Shaving is an example of how consumer products extract more money

I don't think he mentioned race, I think the word he used was "ethnicity" which is inclusive of culture, and doesn't necessarily include race at all. Culture is a shorthand way of saying "behavioral trends within a self identifying community." You might say its a "dog whistle" for race, and you may be right, but we argue the point and take people at their word, in good faith, here.

If I were a white person that lived in a white community that had problems with women getting raped, I'd leave. There are communities like this, and plenty of people trying to find a way out of them. If I were a brown person that lived in a brown community with these problems, I'd leave, which is why I am sympathetic to immigrants leaving their countries and going to ones where women don't get raped all the time.

Also, after reading more of this thread, I don't think he's saying "this ethnicity rapes people" necessarily, I think it's more like "when someone from this ethnicity does rape someone, they don't get punished because the judges are afraid of being wrongly called racists, so if I move away from them, at least the rapists where I move will go to jail. It's not safer because they rape less necessarily, its safer because the rapists are in prison."

But that's all beside the point. You can't fault people for generalizing, we are pattern finding creatures by nature. It's a shortcut to bettering our lives. The pattern might only be correlation and not cause, but that doesn't change the improvement we get when we make decisions based off the recognized pattern, hence the evolutionary advantage to pattern recognition. The apparent pattern might not even exist, but behaving as if it does might not cause us any detriment at all, so there's no selective pressure against it. Berating people for this doesn't solve the problem, it in fact worsens it, and if you're indeed right, then over time people will meet nice people that fall into a negative stereotype in their mind and adjust their world view accordingly, no lecture required.

Modern trackball,flexing, etc. multi-blade razors are expensive, but idiot proof. You can copy one of the Gillette commercials and just mash the thing to your face and make one long stroke through the chemical foam. Bam. Done. If you're happy with this, be happy. Read no further.

What this article isn't telling you is that DE razors can be almost as fast, but there's a learning curve. They don't flex, bend, or rotate to the right angle, so you must hold them at the right angle, even when you're going around curves. There's just one blade, so it's easy to apply too much pressure and give yourself razor burn, so you must learn to use minimal pressure. It takes time to learn these skills.

Is learning how to shave with a DE correctly and quickly worth saving money? If money is no concern for you, then no. However, there are other benefits. One pass of a five bladed razor is, you guessed it, five blades being dragged across your face, and likely with more pressure than is necessary given how much pressure is required just to make the flexing, rotating razor engage with your face. If skin irritation, ingrown hairs, etc. are a problem for you, then learning how to properly shave with a DE razor can dramatically reduce those problems. However, things may be worse at first while you're learning technique. This is all even more true if you're the sort who suffers from irritation and reuses cartridges too long to save a little money. Dull blades make skin irritation worse.

Another thing this article isn't mentioning is shaving soap. Most of us are used to chemical gel's or foams. To be blunt, they all smell awful and feel gross. Again, it takes slightly more time and a little technique must be learned, but traditional shave soap with a badger hair brush, lathered on the face, is something everyone should at least try. There are some awesome smelling soaps out there, and lathering on your face with a good badger brush feels amazing. If you hate shaving, this is a switch that might change your mind.

If you hate something, you can spend less time on it, or you can look for ways to make it more enjoyable.

What if we already do so, the status quo is already the equilibrium, and thus your idea already worked? But it cannot find any more understanding in those doing their complex routine. You’re asking to sleep less, to work more and to get less from people literally competing to have some nice time.

> I'm not going to spend my 30s sitting around waiting for pans to heat up because there's some very small probability a pan will harm me.

This strikes me as particularly ironic in the current context. How much time have you spent so far today arguing about pans on HN? How many times could you have heated up a cast iron skillet during that time?

Are you sure you're not one of those people?