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Author Topic: Things that made you sad today thread.  (Read 8571713 times)

Reelya

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118680 on: August 03, 2020, 01:59:10 pm »

My in-laws have trouble with this exact thing for different reasons. Mother-in-law has internalized misogyny that prevents her from expressing her feelings directly, as women "aren't supposed to speak up". Father-in-law has internalized toxic masculinity, as men are supposed to be stoic and not show emotion (he's literally apologized for "crying in front of his children", as if that were a bad thing).

If neither of them express their emotions then I'd argue we may actually be trying to shoehorn things into those paradigm. Why isn't the man hiding his tears internalized misandry then, and the woman hiding her feelings internalized toxic femininity? We have no actual reason we couldn't call "internalized misogyny" => "internalized toxic femininity" do we? And we could build a completely consistent system around the "internalized toxic femininity" / "internalized toxic masculinity" paradigm. The reason we don't? Because as soon as you start thinking through that model you realize the means of controlling people in the two gender roles are fundamentally the same, so the dichotomy of masculine and feminine toxicity collapses into a single control system that can explain both sides of that: societies are toxic and shoving people into boxes is toxic, and being shoved into a box prevents both genders from expressing their individuality and feelings. There's no need to come up with a different model of how that works based on what's dangling between each person's legs.

And that new "internalized toxic femininity" / "internalized toxic masculinity" model actually explains some things that are hard to explain in the overall "gender warfare" model: why women often police other women's roles, and women even police men's roles. Like any time I try and get fit or think about getting new clothes or any of that, including thinking I shouldn't bring up what hobbies I'm into, because they probably won't like those, the core thought is what women will think of that, I couldn't give a fuck what men think. If I gender flipped the whole thing I'd be accused of suffering internalized misogyny for thinking like that, but to say I suffer internalized misandry because I change myself to what I believe women will like better sounds silly.

The whole "internalized" thing was actually coined not to explain people "self policing" but why women police other women, which didn't fit nicely with the existing paradigm, but women also police men in their roles too, which is even harder to explain under the class-warfare model of gender relations. But if you bring in a model where communities are policing everyone of both genders to stick to their roles, then these things are no longer contradictions. Men and women police both men and women in order to maintain all the roles. It's not one group enforcing the roles on the other group.

It seems like that's more an effort at labeling then. Women from that cultural background sound like they're expected to "grin and bear it" but in the end, that's not a whole lot different to the men from that background being expected to "appear stoic".  If the stoic thing is a trait that defines that gender, then that only makes sense if the other gender isn't expected to appear stoic, but you've said that they're prevented from expressing their feelings too, so I have a hard time working out how that's a thing. The "assigned roles" thing is a thing, and people are considered negatively if either of them act in ways that aren't in line with their roles, but that doesn't make the control mechanism "internalized misogyny" on the one hand vs "internalized toxic masculinity" on the other hand, because that's applying a predetermined external model to the behaviours, with a just-so rationalization rather than good evidence that it fits.

In the end, what are the consequences of not doing the things expected of you? It's the expected consequences which are the control mechanism. For both genders, the most common consequences are external criticism from your peers and family. And I'd argue that this is the same exact mechanism, not a different mechanism for men and women. Fundamentally, the core message is that this is your lot in life, and any grumbling is a moral failing on your part, which the community then "corrects". Not a great thing, but fundamentally not really any different for the two genders.
« Last Edit: August 03, 2020, 02:53:11 pm by Reelya »
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wierd

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118681 on: August 04, 2020, 04:12:52 am »

(Grew up with family that was highly conservative, and held such value systems.)


The issue, is that men need to appear "Strong" in the face of adversity. This means being the backbone that stands up to the soul-crushing realities of life, and forces that reality to realign in a fashion that benefits the family.  There is no time to invest in exploring one's feelings or emotions-- The only thing that is of value is the decisive action; The commanding authority to make something happen, where otherwise it would not.

The flipside, is that the female role in the paradigm is to see to the emotional and mental health needs of all others in the group. (while being selfless about that herself, to parallel the man's emotional sacrifices for the family unit.)   She is the emotional glue that holds everything together, while dad is the iron will that parts the sea of adversity.

