Sailor socialist girl doesn’t care, and it’s not about economic systems

The conversation in the last post turned towards what “socialist” and “feminist” identifying girls mean… and the answer is usually, “not much,” because most conversations are about expressing feelings and hierarchy… the number of “socialists” who even understand what that entails is minimal. When she says she’s a socialist, she’s expressing what she sees as a “caring” underlying value and framing you as “uncaring” by comparison. The number of people interested in ideas is small. A lot of male nerd engineers treat all conversations like engineering problems and consequently don’t get laid much because their engineering mindset, while important at school and work, repels feelings-based women.

When she says she’s a socialist… she doesn’t really care.

She’s not a policymaker.

Her vote doesn’t make a big difference in her life.

There’s a big gap between any functional country and Venezuela… it will take a really long time for any functional country to hit Venezuela or Soviet Union or Cuba levels… she wants to feel good, to feel taken care of, to make other people feel like they’ll be taken care of… Mark J says in the comments, “Debating Western girls like this, (usually white, middle class with a college education paid for by daddy who I guarantee you made his money in a very unsocialist fashion, is a waste of time.) The only appropriate response is to ignore her or ridicule her.” I disagree a bit… “ridicule” never changes minds and doesn’t get guys laid… “ignore her” makes more sense, particularly for a guy looking to get laid, not teach basic economics.

The liberal “socialist” girl has never started a business or worked in a true small business. She’s spent her entire life in big institutions that protect and cosset her and are functional “enough.” Now she works in marketing, another world that is very removed from the reality of creating new and valuable things or services. She is likely looking ultimately for a guy who will subsidize her and her children. To her, the “community property” mindset has always worked (well enough) and she thinks it will always work well enough. Her Dad and the state subsidized her growing up and in college… eventually a husband will come along to subsidize the rest of her life. If you think the conversation is about socialism, you’ve already lost.

Also, before you get too smug and superior about the “socialist” girl… the “conservative” man who succeeds well enough is somewhat similar… he has never felt the sting of racism, of driving while black… he will collect unemployment (from the evil government) when he needs it… he will collect social security when it’s time (just like Ayn Rand did)… he likes the government interventions into individual liberty that make him feel personally good… he is little more principled than the “socialist” girl. I could go on with his characteristics. Online, one sees many “conservative” guys adopt an isolationist mindset, ignoring the vast body of data showing that immigration is a huge benefit to Western countries. Immigrants and their children are far more entrepreneurial and hard working than native-born persons or those whose families have been in country for years. Human spirit is universal.

Same for the “Christian” when it is convenient to love Jesus, but who makes exceptions when they feel good. She gets pregnant! Time for a “Christian” guy to step up and take care of her, because she’s repented and been born again.

For most people… these things are all poses…

By the way… the same is true of the “tradcon” man or the “conservative” who adopts whatever shifting positions Fox News / Rush Limbaugh / the WSJ editorial page happens to be espousing today. 20 years ago those venues were pro-immigration cause the top of the right was… now they’re opposed because of the clown in office… tomorrow it’ll be something else… the number of people who have any consistency in their views is very small… most people hold “views” that are trying to signal their underlying values.

There is a huge number of guys in “game” or “red pill” who think that every guy should run away from any girl who says she’s a “feminist” or something. For most girls… it’s just a label… most girls are not like university spinsters who hate men… the exception is girls who have built their whole lives around being insane activists… if you run into a girl like, it’s time to flee.

If she prematurely claims she’s been raped… that’s also a no-go. There are a small number of ideologically strident and militant girls. An even smaller number of them are somewhat attractive. That number is so small that yes, if you find one, you should disengage from her/it.

Some problems have definite answers. If you are trying to understand why your database keeps falling over, you need to get the answer in order for your business/website work. There is a very strong link between the right answer and the quality of your life. How you feel is immaterial to whether your database works, your plane flies, your machine stamps, your electric motorcycle runs, etc. The further you get from technical questions, the less opinions link to reality, and the more people’s identity answers don’t matter too much. If you are on a date with a woman, your goal is to feed her typical chick crack feelings and emotions material… relationships, stories, drama, travel, dreams… with most chicks, the more concrete and logical you are in a romantic context, the more turned off she’ll be. If you listen to chicks talk, you’ll be amazed by how little informational content they have. If you listen to men talk, you’ll often find the opposite… “marketes are down by 1.1% today… under Smith’s leadership, Acme Company has seen sales improve by 12%…. Canon’s new camera offers 10-bit video, a huge improvement in image quality for your sex videos… let me show you how to fix that problem with your sink…”

I can’t tell you how many “feminist” girls can’t put up shelves… assemble basic furniture… fix their computers… etc. I’ve teasingly said to some girls, “A feminist should be able to check her own hard drive for space constraints, right?” Or diagnose a bad motherboard, etc. The true feminist is a programmer or engineer… funny how few of them there are in those fields, right…?

