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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   26074 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 4, 2023

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Continuing the gymnastics analogy, Aella had recently an interview on trigonometry where she said she vastly prefers escorting and prostitution compared to factory work she used to do when very young, which made her drink too much. Where does the shielding end?

I agree with the OP that this is question of conceptual core beliefs and morality. I think that what we are going through a phase where we will see what are the real consequences of of shredding the old moral principles and replacing them with what we have now. What I find interesting is that between people like Rationalists, Sam Harris and even New Left the common theme seems to be pedestalization of maximizing utils, which means something like "minimizing suffering" as the new ultimate value. The methods may be different - rationalists prefer to think about themselves as professional surgeons who know how to not get emotions in their way. They know what is moral and they will do what is necessary to minimize suffering and maximize flourishing. The new left on the woke side pedestalizes compassion above everything else. They also want to maximize minimize suffering by means of compassionate justice.

I think this morality and aesthetics will bring us ruin, I do not think it is workable as a society-wide system. I agree with the OP that the whole theology is absolutely wrong, the focus on utils and compassion as the highest aim is not only wrong, but I think it is unstable as it was the result of the previous moral system.

Continuing the gymnastics analogy, Aella had recently an interview on trigonometry where she said she vastly prefers escorting and prostitution compared to factory work she used to do when very young, which made her drink too much. Where does the shielding end?

She seems like a very unusual person, and also I don't fully trust her. She seems exaggerate a lot for the sake of building up her rep.

This is something that will obviously vary a lot from person to person. But for what it's worth, I actually sorta got involved in a relationship with a prostitute last year. It didn't last long, but we're still friends, and I got to see how it affected her. Her normal sex drive was completely gone, she was good at faking it but she felt nothing. She was very happy to get away from anything like a "party" and just do normal stuff with me. She's since left that work and seems happier now just doing a low-wage regular job, even though it pays less.

They also want to maximize suffering by means of compassionate justice.

Care to explain?

I don’t think you could find a “new left”ist who would say compassionate justice is intended to make anyone suffer. You can surely find ones who’d say any increased suffering (by the outgroup) would be justified by reduced suffering among the ingroup—but then you’re back to an offshoot of normal moral reasoning.

Typo, I wanted to say they want to minimize suffering of course. Thanks.

Aella had recently an interview on trigonometry where she said she vastly prefers escorting and prostitution compared to factory work she used to do when very young, which made her drink too much. Where does the shielding end?

If 'shielding our children from future harm' is the excuse we need to bring back a strong labor movement and make factory work less stressful and soul-crushing, then it's a weird attack vector but I'm all for it.

Also: When you seriously write the words 'My opponents want to maximize suffering' is approximately the point where you should take step back from teh keyboard, look at yourself in the mirror, and ask whether you might possibly be stuck in a filter bubble that's giving you wildly uncharitable beliefs about other human beings.

I do think that my opponent's policies and behaviors cause more suffering than my side's policies and behaviors on average, but I would never say they want to maximize suffering! That's not even cartoon supervillain, it's literally cartoon Satan (because even the 'real' Satan is more nuanced than that!).

make factory work less stressful and soul-crushing

How exactly would you do this? To make it even more difficult, what steps would you take that don't just distill down to "work less"?

I dunno, I've never worked in a factory! Probably look at the website of any union of factory workers and they'll have a list of demands that make up a good start.

'Work less' is a perfectly fine answer, the division of profit between workers and capitalists is a variable ratio that's unusually high right now, every historical reason to expect that we could lower it by paying more money for less work without causing any problems.

But if you're rejecting that, there's still huge variance in how terrible a job is along other axes, things like how much autonomy and flexibility workers have, how they are treated by management, are they allowed to go to the bathroom, etc.

Again, see any factory worker's union demands, not my area.

Not that person, but below are several steps that immediately come to mind. "Work less" is also a valid answer to avoid damaging people's bodies and minds.

Allowing chairs for all positions it is safe to do so in. There's a lingering boomer right stigma against letting people sit down while doing their jobs even when it is unnecessary for them to stand. Making folks stand for no reason other than elite aesthetic sensibilities is just a petty humiliation for being working class, wears people out quicker, is harder on older folks and those with flat feet and so on.

More rotation of roles, re-skilling rather than de-skilling, so you're not stuck performing the exact same repetitive motion all day every day for life, or so hyper specialized that if the factory closes you have no transferable skills. Maybe Monday it's machine x, Tuesday machine y and so on.

Letting people listen to music, podcasts, etc using work issued headsets that are interrupted by safety alarms and the like. Cuban cigar factories also had (have?) highly popular lectors that would read books and newspapers aloud to the workers so they weren't bored to death. You had completely illiterate people enjoying and discussing literary classics.

Having workers clock-in on arrival before performing long security checks, gearing up and so on rather than wasting time at work unpaid during preparations.

Good points! I was pushing back a little since there are limits to how fun and creative you can make factory work, but I've always loved watching videos of how they function.

There's obviously some low-hanging fruit at many of them. Even adequate/pleasant lighting is something it seems like many miss.

Nobody wants to literally maximize everyone's suffering, but plenty of people want to drastically increase the suffering of specific groups.

Looks like OP just made a typo and has edited it.

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