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See, that’s what the app is perfect for.

Sounds perfect Wahhhh, I don’t wanna
sinesalvatorem
sinesalvatorem

Francois and David are what you could loosely characterize as “libertarian” in their world view, and we often argue about the role of government in society. One particular “clash” stands out in my mind, because it helped me crystalize my thinking on this matter. So we were talking while eating lunch at the Taco Bell in downtown Monterey of all places. Suddenly David, a man in his sixties, excused himself, got up, and ran outside. What had happened was that he had seen several young men bullying and roughing up another young man, and David had gone to intervene.

In thinking about what David had done, I finally understood how he and other libertarians could see their vision of limited government as a viable means of running a society. Such a society would be entirely workable if most people behaved like David!

- Jonathan Lipow

It’s always a pleasant surprise when, instead of saying “libertarians are libertarian because they don’t care if other people suffer”, an opponent of libertarianism says “libertarians are libertarian because they think other people care about helping others as much as they do”.

mitigatedchaos

Isn’t this true of nearly all ideologies? That if they were practiced by good people in good faith, they’d work an awful lot better?

politics
sinesalvatorem
sinesalvatorem

Francois and David are what you could loosely characterize as “libertarian” in their world view, and we often argue about the role of government in society. One particular “clash” stands out in my mind, because it helped me crystalize my thinking on this matter. So we were talking while eating lunch at the Taco Bell in downtown Monterey of all places. Suddenly David, a man in his sixties, excused himself, got up, and ran outside. What had happened was that he had seen several young men bullying and roughing up another young man, and David had gone to intervene.

In thinking about what David had done, I finally understood how he and other libertarians could see their vision of limited government as a viable means of running a society. Such a society would be entirely workable if most people behaved like David!

- Jonathan Lipow

It’s always a pleasant surprise when, instead of saying “libertarians are libertarian because they don’t care if other people suffer”, an opponent of libertarianism says “libertarians are libertarian because they think other people care about helping others as much as they do”.

mitigatedchaos

Isn’t this true of nearly all ideologies? That if they were practiced by good people in good faith, they’d work an awful lot better?

politics
slatestarscratchpad

57dimensions asked:

Do you ever prescribe Ritalin/Adderall for excessive daytime sleepiness? Just curious how common a practice it is, because before my psychiatrist prescribed it for me I didn't know that was a legitimate reason to give stimulants.

slatestarscratchpad answered:

I’ve never done it, and I’d be reluctant to unless I’d done a really good job trying to find the source of the sleepiness (did someone screen you for sleep apnea?)

Even if I had to do something like this, I would probably try Wellbutrin or modafinil, on general “don’t prescribe Adderall if you can avoid it” principles, which I admit are not very scientifically backed.

mitigatedchaos

Regarding Adderall specifically, there is some evidence to indicate it can be damaging to nerve cell terminals, but I don’t have it on hand at the moment. Some detailed post on Quora went over it. The risk profile of Ritalin appears lower. If you message me later, I may be able to find the link.

funereal-disease
the-real-seebs

Okay, I think this needs to be clarified, since apparently people have sort of overlooked it:

It does not matter whether someone’s reasons for not wanting to have sex with you are good enough. They get to say no. Period. No exceptions. You don’t get to attack them or shame them for it. They just get to say “no”. It doesn’t matter whether they’re being transphobic, or racist, or sexist, or whatever else you think is wrong with their reasons. It doesn’t matter whether they’re crass and shallow and materialistic, or holding the world to unreasonable standards, or anything else.

If someone doesn’t want to have sex with you, you do not get to harass them for being wrong.

iopele

if they don’t consent, that is the end of it!

funereal-disease

Caveat: you never get to harass someone for the act of saying no, but you can certainly call out any hurtful actions they take in the process of saying no. If someone says “of course I’d never fuck you, you [slur]”, it’s not wrong to say “I respect your ‘no’, but that was nasty and uncalled for.”

Source: the-real-seebs gender politics
skiesalight

Fragile gender

aellagirl

You know a gender role is strict if people are scared of violating their role.

If you went to a young woman in a very conservative religious culture (like me when I was 17) and suggested to her things like:

*cutting her hair really short
*not having children
*not learning to cook/clean/sew 
*becoming a pastor of her church

Originally posted by nitratediva

She would probably tell you you’re insane and there’s no way she would do that. 

This is because, if she acts like this, she will have a harder time finding a mate. She’s been told all her life that men want a certain kind of woman, and if she is not that woman, she will die alone.

Whenever you see someone in a culture with a strong aversion to breaking their gender role - “I can’t have sex with a lot of men or I’ll be a slut!” then that is a sign that they are undergoing external pressure to behave that way in order to attract a mate - a reaction to “men want to have sex with younger, relatively inexperienced women”

So I don’t understand all of the comments about “fragile masculinity.” 

If masculinity is fragile, then it’s because men have been told their whole lives that women want a certain kind of man, and if he is not that man, then he will die alone.

I don’t understand the mockery. It should be replaced with sympathy. If you wouldn’t mock a young conservative girl for having fragile femininity, then you shouldn’t mock a young man who’s scared of wearing a skirt. He’s not just afraid that wearing a skirt will make him look silly, he’s afraid that if he wears a skirt, women will ridicule him and never be attracted to him again. And sadly, a lot of the, time he’s not wrong.

Originally posted by gurl

If you still don’t feel sympathy for this, imagine being asked to do something that you believe will render you unattractive to your desired gender. “Come on, what’s so bad about a face full of rampant acne?” “Hey, why are you scared of 250 extra pounds? Is your body image really so fragile?” 

