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PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   23942 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 17, 2025

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After January 6, the Democrats focused their self-image around the idea of “procedure” and “doing things the right way”. This calcified to such an extent that anyone in a position of leadership is now incapable of forming and executing plans which do not conform with the collective PMC understanding of what is allowed or “proper”.

I think this is part of it, but I also think there is just a lack of physical courage among most people on the left (and people on the right, to be fair.)

I am genuinely not trying to caricature or strawman the left, but they do tend to attract a more effeminate, intellectual type of person as of late. Note that this CERTAINLY isn't true of the left historically, but seems to be the tendency today. Young men are at historic lows for the Democratic party, the group who tends to have the most physical aggression and willingness to go occupy a building or storm a castle. Combine this with the fact that physical courage seems to be dropping across the board, and you have people who simply aren't willing to put themselves at risk or take bold physical action in this way.

Combine this with the fact that physical courage seems to be dropping across the board

"Lying flat" is a type of strike/collective bargaining. It's not generally recognized as such because the people in power and the people who are thought to be on the side of collective bargaining are the same people, which is why China tries to suppress it.

the group who tends to have the most physical aggression and willingness to go occupy a building or storm a castle

Young men need to have an incentive to do that. They haven't had such a thing for 2 generations now- things have gone downhill for them since the '80s due mostly to enclosure by the old (through various justifications- environmentalism and safetyism being the most popular). In places that have less enclosure, people are doing better- TFRs are higher, wages are higher/costs of living are lower, the police force actually functions, military recruitment remains very high, R&D budgets are high, etc.

Now, young women generally benefit from that because young men will generally compete and distinguish themselves more for access to young women. But they've just discovered that the reward they offer to do those things- that being themselves- is insufficient. Their social credit card has been declined, and if you've spent the last 20-50 years forming your entire identity around having limitless social credit (and men fighting for the privilege to pick up your tab)?
Yeah, I can see how that could be existentially demoralizing. The lies stop being fun to tell when people stop believing in them.

Combine this with the fact that physical courage seems to be dropping across the board

The old also actively punish young men for exercising this virtue. If you remove them and create institutions that reward this it'll come back, but that's going to take some time and require investment.

Writing in 1844, Karl Marx describes the power of money sardonically

The extent of the power of money is the extent of my power. Money’s properties are my – the possessor’s – properties and essential powers. Thus, what I am and am capable of is by no means determined by my individuality. I am ugly, but I can buy for myself the most beautiful of women. Therefore I am not ugly, for the effect of ugliness – its deterrent power – is nullified by money. I, according to my individual characteristics, am lame, but money furnishes me with twenty-four feet.

Time has concealed the meaning of twenty-four feet, but Marx has already quoted from Goethe's Faust

“Six stallions, say, I can afford,
Is not their strength my property?
I tear along, a sporting lord,
As if their legs belonged to me.”

so we know what he is getting at. He needs young men to join his anti-capitalist revolution, so he makes it clear that Capitalism involves the young man standing in the gutter while his girlfriend rides by in a six horse carriage, being pawed by the ugly rich old man who owns it/her. Such powerful rabble rousing! Marx knew human nature and how love could be used to harness young men to his cause.

But 1844 is a long time ago. Would Marx use the same trick today? I doubt it would work. He talks to red-pilled young men and they tell Marx the received wisdom of today's youth: "She's not yours, its just your turn." In today's hook up culture, there is lust, but not love. Marx hoped that young men would die for love. But nobody dies for lust.

My social credit card has been declined? That’s news to me. Do you have evidence that young men compete and distinguish themselves for access to me?

Do you have evidence that young men compete and distinguish themselves for access to me?

No disrespect intended, but this is common knowledge to the point that it defies belief that anyone would not know this (kind of like if you asked someone to provide evidence that people die if they stop breathing). If you're young enough you may not have realized it yet, I suppose. But young men spend vast quantities of effort to try to get attention (and especially sex) from women. It's the #1 thing on their minds, and a lot of things they do can be traced back to "showing off for the girls".