Very few people like “substance” conversations. If you want a girl who is substantive, you can look for her, but she’s rare… hot+substantive is even rarer… I’d say “hot+pleasant to be around” occur together often enough and is a much more common combination. People (male or female) also usually become more substantive as they get older… but prime time for women is their teens to late 20s… the mismatch is evident.

I missed it at first, but xsplat has an extended treatment of this issue… I think there’s some truth to this, “Many of us are sapio-sexual, and get more turned on by smart girls. I think that has to do with liking large breasts. Evolution noticed that smart girls make smarter babies which in turn are more likely to make surviving grandchildren,” although I wouldn’t call myself “sapiosexual.” For a man, attraction to intelligence probably depends on the context… for short-term hookups, it’s pretty irrelevant, but for longer-term relationships, it’s very important.

Back to the main point, most opinions are just random associations, random neurons firing. Sweaty virgin nerds like having “reasons” for opinions/views. Veteran chads realize that most opinions, particularly with chicks, are about generating good feelings. Save the fact talk for work.

Conversations are usually about generating alliances, not about developing a more truthful view of world (science is exceptional because it allows us to ascertain truth, regardless of whether it offends churches, leaders, popes, feminists, etc.). For that reason the institution of science is important. By the way, all you right-wingers, for some reason the modern right is now in science denial about climate change, since the reality of doing something about climate change will affect big corporations like Exxon and General Motors, both of which work very hard to influence your minds… and it works… and a lot of guys online are just like socialist girls, when it comes to confronting realities they don’t like… I’m not saying right and left are equally delusional… but both wings have their tribal moments where they ignore reality.

Author: The Red Quest

How can we live and be in society?

26 thoughts on “Sailor socialist girl doesn’t care, and it’s not about economic systems”

  1. Honestly I laugh every time someone brings up the “duh Venezuela” talking point when arguing against socialism. It just shows how well they have been trained, just like Pawlows dogs.

    What many guys on the right don’t get, is that what they deem desireable economically is undermining what they deem desireable socially. Unrestricted capitalism with, for example, lax labour laws and no government support means people can be easily fired and have to constantly move cities when loosing their job. Makes it hard for a man to start and support a family. And there are more examples, e.g. capitalists hate local traditions and habits, makes trade harder. Hence you will often find an erosion of local customs over time, the more capitalism is unrestricted.

    For guys on the left, it’s often the reverse. They don’t get that what they deem desireable socially is often undermining their economic vision. Women entering the workforce, for example, and putting off getting a child in exchange for a career. Naturally beloved by capitalists, because increasing the size of the workforce keeps labour power and wages in check.

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Tyler, I’ve never heard someone make this point so clearly, but it’s something that I’ve intuitively felt for a long time. Is there a source to this, or just your synthesis of a lot of stuff you’ve read? It’s rare I read such an insightful comment. Thank you.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. Thanks for the positive comment. I’m sure I picked it up somewhere, but I cannot recall any specific source.
        I read a lot of books on economics in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis and it made me skeptical of unfettered capitalism. And reading about red pill topics made me skeptical of a lot of social issues from the left.
        Regarding the economics, if you are interested and can find the time, there is a school of sociology called “Economic sociology”, which I think has a much more realistic view on how the economy actually works compared to economists themselves, who often start with completely unrealistic assumptions and then analyze everything through that lense. A nice introductory book is by a fella named Geoffrey Ingham and is simply called ‘Capitalism’. I think it’s available on Amazon and elsewhere.