It’s also interesting to note that women seem less afraid, in general, of violating their gender role than men are - which is why the concept of “fragile masculinity” is way more popular than “fragile femininity.” I also suspect that 100 years ago, this would not have been the case - that women’s gender roles would have been equally as strict as men’s (as evidenced by all those etiquette books on how to be a ‘proper woman’).

This seems to imply that more progress has been made into loosening women’s strict gender roles than has been made for men. 

Why do you think this is? 

skiesalight

It’s easier to loosen gender roles for women than for men because masculinity also circumscribes within it the span of all heroically admirable traits. Inner strength, ambition, risk-taking, decisiveness, independence, and command are all strongly coded masculine, and are also the traits that you see most often in the protagonists of any narrative. 


The heroic feminine is far more limited- I can only right now think of empathy and emotional resilience (which differs from inner strength in that it is displayed primarily to loved ones rather than to outgroup). These heroic traits tend to be assigned to beloved, but auxiliary characters, which necessarily draw less admiration. Some might argue wisdom to be an example of heroic feminine, but I think wisdom isn’t strongly gendered either way- while the wise woman is an acceptable expression of femininity, there are still more wise men represented. 

Moving from the conceptual to the practical, skills that are coded masculine are universally more respected than skills coded feminine. The oldest example of this is physical combat versus childcare. While you could argue that motherhood and childcare is well-venerated, it’s tiers below the glory found in violence. Even in the modern day, the humanities have become less valued as more women have moved into them, and STEM and entrepreneurship (which retain majority male population) are most respected. While being a doctor is respectable in the US, nations with majority female doctors respect and pay their doctors far less.

This extends even into personal interests- masculine-coded interests like sports and cars are treated as universal, or at least understandable and immune to critique in the mainstream. Meanwhile, feminine-coded interests such as fashion and makeup are seen as frivolous and vain. 

I feel the relationship between disrespect towards women themselves and disrespect towards feminine-coded skills, traits, and interests is, like most such things, a feedback loop with no clearly identifiable start or end. But I do hold that misogyny is at the root of women being able to buck their gender roles more easily than men.

mitigatedchaos

The trouble for a man staying in a female-dominated, or even gender-equal-population field, is that he cannot use it to demonstrate his masculinity.  If something is done 90% by women, then it cannot be used to prove manliness to women - after all, how can it separate him from them when they could do the exact same thing themselves!  (It might be the case that various LGBTQ women, don’t count for this psychologically/socially.)

My fear, not full-on belief, but fear, is that the reason things are this way is that a sufficiently large chunk of cis heterosexual women don’t actually want the situation to change, because their selection criteria are different from mens’.

My hope is that it’s going to collapse by women realizing that they can be attracted to men that break the traditional pattern, and eventually this will reach sufficient critical mass to collapse the culture’s self-reinforcing effect.  A lot of the conditions that created the current culture’s norms aren’t holding anymore.

But since the level of nature vs nurture is unknown, I don’t see that as guaranteed.  Transhumanism may ultimately render it irrelevant by the time it would normally take effect.

Source: aellagirl gender politics
writing-prompt-s
writing-prompt-s

Five years ago a young man went down into the haunted mines, promising to clear it of evil. Today he emerged, covered in ancient armour stained with the blood of unimaginable horrors, glowing of magic. He demands we dig deeper.

mitigatedchaos

“Finally, you’re back!”

Karlof stepped into the wooden mining shack.  The ancient metal of his armor, meant for a war forgotten by time, clanked as he walked inside.  The green patina of the armor was stained with the black blood of countless horrors.

Karlof looked over at the woman who welcomed him.  She sat in a wooden chair, gray hair coming down to her shoulders.  Her simple outfit looked worn from years of use.

“You can’t stay here,” Karlof said.  “We need to warn the village.  We must dig deeper into-”  After a moment, he looked at the woman again.

“Mom?”  He asked.

“We’ve been waiting for you for so long,” the woman said.  “They said you would come back soon.  Listen, Karl, a lot of things have changed since you were gone.  The government-”

But Karl didn’t wait.  If his mother was still alive, perhaps some of the others from the village might still be, too.  He opened the door, still expecting the charred remnants he had seen in the vision far below.

He was startled by the loud “FWEEEEEEEE” of a whistle.  The head of the whistleblower turned and faced him.  Two fiery orange eyes with pupils slitted like a cat’s drew his attention.  Above them, rising from the new woman’s head, rose two horns, curling backwards.  A pair of fangs pushed downwards from bored lips.  She was wearing a sturdy outfit of cloth and leather.

The horned woman looked back at him for a moment, before turning her head and shouting.  “Alright, ‘e’s out!  You can get back to digging!”  In the corner of his eye, Karlof saw the mass of some huge brass contraption move.

“What’s the meaning of this?!” he said, looking first at the horned woman and then at his mother.

“The government was taken over by these Otokyaryi, oh, several winters ago now.”  Said Karlof’s mother.

“We lost the war?”  Karl said the words, but after years of fighting in the dark recesses of the Underworld itself, he had almost entirely forgotten the fighting on the surface.

“No,” objected the horned woman.  “We bought this territory fair and square.”  She gestured in a “come here” motion with her hand.  “Now step on out of there.  We’re two million pounds overbudget and three months behind schedule.”

Karlof just stared back in disbelief.

“Well don’t just stand there looking at me,” said the horned woman.  “If this energy well isn’t finished and converting nightmares into crystal rock in the next three months, I’m going to get fired.  You didn’t think magic carpets fueled themselves, did you?”

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