Or, as Chris Rock memorably put it: "Women are offered dick every day. Every [woman] gets offered dick at least three times a week. Three times a day, shit! That’s right, every time a man’s being nice to you … all he’s doing is offering dick. That’s all it is. ‘Can I get that for you? – How about some dick?’ ‘Could I help you with that? – Could I help you to some dick? – Do you need some dick?’" Yes he's a comedian and he's playing it for laughs, but it works because both he and the audience know how true it is.

Yes he's a comedian and he's playing it for laughs, but it works because both he and the audience know how true it is.

What else are they going to offer? Pussy?

(Actually, come to think of it, there are some exceptions to this: cougars are what women-offering-dick looks like, and "male-offering-pussy" is the trap archetype. 'Masculinity' and 'femininity' are derivatives of this, but they mean different things to each gender.)

My impression is that she's a trans woman. Things like putting "and no I am not a man" in her bio, and talking explicitly online about her UTI, and the proportion of posts about gender vs everything else.

On the other hand, no, being offered "dick" three times a day isn't exactly a positive experience, even if accompanied by some other performances.

My impression is that she's a trans woman. Things like putting "and no I am not a man" in her bio, and talking explicitly online about her UTI, and the proportion of posts about gender vs everything else.

Funny, my reading was just that she was a troll, especially because her bio has "[...] you can call me a troll until your throat hurts." My money would be on "cis male troll" before it would be on "good faith trans woman", but only because a username like "just a woman" feels like something neither a cis nor trans woman would make, and certainly not in this space.

I also clocked that. Normally, I don't think it matters what your identify is, only the content of your thought.

But if you're going to make your whole thing about gender, I do think it matters a lot whether you are trans or not. Especially if you're going to ask for "sources" that men want sex from women. The experience of a trans woman is not the same as a biological woman. It's just not.

Who knew my biggest struggle on this site wasn’t debating hobby horses it was convincing people I’m a biological woman. I even put it in my name to make it easy. If you want a picture of my tampon stash all you gotta do is ask.

Strangely, those are the sorts of details that suggested trans to me.

(I have given birth to three children, could probably have another, and have no tampon stash)

Genuine what the huh? I can't tell if you're asking me for a picture of my used tampons but the answer would be and is no.

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I want to make a Yaniv joke, but it's probably against the rules somehow -- so let's just say that on the modern internet, not only does nobody know that you're a dog, but nobody can be sure that you aren't a dog either.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Internet_dog.jpg

But in Twitter, everyone knows you're @dog.

...I'm pretty sure the joke flew over my head?

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I even put it in my name to make it easy.

There are a surprising number of corners of the internet now where P('biological woman' | 'explicitly and visibly states is a woman') is lower than P('biological woman' | 'NOT(explicitly and visibly states is a woman)').

(Alas, it is essentially impossible to gather proper statistics on this.)

I’ve been called a lot of things, but being trans has gotta be a first. That was a good giggle for me.

Edit: Also hey you try going five days in a row with barely any sleep from feeling like you gotta spend a penny 24/7 and NOT talk about it.

It wasn't based on much, so I'm willing to believe I'm just wrong about that.

I can assure you I have 100% organic home-grown cage-free open-field breasts.

I mean, I didn't say it was. Just saying everyone i know (women included) is well aware that young men spend crazy amounts of effort on catching the eye of young women. Whether it's sexual or not (it isn't always), young men are thirsty for female attention and chase it very, very hard.

The fact that their first instinct to oppose him is to open up a lawsuit is telling. It may have been more effective in a previous era, but it relied on a high-trust society which saw the institutions of government as legitimate. They really have absorbed the Asimovian morality of 'violence is the last resort of the incompetent', but hoping that historical forces give you victory isn't strategy. It's not even tactics. It's assuming that the universe will award you with moral victories without developing virtue.

I imagine that filing a lawsuit to overturn an executive order is a delicate business. If an ordinary lawyer tries it, their case will be promptly dismissed. Only the top, expensive lawyers get hearings for fancy legal theories leading to restraining orders against government actions.

Expensive lawyers. These lawsuits may become rare if the dark money from USAID and elsewhere dries up.

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