When seen from this angle, the narrative about "Not crying in front of the children" makes more sense--- Dad is supposed to be unflappable-- Always able to take action, reliable, consistent, strong, and fierce.  Crying on mom's shoulder in public view is the exact opposite of that. (It is heavily implied that Dad cries on mom's shoulder in private, away from everyone else-- At least in my flavor of this toxic regimen, it takes strong coloration from biblical prescriptions about what the ideal partnership is, and his is one of the things that is meant when the old testament describes the woman's role as the man's helpmate, and what is meant about the man being the head of the household; It undermines the projected strength of conviction and will, for the woman to publicly assert dissenting views. If desired, I can produce suitable direct bible references for this behavioral paradigm.) 

You are correct that BOTH genders actively police and enforce the paradigm.  Women (who are indoctrinated under it) are disgusted by "ineffective" or "weak" men--  Men (who are indoctrinated under it) are disgusted by "willful" and "prideful" women.  Simultaneously, such indoctrinated women are aghast and shamed by being in the presence of willful women, and indoctrinated men likewise by being in the presence of emotionally supportive men, or men who show public signs of emotional vulnerability.

Rather than objectify it in an artificial crucible of "(dramatic music) Patriarchy!! (lightning crashes)", it is better to view it from the historical perspectives which gave rise to it, and the economic and societal conditions that fostered the creation of this tight feedback loop on mutual enforcement.  Rather than focus simply on just one side of the suffering ("The suffering of WOMEN is unbearable!! Men have all the power!!", etc)-- it is important to understand that men suffer just as much under such a system, just in different ways.  Sure, they have all the executive power in public, but they also have crippling emotional traumas they cannot express publicly, for fear of social ostracism or worse. 

It has been getting more coverage in recent decades, but for the LOOOONGEST time, the notion that men suffered at all under patriarchal social conventions was met with spittle-faced hostility and incredulity by the feminist movement. (and is one of the reasons why I do NOT self-identify as a feminist, but instead as a gender egalitarian.)  That it still does happen, is why I still do not approve of feminism's operative force. (the goal is laudable, but the methods matter.) Just bring up "Men's rights" some time, and see what happens. (Count to 20, and see how long it takes for the term 'misogynist' to come up, for instance. Nevermind the reality that just as it is possible to have a discussion about women's rights without misandry, it's converse must also be true.  I view the assertion that it is not so, to be a demand to have the cake and eat it too, from the female perspective of the toxic paradigm-- Men are not allowed to have feelings, needs, or wants (in continuance of the toxic paradigm) but women should have executive power equal to them.)  I find that to be wrong in every capacity, which is why I self-identify as gender egalitarian.  All people are fallible, which is why all people need to take comfort in each other, and listen to the ideas of all of their peers openly. 













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Reelya

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118682 on: August 04, 2020, 04:38:21 am »

It has been getting more coverage in recent decades, but for the LOOOONGEST time, the notion that men suffered at all under patriarchal social conventions was met with spittle-faced hostility and incredulity by the feminist movement. (and is one of the reasons why I do NOT self-identify as a feminist, but instead as a gender egalitarian.) 

Yup, it also help explain some otherwise paradoxical findings:

https://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/news/we-are-a-nation-of-hidden-feminists

Quote
A significant majority (83%) of the British public support equality of opportunity for women – this included even higher support from men (86%) than women (81%).

This part is hard to explain in the standard paradigm. You know the mantra: "if you believe in equality then you're really a feminist". maybe a "small f" feminist, but definitely not a "big F" Feminist. 86% of men in this UK survey believed in equality, do you think they're free to walk into a big-F Feminist group and start discussing the issues as equal peers? If not, then just believing in the abstract notion of gender equality doesn't actually make you a "F"eminist. Them saying that any pro-equality feelings mean you must embrace the full 'F'eminist thing (but their exact specific strand of feminism of course) is a lot like Christian proselytizing saying that if you have any spiritual feelings then you need God, specifically Our Godtm. So in other words the "if you believe in equality you're a feminist" thing is in fact an attempt to own the notion of equality itself, the same as any specific religion claims to own the notion of spirituality. However, since 83% of UK people believe in equality, while only 7% of UK people are feminists, this suggests that the idea that there's a 1:1 match between feminists and equality-believers is in fact disingenious. If you ask any Brit at random "do you believe in equality for men and women" and they say "yes" there's only about an 8% chance they are a feminist. Basically big-F Feminism is a club for people who are obsessed by this one thing, and have a very specific notion about it. It's like doing a survey and finding out 80% of Brits like trains, and the Diesel Trainspotters Society saying that means everyone is secretly a train nerd, but when you go to the meeting they ask which type of diesel train you like best, and you say "well actually I prefer electric trains" then they scream at you Body Snatchers style to get out as a false train lover. It's these kinds of purity tests and narrow dogma that keeps the numbers so low, not any external anti-feminist forces*.
 