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  2. Yeah, look I don’t recommend ridiculing girls you’re trying to sleep with but reading through the lines it sounded like XBT was trying to have a logical, reasoned discussion with the girl, so I assumed seduction was not his motivation. If it was, then needless to say, logic and reason should not have been the starting point.. The Venezuala comment was flippant and for sure its a right wing trope so throwing it in there was a bit lazy. Truth is I’ve never voted in my life (49 years old) and I think taking politics seriously is a complete waste of time. Trump is a moron, Biden clearly isn’t all there and the US is simply too big to govern effectively. I’m somewhere in the top 2-3% income / wealth distribution but I know current inequalities are unsustainable. Why anyone would want to be publicly wealthy right now is beyond me. The mob will be coming for them with pitchforks sooner or later. The tradcons are just as delusional as the sjw’s ever were. BLM missed a massive opportunity to own the narrative by focusing on an issue that almost everyone agreed with, (that kneeling on a man’s neck for 9 minutes is abhorrent and indicative of huge moral failings within police enforcement) but instead push defund the police messages, endorse the abandonment of traditional patriarchy and family structure in their manifesto and conveniently forget that the vast majority of black men are killed by other black men. Coleman Hughes amongst others has written excellent, informative pieces about these issues. Overall, it feels to me like we are in a bit of a mania (read Bari Weiss’s resignation letter from the NYTimes) and I am in the process of significantly culling my Twitter Feed to tune out as much political crap as I can and focus solely on the subjects that matter to me.. (Finance / BJJ / Player blogs) None of the other stuff makes anyone happy and in that sense I am on page with Blackdragon. Getting into debates about politics with all women and almost all men (even as an intellectual inquiry) is a waste of time.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Mark you hit the nail on the head. RQ, as always I agree with almost everything you said, but I think my point might have been missed. I was just talking to a coworker of my girlfriend. We’re in an open relationship but fucking her coworker would be bordering on insanity. Seduction wasn’t my goal. Also, for context, I’m a wealthy Ivy league educated Black man who voted for Hillary Clinton, a veritable unicorn in Red Pill land. I want to go back to my original point, which was not about socialism or feminism. My point was, she was smart, well educated, and making logically inconsistent statements. This is true of a lot of the people I spend time with in NYC. There are almost as many morons on the Left now as Trump voters on the right. Let’s swap her gender and assume it’s a man if that makes the question more clear. The question is, how does one not get cynical, angry, bitter when one meets new people and grows ones social circle. For me, the idiocy tends to be more common when I’m engaging with women, but men are not immune. The older I get the more naïveté frustrates me and I find myself enjoying conversation much less than I used to (very extroverted by nature with a large social circle). So the question to RQ/commenters is, how does one avoid being a know it all dickhead, and continue to find joy in meeting new people and engaging as peoples ability to think seems to crumble the older/wiser you get. I’m in my late 30’s and I didn’t feel this way 10 years ago most likely because I was the one lacking wisdom and an ability to think. I’m more critical of new people I meet and really struggle to engage when I hear some of the nonsense people start parroting from social media. Again, I’m talking about how to balance acquiring wisdom over time with handling others lack of wisdom, not some autistic loner asking for advice on how to make friends. There’s some quote to the effect of “would you rather be right or happy”, and I want to make sure I’m not the guy who ends up knowing all the answers but is hanging out with myself at my 50th birthday party.

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      1. I feel ya. The only method that I know of is to get older. Grandparents tend to have that kind of kindly attitude towards ignorance that you seem to wish for. That attitude might be biologically built in to start to be come more accessible the older you get.

        Liked by 1 person

      2. Fair, and true… I think I projected or imputed way too much… apologies for that. The overall points in the posts aren’t bad ones, I’d say, although they don’t apply to the comment left.

        >>My point was, she was smart, well educated, and making logically inconsistent statements

        Yeah… and those can be lightly and socially intelligently probed in a date.

        >> The question is, how does one not get cynical, angry, bitter when one meets new people and grows ones social circle

        A good one… and one worth its own post… I don’t have a perfect answer… one part of the answer might be that I try to accept people as they are, or as they are capable of becoming, which, for most people… is not that great/high.

        Thx for the comments in general btw, they are consistently good and interesting.

        >>There’s some quote to the effect of “would you rather be right or happy”, and I want to make sure I’m not the guy who ends up knowing all the answers but is hanging out with myself at my 50th birthday party.

