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I'd rather not even talk to the cashier. I definitely don't want to fuck the hypothetical harem (given the alternative option of a ~zero-effort monogamous casual arrangement, or, even better, a high-effort monogamous serious one).
But "fuck" is a whole lot of interacting with a stranger. (don't) Fuck that.
Out of curiosity are you over 30? I can't imagine any man 15-30 endorsing this attitude, to be honest.
Over 30. Was way more sex negative before. Pre-Lesswrong me would respond to such a comment ... either as if personally attacked, or by glibly retorting "At least someone agrees I am not a man."
...
At least someone agrees I am not a man. ::P
(I italicized "someone"! That makes it different!)
I think this has become known as asexuality,, among psychiatrists. Mostly because SJ pushed it hard in response to the strictness those of your view insist upon its functional universality.
FWIW, I have lots and lots of notes and posts and maybe some IM conversations from the 00s and early 10s, if you want verification of my mindset at the time. But TLDR, Dr. K's description of asexuality describes me more or less to a t.
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Yes. Mid 30s.
I see, any chance that you from 10 years ago would say something drastically different?
I'm approaching 30s myself. Compared to a peak of around 5 years ago, I can already feel a material change in libido and how much it affects, although i find it difficult to disentangle whether it's my libido that is shifting or the effects of being in a LTR.
As it stands, if I wasn't in an LTR I would pass up exactly 0% of effort and consequence-free sex opportunities, if those existed. I will know in 5 to 10 years, if the libido changes become more pronounced.
Hm, maybe a little different, but not drastically. Even in college, when I was sleeping with a few people, I always had a favorite/tended to break things off with all but one/want something serious. It's not that I was low libido, and while it's probably lower now I wouldn't at all say low/below average (for mid 30s). I think I'm just wired more monogamously than you.
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This definitely changes as you get into your 30s. Throw in a long term live-in woman? Then maybe add a kid or two? Yeah, your libidos gonna take heavy hits and the harem cravings go way down (but never to zero)
It’s honestly kind of nice though. I remember my libido being so strong it made me depressed, like being extremely hungry but never getting enough food, while constantly seeing delicious food everywhere you couldn’t ever eat. So glad to leave that behind me.
As a counterpoint, I'm in my thirties and my libido is not weaker one bit, I'm still surrounded by delicacies while starving. What changed is that my looks cratered and my misogyny skyrocketed, so I don't spend even a moment in a free-form interaction with the opposite sex now.
Perhaps it’s contextual factors like relationship status and parenthood that are more important than age per se. I’ve read studies that show your T goes down a lot after living with a woman and even more with kids around
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I think you heavily overestimate the amount of (mental) effort required to fuck the harem in this hypothetical. I don't like to talk to the cashier either and I can envision having to talk to the harem girls even less than I have to talk to the cashier.
Perhaps the fundamental difference then in our viewpoints is I think the mental effort that goes into fucking someone is actually a lot of the fun. Knowing how to press each other's buttons in bed, the comfort of familiar company. So by the time you've removed that from the hypothetical, I no longer consider the activity really all that worth doing. Don't get me wrong, if it were the only thing on offer, I would take it with a big old smile on my face. But it's hot dogs when I'd rather slow cook ribs.
But as long as you have learned to cook ribs, how hard can it really be to learn a few more recipes? As long as you have the general knowledge down, so to speak, I don't think it would be that much harder to keep up with two casual hookups' preferences than one, or three rather than two.
Not hard to learn, just don't wanna. (And, I've, uh, learned a number of recipes over the years, just because I move etc.)
To continue overextending the metaphor, I actually have the same preference with food: I'm good at cooking a range of recipes, but mostly eat Soylent and put a small number of things in the air fryer.
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The number of potential conflicts between N people grows as O(n^2).
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