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Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

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Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#211

Post by hndamien »

ronnier wrote: post #28
damagednoob wrote: post #11

> Did you know that teens are having substantially less sex than the previous few generations? It’s true! And generally interpreted as a good thing. But Ronson suggests that this is in large part because porn is replacing sex, and, in fact, making real sex with real woman seem alienating and difficult. Further down the author specifically mentions the correlation/causality fallacy but there are surely other explanati…

There’s also been a shift due to online and apps that give women an unlimited choice of men while giving the majority of men nearly no choice — the dating world for most men has become a lot more difficult over the last couple of years. I see my male friends really struggle and I see my female friends have unlimited options.

Your male friends potentially also have an unlimited choice in men ;)

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#212

Post by da_chicken »

throwwit wrote: post #199
da_chicken wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Peterson seems to have a knack for not explaining himself well and expecting people to just understand where he's coming from. He's also really bad at phrasing. He constantly seems to get into hot water for what he says, and then if you try to figure out what he says he actually said it's never for what we're told he says. I think he'd do much better if he wrote more books and had a really good editor .

My take so far (with limited research) is that Peterson is trying to evoke debate on the issues in a centrist fashion reminiscent of Plato and his cave. The ‘shapes’ of traditional societal structures are being bound to new normals on the ‘wall’ of the human condition; solving this jig-saw of a problem necessitates open debate & negotiation.

That seems reasonable. I think he spent so much time in a classroom that it's colored his speaking. He's too used to leading students to the point that he's trying to make and waiting for them to make the final leap of logic instead of just saying what he's trying to say.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#213

Post by ozim »

ovao wrote: post #68
ozim wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not following that absurdity reduction. In the context of discussion you could compare it with alcohol not sulfuric acid. Alcohol creates concrete bad outcomes when for instance driving. I think there is a lot less people watching porn while driving than driving under influence. Alcohol makes you prone to some kinds of cancers, porn not much. Watching porn is at least order of magnitude safer than drinking alcoh…

I think your reaction to the first statement is an indication that you didn’t read the second. I specifically argue that there is no clear scientific indication relating to moderate porn consumption, whereas there are clear indications about injecting sulfuric acid. The point being: it’s unclear as to whether porn consumption is harmful in moderation and therefore problematic to suggest that it’s “fine”.

But your comparison is just wrong. You try to bash argument that "everything in moderation is harmless" by taking example of something that is out of scope. Person saying "everything in moderation" does not imply jumping into volcanos done in moderation is harmless. "Everything" in that statement is more like, alcohol, drugs etc. not sulfuric acid injections.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#214

Post by arximboldi »

lurena wrote: post #197
arximboldi wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree that the message sounds a bit like that, I think he is right about that point. For me an eye opener was Tinder. Where I live it seems like half of the women have something like "Don't even try if you are less than 1.80cm" or something like that in their profile. I am actually relatively tall and happy with my sex life, so I don't take the offense personally, yet I can't help but wonder what would happen…

A lot of people here are basing their view of gender dynamics (such as women being given 'the upper-hand' and so on, whatever that means) on Tinder and related websites/apps. It may be worth mentioning that the vast majority of people on Earth (or even the developed world) do not, in fact, use any dating apps at all. Most people's flirting activities still take place in meatspace, with all the associated awkwardness.…

I do not think that women have "the upper hand" or that they have "more power than men", in general nor in particular when it comes to relationships. In particular, what others say here: in spite of these examples, men also reject and of course appearance is also a preference (sometimes even more so than for women).

And while I also agree that the sample from Tinder is a very restricted view, and in general I also prefer meeting people directly in the real world. What I found interesting about Tinder is, precisely, that I allowed me to directly see how women outside of my social circles and spaces I frequent present themselves. While I still live in a hipster urban area, I found that so many of these examples of very traditional views about courtship---all this "I am a price" logic I mentioned in the parent post is not so much a sign of power, but I see it as more of a conservative view that puts women in a passive role. It can be frustrating for men, but probably it is also damaging for women, and to me showed, somewhat, that the road to better gender equality and fluid roles is a long one.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#215

Post by _b8r0 »

superkuh wrote: post #180
dasil003 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's crazy where the Overton window is that no one gives a shit about privacy issues unless they tie into politics somehow, and government trying to protect citizens' privacy by means of laws with actual teeth (read: fines) is equated to physical violence. Ad tech has taken full carte blanche for long enough. If you actually dig into GDPR you find that it's quite reasonable, far better than the cookie law and other e…

Oh, I care a lot about privacy. Because of that I made many choices to never even start using services like Facebook or carry a cell phone with me. I also run white-list only javascript in browser and host all my own services (web/mail/voice chat/etc). These things have made it harder to stay involved with friends, harder to use the web, but it was my choice and the right one. The idea that people have to be protecte…

> Because of that I made many choices to never even start using services like Facebook or carry a cell phone with me.