        I hear you there. I had some know-it-all-itis when I was younger. Never in a terrible, debilitating way… but enough to know it was there…

        Liked by 1 person

    2. >>Yeah, look I don’t recommend ridiculing girls you’re trying to sleep with but reading through the lines it sounded like XBT was trying to have a logical, reasoned discussion with the girl, so I assumed seduction was not his motivation

      You’re correct that I missed this nuance and consequently didn’t respond optimally…

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  3. Seeing as Ill be 50 next year, perhaps I can be of service with a few thoughts
    1 – Accept that your circle will get smaller as you get older. Your time becomes more valuable, hanging out with marginal people makes less sense and your patience for anyone not positively contributing to your life goes down Other people invariably drop off the radar as they get preoccupied with their own lives / families
    2 – Join single focused clubs / activities.. I recently started BJJ (now stopped due to COVID) and enjoyed the complete lack of politics / finance / women talk.. Its just guys training / hanging out and talking about BJJ
    3 – Have a kid (assuming you don’t have one) My son is 18 and fulfills a huge portion of my need for social interaction, validation, love, care whatever you want to call it. Between him and 3 close friends I do not feel in need of meeting new people. Which leads to ..
    4 – Accept that as you get older it gets harder to meet new people. I enjoy commenting on RQ largely because Iget to interact with other men, whether or not I agree with everything they say is irrelevant to me. Where else am I able to get into spirited debate with men I don’t know.
    5 – Find a niche and be a leader in it. RQ has shown the way here with his blog and focus on sex clubs and non monogamy. Men now come to him for advice and he is a leader in his niche. My understanding (correct me if I am wrong RQ) is that he has met In person and developed friendships with Some of the others in the community.
    6 – Wait for current hysteria to blow over. As I said before this has the feel of a mania and manias never end. sooner or later people will forget about politics and go back to living their lives.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Well said Mark. One thing I want to figure out how to develop, is a more robust system of intergenerational conversation. With the exception of father -> son relationship, very little wisdom is passed between generations. Most people only interact with people their own age (with any level of depth). The “non-monogamy” scene has actually been useful to be from that perspective. I’ve made some genuine friendships with guys who are older and in different stages of life that I can learn from.
      1,2,4,5 are great points. Acceptance has value. I spend a lot of time trying to optimize and fight things which might be inevitable. Maybe wisdom/growth is understanding that life changes and that certain phases are what they are.
      3. I’m curious how you see life evolving as your son leaves the nest?
      6. What’s your vision for how this ends? One thing that’s been profound for me that I learned from trading, has been that all assets trade in cycles, rather than the linear view of time typically taught by Western thinkers. Nature, and most things organic also are cyclical. “The Fourth Turning” I found to be a compelling argument for us being at the end of the current 100 year cycle, as well as Ray Dalio’s writing over the past few years. How long do you think the mania will last, and do we have a revolution, or an evolution.
      I’d also love to hear your view on how BLM missed the boat. I think we most likely agree, but probably have slightly different takes.

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      1. >>Well said Mark. One thing I want to figure out how to develop, is a more robust system of intergenerational conversation. With the exception of father -> son relationship, very little wisdom is passed between generations

        I think the big problem here involves books… the main way information/knowledge gets passed is via books… at the same time, though, lots of people never write down what they know, or these days digitize it by talking into a mic, or being interviewed.

        Until recently, too, the publishing industry was a narrow focal point controlling the dialogue. The game is very old, but The Game, as articulated by Neil Strauss, only came out in 2007 or somewhere like that. Men have been seducing women since the beginning of the human species… yet the Internet allows us to talk to each other as never before. Red Quest blog, started by some guy with some weird sex obsessed interests, now has 500,000 page views… far more reach than I could ever get talking to guys… and the guys who are interested in fucking a lot can identify one another… https://theredquest.wordpress.com/2020/02/07/write-your-player-blog-its-an-advertisement-but-not-in-the-way-you-think/

        Liked by 1 person

    2. Fair comments… I’d say that a social circle doesn’t HAVE to become smaller, although it defaults that way. Agree though that it’s harder.

      I’m scared for the future of the world if I’m a leader.

      But… it is still surprising to me that more guys haven’t figured out what I’ve figured out, then written about it. Have met a couple guys from here.

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  4. RQ, is it possible to allow comments to be threaded more than the current amount? Looks like 3 deep is the current max nesting?

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  5. Man so much wisdom here it’s hard to know where to start–first let me just say that I found all the comments to be insightful to a large degree, true, well thought out, and nuanced, which seems rare these days.
    Many of you touched on some things I’ve been thinking, but don’t think I’ve written, or said out loud.

