't convincing to you because you require that a prostitute gets paid for her trade then here is another argument for what exactly I mean here: Consider an expensive escort and a cheap whore. I'm sure you agree that both of these people fall under the umbrella of "prostitute". You can think of some smooth function which takes as argument the price you pay and returns the corresponding hooker at that price point, so if you feed it a low price you get the cheap whore and if you feed it a very high price you get, well, Aella, with a smooth gradient in between.

Now keep reducing the payment price and and take the limit as it approaches 0. Every element of this sequence is a cheaper and cheaper whore (because you're paying less and less). That final limit, even though it may not be a prostitute according to your definition (the set of prostitutes is not closed) is what I mean by a free prostitute and what I think is a decent descriptor for your average modern liberal western woman (because even the cheap whore knows her worth and doesn't sell herself for less than it while the average modern liberal western woman sells herself for free).

Note: this doesn't mean I am against women who like to have lots of sex for the sake of sex because they find it fun. I respect them a lot too because they are willing to break the mold and get what they want. They display a certain will to power which is often sorely lacking among members of their sex. Unfortunately this description does not apply to many modern liberal western women no matter how much they tell themselves it does.

I would respect a women who slept with 50 men because she genuinely wanted to experience sex with lots of other people a lot more than a woman who slept with 50 men because they were all extra attractive and she wanted (but failed) to bag one of them. And I would respect this particular women a lot more still than a women who slept with 50 men because her friends and the prevailing culture she's immersed in told her that this was the good and right thing to do which is another particular brain worm infecting the modern liberal western female mind but that's a discussion for another day.

That's called young women being naive, not being prostitutes. Yes these young women are very foolish, but seriously believing commitment is the price of sex is, literally, what separates a proper lady from a public woman.

They have always been naive, but this behavior is new.

I recall a '40s born writer in a novel describing toilet sex between people who met themselves on a trip as utterly disgusting and low class.

Now sex on first date is allegedly common.

On one hand, sure, there's probably a signal there.

On the other hand, this comment immediately reminded me of "Train Kept a Rollin", which I thought was first recorded in 1956 by Johnny Burnette: https://youtube.com/watch?v=hbw_jI4S924&pp=ygUjdHJhaW4ga2VwdCBhIHJvbGxpbiBqb2hubnkgYnVybmV0dGU%3D Upon closer investigation, the actual original was in 1951, by Tiny Bradshaw, and rather less suggestive to my ear: https://youtube.com/watch?v=ci4EQDD4CqA&pp=ygUYdHJhaW4ga2VwdCBhIHJvbGxpbiAxOTUx

The signal is a lot less informative when half of the people do it.

And christ, that Burnette version is nasty, in all kinds of ways.

More comments

This is because young women have more freedom to do stupid things. This is not in their interests, of course, but 'why did naive young women not put out in 1940 when they do today' has an answer and it isn't 'there was a war on' nor is it 'because today they don't think they should get commitment for sex'.

Yeah. But we live in a liberal society that pretends we're all equal in our decision making ability.

So very noble and conveniently also allows for the exploitation of the weak minded and willed by the clever and the ruthless.

Yes, because of the sexual revolution. Whether that was or remains in women’s interest is a different question entirely.

Women who have sex with men in the hopes the man will then commit. Attractive men have several such orbiting and enjoy the sex, the sadistic ones probably also the desperation.

Men who orbit women get used as objects of emotional labor, women who orbit men get used as objects of sexual labor. Says something about people, doesn't it?

I loved the McMahon doc. One of the most interesting parts that no one commented on: him and his son both had great wrestler genetics. Like, yes there were a ton of roids involved, but still: it's crazy that they were able to put in a solid workmanlike performance in the ring with guys who weren't nepo-babies from ownership. Like most of the other wrestlers who were main event guys were pure genetic freaks who worked their way up, and then you had Vince and his Son participating and they got into it purely from having inherited the role.

It's wild that not only was the original documentary planned as a hagiography, it was specifically planned to go with the Netflix-WWF deal. So Netflix didn't just find themselves with a documentary they needed to salvage from a MeToo disaster, they had to salvage a multi-billion dollar content deal in real time.

I mostly endorse your opinion, and extend it to all famous people. Famous CEOs, politicians, intellectuals. Rare are the famous people who wish they weren't famous, who just want to work and hate what has been thrust upon them, rare enough that I think they can mostly be ignored. Even those who got big out of love of their art, fame changes them, money changes them. A FiveHourMarathon who women recognized in the street would be a different man than I am.

You aren't wrong. Which is why it's so much more remarkable when people do turn away from fame. The example probably most near and dear to myself is Bill Watterson. There is something transcendent about becoming the best, a worldwide sensation, and then walking away and living a nice quiet life in the Midwest. Wikipedia says he has a wife, no mention of kids, but as private as he is I think we only know about the wife from public real estate transactions, since it's only mentioned alongside him buying a house.

I kind of love this. It makes it easier for the art to stand on it's own. I'm not fretting squaring my love for Calvin & Hobbes as a child with Watterson's political beliefs, his support for or lack thereof for Israel, which party he supports, his twitter beefs, outrageous bullshit he said for attention, etc. I know virtually nothing about him except by proxy from his art.

Even more than that, he stood to make millions from licensing Calvin & Hobbes for merchandise, but refused, as he wanted the comic to stand on its own. Every piece of C&H merchandise you've ever seen (including the infamous sticker of Calvin going for a piss) was unauthorised. You have to respect that kind of integrity.

My wife and I had to hand sew a Hobbes stuffed tiger for our son when he was born, it wasn't until that moment that I realized he never merchandized the characters.