Yet services like Facebook will have a shadow profile for you from data built up through abusing access to other peoples' systems.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#216

Post by _b8r0 »

elorant wrote: post #29
_b8r0 wrote: post #18

From the site here in GDPR-land: "Select 'OK' to continue using our products, otherwise, you will not be able to access our sites and apps." Looks like I'm not reading this then.

With uMatrix installed there's no redirection. You should give it a try, makes surfing the web a lot easier.

I get where you're coming from, but if a company decides that they'd rather fuck me around than comply with GDPR properly, I'm not interested in their service.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#217

Post by elorant »

_b8r0 wrote: post #216
elorant wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With uMatrix installed there's no redirection. You should give it a try, makes surfing the web a lot easier.

I get where you're coming from, but if a company decides that they'd rather fuck me around than comply with GDPR properly, I'm not interested in their service.

Fair enough.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#218

Post by ovao »

ozim wrote: post #213
ovao wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think your reaction to the first statement is an indication that you didn’t read the second. I specifically argue that there is no clear scientific indication relating to moderate porn consumption, whereas there are clear indications about injecting sulfuric acid. The point being: it’s unclear as to whether porn consumption is harmful in moderation and therefore problematic to suggest that it’s “fine”.

But your comparison is just wrong. You try to bash argument that "everything in moderation is harmless" by taking example of something that is out of scope. Person saying "everything in moderation" does not imply jumping into volcanos done in moderation is harmless. "Everything" in that statement is more like, alcohol, drugs etc. not sulfuric acid injections.

> Person saying "everything in moderation" does not imply jumping into volcanos done in moderation is harmless.

In which case, the word “everything” is entirely the wrong word, is it not? I think we can agree that “many things” would be a substantially better fit here.

Again, I feel you’re missing the point. It’s not about the semantics of the statement; it’s about porn viewing. Again, it’s unclear whether porn viewing in moderation is “fine”, by some variable definition of “fine”, which is why his first statement is problematic. It’s not because of any particular word or any particular other comparison you or I may contrive.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#219

Post by Noumenon72 »

pjc50 wrote: post #77
temp-dude-87844 wrote: post #52

The widespread availability of pornography probably does drive home several extra layers of resentment in someone whose personal track record with courting, dating, and sex has been unsatisfying. At a surface level, it seems to demonstrate that sex -- and not just fruits of performances thereof -- is a transaction, and that the attributes that they bring to the marketplace (appearance, aesthetic, attitude, interests,…

> Declining to date someone because they're fat is now firmly seen as a bullying tactic, but not dating someone because they're short is perfectly fine. As they say, "'No' is a complete sentence." Anyone can decline to date anyone for any reason you like. And it's probably best not to give reasons, especially if it's something intrinsic or hard to change. Many people lack a peer group capable of giving them effective…

I don't look to my peer group to provide me with advice on investing, diet, apartment hunting, or programming, so the notion of finding a peer group to advise me on dating would never occur to me.

Re: Pornography and the Butterfly Effect

#220

Post by hitekker »

phaus wrote: post #204
da_chicken wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You're ambiguous therefore you're malicious"? Yeah, I don't buy that he's being intentionally vague primarily because he will explain what he means when people ask him to explain himself in more detail. It's just that everybody knee-jerks today. Every time I've seen an article about Peterson -- which, to be fair, has been all of three times so I'm not particularly well read -- it's saying he's done something or said…

I didn't say he's malicious. I'm saying he isn't insightful or original. He has nothing meaningful to say that everyone doesn't already know. He just phrases it incomprehensibly and vaguely because he's trying to make a living selling books and giving self-help talks. You are apparently upset that everything turns into a team sport with the left on one side and conservatives on another. Well, you're the one doing tha…

I, for one, agree. Jordan equivocates so much on his more controversial ideas because he wants to maintain the pretense of objectivity.

"I'm not right wing, or conservative!" from the man who says "Abortion is clearly wrong"

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