    One of the big issues we’re dealing with as a society is that women are now, for all intents and purposes, equal to men in terms of legal, economic, and political rights–which I have no issue with–however, women were not raised to accept the responsibility that comes with such freedom. RQ has a post “even women don’t think women can make adult decisions” and he was spot on. Whatever rights and freedoms women now have–and I think one could make the argument they may have surpassed men in terms of privilege, particularly middle to upper class white women–we don’t expect them to accept a commensurate level of responsibility and agency for their choices or their outcomes. Men don’t. And ironically, women’t don’t either. A big part of this is that we still coddle and shelter women from life’s realities in a way that is just not true for men.
    So sure: if you’re a hot 23 year old chick, you can go to Aziz Ansari’s apt, suck his dick, let him go down on you, and then decide for whatever reason you don’t want to have sex, so he stops and calls an Uber, and then people still take you seriously when you try to frame it as sexual assault–when any objective observer would note that this is explicitly not an example of sexual assault and Ansari could not possibly be expected to read her intentions any other way than what he did.
    My friend recently found out his wife was cheating on him and they’re now getting divorced, and as we were talking today, I couldn’t figure out why it was it bothers me so much when wives cheat, but not husbands…and I finally figured it out: it’s because a husband who cheats KNOWS he’s doing something wrong. He knows he’s a scumbag, and he knows if he’s caught he’ll be in real trouble with no one to blame but himself.
    However, typically when a woman cheats on her husband, even though she knows it’s wrong, she’ll twist it so that it’s somehow not her fault, and often go one step further to claim it’s the fault of her husband. Like, my friend’s wife and her friends would actually sit around on girl’s weekends or cocktail hour and talk bout how they were cheating on their husbands and it was all perfectly justified and understandable.
    Now, maybe some guys would do that same thing–but no one I know would. Even guys who are players in this community would tell me I shouldn’t cheat on my wife, especially if I had young kids, nor would I get a pass on responsibility. If a man tried to claim it was his wife’s fault he cheated, people would laugh or get angry or both. But when it’s a woman, watch chicks come out of the woodwork to justify it on her behalf, then take the guy’s money and kids to boot.
    Another thing re: how relative equality for women affects society, is that we are an extraordinarily unequal, decadent society, and I wonder if that is in large part because women like nice things and they like to have fun. And so to get chicks, who are far more materialistic and driven by entertainment than men (we like to build things or compete, more than simply have fun), men have to become materialistic and driven by entertainment as well.
    It also strikes me that the sort of society that poo-poos reading books, intellectual discussion, a genuine debate on political policy, and free speech is a deeply unserious one that is setting itself up for disaster–and what do you know? Here comes COVID. But why would people, particularly men, value those things when anyone who talks about it publicly is thought of as a bore and serious intellectual pursuits dry pussy up like an 80 year drought?

    On the point that the current anti-intellectual trend will eventually eat itself, which I think Mark brought up, I agree, but I don’t think that’s going to go away anytime soon and there will continue to be a lot of casualties along the way, like what happened with Ansari, and other people who’ve been canceled or who’ve lost jobs or status due to the current ridiculous social movement.
    View at Medium.com
    Part of the problem inherent to this is that being “anti-racist”, “feminist”, or an SJW are framed as intellectual. The term “woke” is a nod to that–that somehow these pursuits give one an edge in IQ or knowledge that should be seen as a good thing.
    However, as any truly intelligent, well-read person can easily see, these are distinctly anti-intellectual, anti-science movements that are often completely divorced from reality. Take either of the two books I regularly see people virtue signal about on IG or Facebook as “must reads” for white people: White Fragility, by Robin DiAngelo, and How to be an Anti-Racist by Ibram X Kendi.
    In both cases the authors are praised as a light in the darkness helping us move forward, but if one looks at what these people are actually saying, the thesis of either book can only be described as absurd. These people are charlatans profiting off of stupidity, and the fact so many people are praising them shows that a lot of very “woke”, intellectual white people are actually morons who understand nothing about how the world works or what it would take to move forward in terms of race in this country. Mark also mentioned Coleman Hughes–he’s fantastic–anyone who doubts what I said should listen to his takedown of both books in a recent podcast Q & A he did. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/q-a-with-coleman-hughes-bonus/id1489326460?i=1000479492292
    XBTUSD you asked Mark where he thinks BLM missed the boat–I’ll bite.
    Should there be police reform? Yes. Is racism a problem? Yes.
    But what would actually benefit African Americans far more than defunding police is free college, better schools in inner city neighborhoods, single payer or very low cost health care (I know RQ is opposed, but to me it’s long past due), doing something about the number of handguns floating around in our society, more low cost housing, a robust system of tutoring and mentoring for kids, more playgrounds and parks, and ending the war on drugs and long, cruel prison sentences. Any of those changes would do far more to improve the life of the average black person than police reform, as obvious as that now seems.
    Anyway, I think the current culture of “wokeness” will eventually eat itself, as the distillation of this toxic ideology become ever more extreme and people start to accuse each other, and organizations and businesses break down and collapse as a result…but it’s going to take a while.