It actually saddens me that after he dies (sad enough on its own) that someone, somewhere is going to roll a freight trains worth of money up to his heirs and convince them to sign the rights over, then we're getting saturated with C & H content.

One of my favorite factors in the comics is that Calvin and Hobbes have no "voice" so every person has a slightly different version of them in their own head.

When they eventually make a CGI movie and they're voiced by Chris Pratt and Seth Rogen it will genuinely diminish the art, I'd argue.

That would depend on how his will is written. Presumably he could transfer the rights to a trust with instructions to not permit anything.

You'll have to wait seventy five years after his death for AI Pratt and Rogen to voice them.

Yes, he can do a lot of things to try and restrict any use of his IP after his death. Most of those things can be circumvented if they're willing to bring freight trains worth of money.

I can say on a professional level that even an extremely well-drafted trust with 'airtight' language still fails if you don't have someone in charge who is truly aligned with your vision.

I sometimes point out what happened to The Ford Foundation which, after Henry and Edsel died, made it about thirty years before its original mission was fully compromised.

What can be done if he transfers ownership of his IP to a trust before his death?

I don't think you can really compare a foundation that has a board of directors etc etc with a law firm administering a trust that holds the IP.

The easiest thing he can do is transfer the IP rights to an irrevocable trust, and dictate that the IP rights are to never be transferred to any entity, nor should any new media be produced, and basically to preserve the IP as closely to the state it currently exists in until the copyright expires.

And fund it well enough that the Trustees can go after any entities trying to infringe on the IP. And it can produce revenue by making new printings of the comics (without editing original content too much) to keep that fund topped off. And I guess extra money over that amount can be kicked off to particular beneficiaries, but make it clear they DON'T get to dictate how the trust property is used or make demands of the Trustees.

And pick a law firm that's been around for 70+ years to act as trustee, and otherwise has minimal financial incentive to milk the trusteeship for fees.

The biggest risk at that point is the Trust depleting its liquid assets and thus being put in a position where it 'has' to start selling or borrowing against the IP rights in order to continue operations, since that is the main and primary asset of value it has.

Even if the trust's explicit purpose is to prevent C & H adaptations from being produced as long as possible, if the Trustees believe that there will not be sufficient funds to carry out that purpose, they can potentially argue that selling off one piece of the IP rights is justifiable since that is the only way they can continue to operations and that is still in the 'best interests' of the trust itself.

Words to live by: If you're watching it, you are the target audience.

The majority of people who watched Jersey Shore did so "ironically", self-consciously. They outnumbered the people who watched the show "uncritically" by a significant margin. The show's producers were quite aware of this fact and played into it. The people who thought they were "above it all" were actually exactly in the target audience the whole time. There's ultimately no such thing as watching anything "from a distance"; you're always involved, you are always the target.

The point being that, to the extent that you have consumed the products or patronized the activities of these degenerates, you are complicit in their degeneracy. They cannot be dismissed as a mere aberration or mistake, because you are in a symbiotic relationship with them. The degenerates can proliferate because they've found a stable ecological niche; legions of people are willing to pay for their services. The strategy will persist for as long as it continues to be evolutionarily effective.

The majority of people who watched Jersey Shore did so "ironically", self-consciously. They outnumbered the people who watched the show "uncritically" by a significant margin.

Is this the case, really? The vast majority of people who watch trashy reality TV - the Kardashians, Real Housewives of X, 90 Day Fiancé - certainly don’t do so “ironically”.

Probably more accurate to say that there are levels meant to appeal to different people.

But I think the point that @Primaprimaprima made still stands. The people who are winked and nudged at are still very much part of the core audience.

I guess if I have a point, it's that the Roman's were correct. Entertainers are all degenerates and you should scorn anyone who chooses to be one.

Just think of the fiction writers. What sort of sick mind seeks to profit over the imagined suffering of others for a voyeuristic reader base that loves to see its characters suffer?

[/kidding]

That's actually a really interesting interpretation of much of the sequel of Don Quixote. Quixote and Sancho find themselves taken in by superfans of the first book, a nobleman and his lady, who proceed to put them through all kinds of goofy adventures. The sadism and cruelty of the superfans is sent up for comedy, but how different are they from the author and his readers, who create Quixote so that he can be tortured?

I guess if I have a point, it's that the Roman's were correct. Entertainers are all degenerates and you should scorn anyone who chooses to be one.

During the MeToo era, Steve Sailer pointed out how the Greek term for rule by actresses would be 'Hypokritokratia', or hypocritocracy.

Well, we may or may not suspect that a giant orgy has a pernicious effect on one's psychology like taking steroids and pro wrestling has a pernicious effect on one's body, but I don't think we know that first part for sure.

Really? I take it as a given. Of course I seem out of step in disagreeing with the rather large generalization that began this comment chain (that all performers are degenerates). So maybe my strongly held conviction that orgies aren't so good for the psyche (especially if you are the only girl involved) is in the minority here.

Hmm. My first assumption is that if it were in the minority there would be orgies absolutely everywhere, as opposed to just everywhere furries gather. Although the proclivity for orgies of furries suggests it's personal shame and body image issues that hold a lot of people back, so maybe we are in the minority.

Uh, you do realize that furries are not exactly an unselected group, right? They typically have open and liberal sexual attitudes, are very likely to have proclivities, and lots of them are gathering at fur conventions specifically to hang out with other people with... proclivities.

Fur conventions having orgies doesn't mean much more than gay pride parades having orgies. I mean, maybe a little more, but not much more.

Well I meant specifically on this site, but also I didn't realize furries were big into orgies. I learn more every day.