3 Responses to “The world we live in”

• #1

  Steven

  January 11, 2023 at 6:12 pm

  I’m going to disagree with the commentator here.

  First, it’s not obvious that anything in the world has changed. I suspect those angry, unsocialized, misogynistic young men have been there all along–since the dawn of the species. I would hazard that the only thing that has changed is their visibility. People like that used to be somewhat isolated and ignored by society at large. Today they have voice and visibility on the internet, and people like Tate who draw attention from the mainstream press.

  Second, blaming this on porn is too easy; too simplistic. If we think that something substantive has changed, then we need to be looking for substantive causes. Porn is not substantive. Porn is a mirror–you see what you want to see. Porn is–at most–a second-order effect. Porn is the comic-book panic updated for the 21 century. If you want to argue that porn is driving these attitudes and behavior then you need evidence, and it’s just not there.

  Here’s a different theory. Up until the 20th century, a woman really could not survive on her own. She needed a man for income and protection. Men competed with each other for women, but in the end every man could have a woman because every woman needed a man. That’s not true any more. In industrialized democracies today a woman can get a job and survive on her own. So a man who wants a woman has to make himself attractive to some woman. He has to be better than nothing. Men who are unable or unwilling to meet that threshold don’t get women. It is easy to imagine the rage and misogyny that follows from that.
• #2

  Blood Knight in Sour Armor

  January 12, 2023 at 12:42 am

  Tend to agree with that… You can blame porn for more extreme sex acts becoming default in the minds of its consumers (mostly male, probably) but it’s the attitudes, the mindsets, the animalistic drive that fuels its consumption.

  In a way, Tate is pretty typical, but in another century you’d have to be the head man, a king, or a priest to flaunt it that way. If you’re not in charge and act in antisocial ways the community has ways of dealing with you.
• #3

  Steven

  January 12, 2023 at 9:57 pm

  16 The Lord says, “The women of Zion are haughty, walking along with outstretched necks, flirting with their eyes, strutting along with swaying hips, with ornaments jingling on their ankles.

  17 Therefore the Lord will bring sores on the heads of the women of Zion; the Lord will make their scalps bald.”

  18 In that day the Lord will snatch away their finery: the bangles and headbands and crescent necklaces,

  19 the earrings and bracelets and veils,

  20 the headdresses and anklets and sashes, the perfume bottles and charms,

  21 the signet rings and nose rings,

  22 the fine robes and the capes and cloaks, the purses

  23 and mirrors, and the linen garments and tiaras and shawls.

  24 Instead of fragrance there will be a stench; instead of a sash, a rope; instead of well-dressed hair, baldness; instead of fine clothing, sackcloth; instead of beauty, branding.

  — Isaiah 3, ca. 700 BCE

  9 What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

  10 Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time.

  — Ecclesiastes 1, ca. 400 BCE