    On politics, to return to game, what any player should want is a capitalist society where there’s abundant economic opportunity, a generous social safety net, relative equality compared to what we have now, and a far higher level of social cohesion. Like XBTUSD, I voted for Clinton in 2016 and I’ll vote for Biden in 2020–not because I’m necessarily enamored with Democrats, but because he seems more capable of dealing with COVID than Trump, and the faster we get back to state of normalcy and calm, the easier it will be to get back to game and seducing women.
    One point, however, that seems totally lost on Democrats are the social issues, specifically re: men and women being very, very different, and recognizing those differences as opposed to pretending everyone’s the same and gender is a construct. Since swallowing TRP, I’ve come to empathize and understand why guys like Trump, or at least feel compelled to vote for him, because what they see on the other side is a social movement that is totally unhinged from reality and unwilling to acknowledge basic facts that anyone who’s alive can see as clearly as the blue sky above.

    Last point I’ll make is that I think this is how we contribute and build bridges to the younger generation–particularly young men, who need leaders more now than ever. I very much agree with Mark: have kids. They’re beautiful, and even though it eats up a lot of my time, I love my son and find it extremely fulfilling to spend time with him and watch him grow.

    Goddamn that was a lot. I guess I could’ve published that on my blog, but the conversation seemed more relevant here. Thanks for starting the discussion RQ. And again, very much enjoyed everyone’s takes.

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    1. This is probably the best discussion I’ve ever seen on a blog comments section. Thanks for joining in.
      RQ had a post a while back about attractive women essentially being handed a million dollars when they turn 18 and having no ability to manage that money. I thought it was a profound point, and was something I knew, but the analogy really crystalized the point. Another analogy I would make is to the training/discipline someone needs before they use a firearm. The army actually does a good job with this IMO. We hand women the equivalent of an assault rifle at 18, and we’re all surprised when they kill a bunch of people. At the same time, we also recognize there’s no way they could have been expected to handle that level of responsibility without any training, and so we coddle and excuse their behavior. And the school shootings continue month after month.
      Totally agree re:the cheating. The RP community went nuts over the Jada Pinkett Smith/Will Smith thing recently. And While I think a lot of the chatter is stupid, the core point is valid. If you reverse the genders in that video, it would seem insane. The Jada was a man she would have been DESTROYED by the culture. Full cancel.
      I added Coleman to my podcast app, will check out the one you referenced.
      The interesting thing to me about the White Fragility thing is that I actually think the core point is directionally correct. It’s something I deal with a lot in my life. I’m surrounded by white people who think they’re super woke. I’m the last person that walks around calling everybody racist, but holy shit try talking to white people about race, they absolutely cannot handle it. And yet, I hate her, and I hate anybody who starts with a logical argument structure that says, I accuse you of X, if you dispute X, that’s proof that you are doing X. It’s a tautology and I reject out of hand anyone who speaks this way. A lot of the SJW shit uses similar rhetorical devices to force people into conceding stuff that they feel backed into a corner on.
      Re: how this all ends. I think anyone with a brain can see that the left is destroying itself. It makes me really sad.
      I fantasize about voting for Trump just because I hate what the left has become. Joe Biden saying I’m not black if I don’t vote for him? Are you fucking kidding me? And yet I don’t think I’ve ever despised a human being the way I do Trump, so Biden it will be.
      Agree re:leaders. I’ve been doing a lot of writing, but haven’t published any of it with the exception of a small community of smart people I trust to be able to debate taboo topics without being cancelled.
      On BLM. A few points:
      One) I agree with everything you said, but agree with Mark’s comment also. I don’t think it’s an either or. The Black family was destroyed by this country, to save it, you’d need to provide the stuff you mentioned. And yet without strong families it is just “rearranging deck chairs” (great expression BTW Mark). I’m pretty hopeless about the plight of Black people in America, I don’t see it ever changing, but I’ll continue to work to change it.
      Two) I think a lot about systems. BLM and the debate about policing in many ways seems like the systems attempt to not change. Policing is the most visible manifestation of a societies ills, the violent manifestation of the state solving problems it created. So it becomes a focal point when societies fail its citizens. It’s a head fake, everybody look over here, so that we can waste a bunch of energy debating a point that won’t solve anything. All the rich liberal idiots I live with in NYC can scream and carry on and feel like they are the “good” white people, while never actually giving anything up to change the system. They don’t actually want the system to change. They just don’t want to feel guilty about participating in a fucked up system. As long as there are “racist” cops, the system survives because the energy for change can be directed and focused on things that will not change the system. The system is similar to our bodies. It deploys antibodies and white bloods cells when it gets attacked, and we all think BLM is the attack on the system, but actually it’s the systems defense against real change.
      Thanks for the rec on kids. I have some health issues right now that preclude that, but hoping that will change. Still not sure even if that did resolve, so good to hear from older wiser folks.
      I am somewhat hopeful that places like this can be repositories of knowledge that the older and wiser can compile and pass down to the younger and dumber.

