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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 10, 2023

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So you'd happily pick one of the homeless women off the streets as a wife?

Uh, that's not the best way to interpret his statement and ask if he in particular is the guy who would go looking for marriageable homeless women.

Because I'd actually bet that there's probably SOME guys out there desperate enough to take that gamble. They almost certainly exist. The limiting factor is probably that for a woman to end up homeless she probably has mental issues and addiction severe enough to make her incapable of consenting to such a relationship or just simply refuse any offers.

The limiting factor is probably that for a woman to end up homeless she probably has mental issues and addiction severe enough to make her incapable of consenting to such a relationship or just simply refuse any offers.

Yeah - schizophrenia can do that. There are exceptions like women fleeing abusive situations and not being able to get IDs and shit like that. There's also homeless people (men and women, but mostly dudes) living on the streets in like Portland who choose to live that way or at least look functional enough to be able to hold down basic jobs and live in apartments. They don't smell, are wearing clean clothes, can hold a normal conversation with you...

Because I'd actually bet that there's probably SOME guys out there desperate enough to take that gamble. They almost certainly exist.

A data point: I linked this article about Aileen Wuornos (the USA's most infamous female serial killer) downthread. The article mentions that as a teenager and young adult, Wuornos was a homeless alcoholic who had numerous run-ins with the law, which did not prevent her from finding a husband at the age of 20. Granted, he took out a restraining order against her a few weeks later and had the marriage annulled, but nonetheless: a homeless alcoholic future serial killer (with a series of convictions under her belt and probably suffering from undiagnosed hereditary schizophrenia) was nonetheless able to find a husband. How many men meeting that description do you think would be able to secure that deal?

Did we ever get a diagnosis for Charlie Manson?

If you're going to say "a man who fails is a hopeless loser, a woman who fails can just get married", you have to deal with "and there's an example of a woman who failed".

'Oh women have it so easy and so soft' is a nice complaint, but there are women even the 'failure man' wouldn't touch with a bargepole.

And I think that is simply wrong.

Because no matter how hard up a given woman is there's going to be several guys in exactly the same situation who would absolutely give her a chance because there's no way they're finding anything else.

The stats are what they are, there's more homeless guys than women, so you think even a homeless woman is going to be without 'options' to the extent she has any desire?

Being able to have sex with someone is absolutely not the same thing as being able to marry them and use their resources. This seems like it should be blindingly obvious.

To the extent that she marries a homeless man, they're in the same situation, maybe he'll physically defend her if someone threatens her, but that's about it. "You can just get married" [to a person who's likely even worse off than yourself, and might beat you] is not much of a consolation prize.