Also note that a fair chunk more women than men oppose this notion of equality. My take on this is that when asked about whether women should be treated equally men say "sure knock yourselves out, great idea" because they don't really care, hence they parse that as the abstract notion of equality, however like "freedom", "equality" can mean many things and may have many loaded meanings. Implementing actual "equality" is messy and involves trade-offs. For example, equality of responsibility, if women are to be equal, they must work 40 hour weeks, etc etc. Not every woman views working 40 hours a week doing the same menial work most men have traditionally done as being some super-amazing achievement, unlike a bunch of white upper middle class women with their 'careers' rather than 'jobs' who tend to dominate groups such as the Fawcett Society who did this survey. So when women hear "should we be equal" they're more aware of the hidden layers of meaning and the pros and cons of the debate than men are, so more of them disagree with the idea.

* EDIT: i'll also point that any ideological organization tends to prefer to stay small but ideologically "pure". This keeps the existing power structures in those groups intact. The last thing any existing dominant people in any ideological group wants is a sudden influx of new members. The existing ideology tends to lose sway then. Say a large influx of women came into the feminist movement, getting vocal membership up to say 50% of all women. Great, so now you got all these foot soldiers to help with the overthrow of capitalism and the patriarchy? Probably the exact opposite. Most of those people are going to rather like the stuff that capitalism made, and now they heavily outnumber the "faithful". More will get done, for sure, but just not the type of overthrowing-society stuff the old guard dream of.

Keep an eye on Black Lives Matters too. A vast new influx of members has come into the movement, and I'll bet they're nowhere near as radical on average than the existing members. The old-school BLM people may well lose complete control of the movement - however the trade-off is the movement becoming vastly more effective at its stated goals. Keep an eye out for accusations of the movement "selling out" as it becomes more successful. The hard-line radical elements with links to other radical causes are going to become more sidelined in the future, so this is a good test of the general idea.
« Last Edit: August 04, 2020, 05:27:19 am by Reelya »
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wierd

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118683 on: August 04, 2020, 05:33:20 am »

I would point out the "DONT STEAL OUR MOVEMENT, IT'S NOT FOR YOU!" histrionics that is already present in the face of "All lives matter."


The oppositional view is that by asserting such a thing, it destroys the legitimacy of the need for change specific for black people.


In reality, much like you can have a conversation about women's rights without misandry, you can assert that black people's lives matter, and that their stake in society is equal to all others without putting them on a specially protected pedestal-- That society needs to move away from institutional racism of any shape, form, or caliber-- that all lives do in fact matter.


I am for race equality, not for pedestals or institutional edifices of any kind.   
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Reelya

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118684 on: August 04, 2020, 05:49:01 am »

I get the "all lives matter" thing but I think that's somewhat outside the scope of what I was thinking.

What I was really thinking about is the type of activists that you may find within a movement like BLM, but who also subscribe to revolutionary concepts such as "smash the patriarchy", "collapse capitalism" or "destroy the state". And they may in fact oppose gradual direct improvements because they see these as undermining the "true" goal which isn't about the immediate goal of improving black lives, but about furthering their true goal of overthrowing the system itself. You see this in the local socialist groups who never get anything done because they oppose any actual practical efforts to make anything better because they feel this will undermine their goal of things getting bad enough to trigger "the revolution". The people well know that they're not going to get a large number of people going "yay communist revolution", so they then attach themselves to various "causes" which include things of the BLM type (even though I've never met a non-white Socialist at any of those groups).

While I'm sympathetic ... some of these people are in fact deluded enough to believe that they'd be able to ride the coat-tails of something like mass protests about BLM all the way to a full scale communist uprising. But the real news is that by the time things get that big, those 'socialist club' silly-billies will be sidelined as the useless people they are, and like the civil rights era for example, positive change will be enacted which categorically will not include destroying the patriarchy, capitalism, or the state.