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      1. “Another thing re: how relative equality for women affects society, is that we are an extraordinarily unequal, decadent society, and I wonder if that is in large part because women like nice things and they like to have fun. And so to get chicks, who are far more materialistic and driven by entertainment than men (we like to build things or compete, more than simply have fun), men have to become materialistic and driven by entertainment as well.
        It also strikes me that the sort of society that poo-poos reading books, intellectual discussion, a genuine debate on political policy, and free speech is a deeply unserious one that is setting itself up for disaster–and what do you know? Here comes COVID. But why would people, particularly men, value those things when anyone who talks about it publicly is thought of as a bore and serious intellectual pursuits dry pussy up like an 80 year drought?”

        Oh also, I wanted to add another point I forgot. I went to a recent talk by Esther Perel, who is a genius. She’s workshopping her new material about masculinity. Her essential point is that masculinity is a prison, and growing the space for what it means to be masculine would benefit both men and women. I asked a question at the end which was essentially “What role do women have in creating this new masculinity? Men respond to what women select for.” She gave a sort of hand wavy answer which didn’t satisfy me. I have since said to many female friends who complain about “toxic masculinity” that if tomorrow women said they’d only have sex with men who wore pink shirts all pink shirts would be sold out instantly. In many ways women define masculinity because they are the sexual selectors. They only have themselves to blame for male behavior and if they stopped having sex with people who behaved in a way they defined as toxic, the behavior would end nearly overnight. But they don’t want to actually change, they want to complain, and not take any responsibility for their role in creating the world. I’ve also recently been trying to explain to female friends who ask for my dating advice that they have agency even in contexts where they don’t see themselves as agency. The way hetero dating is defaulted to in America where women are essentially “interviewing” the guy is so bad for them long term because it teaches them that they have to just “hope” that the guy does what they want. HE is the one that is taught agency and responsibility to create the outcome he wants. SHE just crosses her fingers not realizing that there are TWO people on the date with agency and a responsibility to create fun/romance/sex. While it’s “harder” for the guy, in the long run, he builds the skills, her brain atrophies and it becomes pervasive in other parts of her life. Women don’t believe they have agency, and we set the bar lower and lower for them. When you don’t expect much of people, they don’t expect much of themselves. Similar to how I see some of the problems with Black Americans and the messaging from the left.

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      2. >> I’m surrounded by white people who think they’re super woke. I’m the last person that walks around calling everybody racist, but holy shit try talking to white people about race, they absolutely cannot handle it

        The weird thing is that the woke people try to be so anti-racist that they merge back into being racist. I just tweeted https://twitter.com/ryanlongcomedy/status/1285208497517473793 which is a good humorous depiction of this. Also, trying to lump many millions of people into one big category is inane IMO.

        It’s very hard to avoid identity based attacks… anonymous Internet can be good for that reason, cause you have to think about what’s being said more than who’s saying it.

        Overall I buy the idea that it’s not possible in most cases to push top-down functionality from large units of government to individuals/families. One big problem I see with family formation today and really for the last few decades is that men are poorly incentivized to marry, and women are poorly incentivized to stay marry. A guy who wants a lot of sex is better off getting jacked and learning game than marrying. A woman who is married has a 50% financial option on her husband. Then we are surprised people don’t get and stay married???

        I actually think this is a more universal issue, or class one, more than black/white, although incarcerating so many black guys has been terrible for black families…

        >>I am somewhat hopeful that places like this can be repositories of knowledge that the older and wiser can compile and pass down to the younger and dumber.

        I think the books will endure longer… maybe… hard to say… I’m not sure red quest will go on indefinitely… probably not…

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  6. XBT where do I start…
    First off I guess I should provide some context. I have a mixed race 18 year old son (mother Caribbean American). Anyone with kids will tell you that their son’s / daughter’s future is the No 1 priority in their life. If I thought for a second that BLM were doing anything significant to bring about constructive change that would make my son safer in the long run. I would support them in a heartbeat. Shit, I’d probably send them money. Needless to say. I don’t and I haven’t.
    I’ll start with leadership. Somebody please tell me when I google BLM founders its 3 women. (One of whom is married to a white transexual man. ) Black women have a mildly higher chance of getting killed by police than white women which is to say .. almost zero. For context white men are killed by cops at a rate over 10 times that of black women. The two men most associated with BLM, Sean King (who looks practically white) and DeRay McKesson (who is clearly gay) could not be less representative of the black men I know who have had issues with cops (including my son)
    RP while your points are well taken I actually think they are all some form of rearranging deck chairs. Nothing changes until the black family is repaired. Nothing changes until we reverse the trend of fatherless black children. Fatherlessness is a disaster for any child. No matter what race. Tragically rather than reversing the trend, the data suggest that fatherlessness is increasing across all races (other than Asians) and both whites and Hispanics are slowly closing the distance with black children in the wrong direction. Incredibly the BLM manifesto actually argues for the further destruction of the nuclear black family and all ‘western patriarchal’ structures. Again this is completely unrepresentative of the political desires and social views of any black people I know. But hey.. I haven’t visited the Berkeley campus recently !
    XBT I have more thoughts and am interested to hear your perspective but I’m wary of hogging the comments section here.. Feel free to email at markj5671@gmail.com

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    1. *Somebody please tell me WHY, when I google BLM founders its 3 women
      Maybe I’m an asshole / misogynist but the data show pretty clearly that women, irregardless of race are almost never killed by cops. To me this is another example of the modern females need for attention even in matters that aren’t actually about them. For an even more egregious example look at all the white women shaving their heads to ‘support’ BLM. I think its ‘performance activism’ and a lot of white liberals revel in that shit.
      I really don’t believe most of them actually know any black people, and no saying hi to Kevin from accounting every day doesn’t count. But its clear to me they’ve never been to a regular black family house. Or had a real friend who was actually black.
      It explains the weird occurrence of famous white liberals who’ve turned out to have done blackface. (Jimmy Kimmell, Jimmy Fallon, Justin Trudeau) If you grew up or around black people I cannot see how it would even occur to you that blackface would be acceptable. And if it did even for a second, you would have a black friend to tell you ‘dude, wtf are you doing?’ But these guys were doing this shit in the late 90’s / early 2000’s !
      Anyway I’m curious to hear your opinion and if you think I am off base , don’t hesitate to tell me

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      1. Come in, there is nothing wrong with blackface. It’s the kind of thing one can do for a costume party or similar event. It’s not an attack on or making fun of actual black people – no more so than dressing up as a shepherd in a Christmas play is hurting actual shepherds. Or whatever is the PC word for Christmas these days.

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    2. Most of what I had to say I left in my comment to RP. Thanks for adding that context. Fatherlessness and the dissolution of the nuclear family seem to be a trend now that’s bifurcating the experiences of rich and poor. Marriage and a strong family are luxury goods these days. Very dark trend. I have not donated to BLM, nor will I ever. Performance activism is a cancer that crowds out all real change. I hate it, and everyone white person I know marinates in it for the simple reason that it is a shield, and avoids them having to DO anything.

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  7. @RQ fair point re:lumping people together, I think without the ability to do this though, you lose the ability to have conversations. And yes, that tweet is 100% on point. A lot of the stuff I hear from the wokest people is so insane it’s hard to believe they are saying it without a hint of irony or satire.
    Your point about pseudonymous accounts being a good way to have conversations because one has to focus on content rather than trying to attack the identity of the messenger is an interesting one. Hadn’t thought about that. I use my real identity 99% of the time. As cancel culture has been ramping up, I’ve become much more interested in developing pseudonymous identities for engaging.

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