For example right now you get people saying that the police beatings are "inherent in the system". Those people are in fact saying that nothing can get better until the entire system is destroyed. They're saying full revolution is the only means. But those people are as wrong as the people who say that America's private health system is the only way it can be, and there are no alternatives. In both examples they're acting like other nations don't exist. For example ... Sweden has a capitalist patriarchal state, and they don't have out of control police beatings and shootings. They also have public health without the doom and gloom outcomes the pro-private people predict. So, while Sweden is a counter-example to private health, it's also a counter-example to the notion that the entire state and free market must be toppled to stop police brutality.
« Last Edit: August 04, 2020, 06:01:04 am by Reelya »
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wierd

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118685 on: August 04, 2020, 06:03:33 am »

Depends on where you dray the line of totality in that arrangement--

In some cited instances, it DID IN FACT REQUIRE a complete ouster of the ENTIRE police force, and rehire from OUTSIDE the region, to accomplish a sane and rational police policy, and restore community trust. (as incremental reformism had failed for decades.)

Entrenched power sometimes really does need to be pulled up by the roots.


I am just that nasty little voice everyone wants to shut the fuck up, that says "replacing one brutalist set of thugs with another is not progress; Be mindful what you are actually doing."
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Doomblade187

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118686 on: August 04, 2020, 10:03:50 am »

Yeah, Reelya, most people saying that the system is the problem with the police are simply advocating for the destruction of the police system as it stands, and a replacement that is equitable. While there are some people who do also advocate a change in economics, most people in the movement wanting systemic reform want the cops changed.
« Last Edit: August 04, 2020, 10:05:43 am by Doomblade187 »
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LordBaal

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118687 on: August 04, 2020, 10:43:09 am »

A piece of advice guys, all work related issues MUST be written down and passed on email. Not saying  you can only comunicate by email (sadly), but after a conversation wrote all down and forward an email stating "as previusly discuded on x date or x place"....

I make this post on the sad thread because Im obsesive with record keeping anything work related and that have saved my neck more than once. However it makes me sad that this effort goes to waste constantly on my current job. Its like working with kindergardens ffs. 
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McTraveller

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118688 on: August 04, 2020, 12:34:37 pm »

My company is in the early stages of soliciting "strategic partners" and possibly being purchased.  I heard today that one of our customers is considering purchasing us.  If they purchase us as a subsidiary it may not be too bad... but if they absorb us I think everyone is going to jump ship.

I have a pit in my stomach.
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Reelya

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118689 on: August 04, 2020, 12:48:21 pm »

That's right, think about why they'd care about buying you in particular.

If they just purchase you and leave things well enough alone, then the cost savings will in fact be minimal: no better or worse than investing the same money in any equally-sized venture. So you have to ask what are the *specific* benefits of buying out your supplier. "getting stuff at cost" isn't good enough, since like I said you can buy shares in *anything* and get the same rate of return on the investment.

What advantages do you actually get by buying out your supplier? Well do you also supply their competitors? They can jack up the price for "not us" companies or stop selling to them completely. Or, they can streamline the paperwork by reducing duplication between the two companies. These would be good for them, but they're not things that create jobs for you, and of course if they merge HR for example, it's going to be absorbing your HR work into their system and not the other way around.
« Last Edit: August 04, 2020, 12:50:23 pm by Reelya »
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TamerVirus

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118690 on: August 04, 2020, 12:52:29 pm »

Sounds like somebody's about to get vertically integrated
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scriver

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118691 on: August 06, 2020, 06:51:45 am »

So I think what's been happening with my computer is that the nvidya card is gone bad. I might dare take the computer apart and check. But I'm not sure what I'm checking for. I assume it will smell like sulfur and be wrapped in yellow tape if it is no longer functioning.
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George_Chickens

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118692 on: August 06, 2020, 07:29:11 am »

So I think what's been happening with my computer is that the nvidya card is gone bad. I might dare take the computer apart and check. But I'm not sure what I'm checking for. I assume it will smell like sulfur and be wrapped in yellow tape if it is no longer functioning.
Have you ever used medical iodine? Like Betadine. It smells like that but more offensive and with a hint of smoke.
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scriver

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118693 on: August 06, 2020, 07:40:12 am »

I have absolutely no idea what that smells like. I believe Betadine is what the telepath in Star Trek was and she looked like she smelled nice though.
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methylatedspirit

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Re: Things that made you sad today thread.
« Reply #118694 on: August 06, 2020, 07:44:17 am »

I'm betting that if it died of overheating, there's just gonna be the faint smell of smoke coming from the card.
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