This article is in the Official Press and thus mainly propaganda. However, truth is all one thing and propagandists are stupid; by keeping their eye on the ball they lose track of the field, accidentally letting things slip. They use up their mental RAM keeping track of the logical links of their target belief, and their inferential horizon is elsewhere quite diminished.
What I learn is that American marriage is perverted in the pornographic sense. The "marriage night" thing means: "Hey we all know you're about to have sex." Voyeuristic. They often even know where the couple is about to have sex. Further, you're having sex because it's expected. What if you're not in the mood? Too bad; it's the marriage night. I believe there's a term used by moderns for compulsory sex...
When the government is not meddling with your marriages, consummation doesn't have a fixed date. As long as the kid has both a mother and a father nobody much cares.
On the other hand, I am curious about how peasant families handled sex given the whole family would own one (1) bed. (The piece's author isn't interested, because woman vs. low status. Non-celebrity gossip; bleh.) Maybe Americans are double perverted, acting like it's a big deal for children to witness sex. After all, farmers' kids see sex all the time. After seeing the donkeys going at it every year, they don't exactly need an education to work out that tab A goes in slot B. Nobody can tell who grew up on a farm without having to ask, so it's clearly not significant.
Maybe peasants went far out of their way to keep it private. Did they keep their voices down? Regularly ban kids from the house? Were content with rare sessions? Of course now it seems I'm being voyeuristic... However, the issue is American sex habits are clearly unhealthy. You don't have to check, you can just assume. Null hypothesis: fuckin' crazy. This means I need to know what healthy sex habits look like, for comparison. What's actually a big deal and what's pathologically twisted social signalling?
E.g. aristocratic families would clearly try to prevent their kids from witnessing sex, but this was mainly to show off that they had big enough houses to accomplish this. "Look how innocent I can afford my children to be. Isn't that cute?" It's not a moral thing, it's literally applying coercion for personal benefit. "You're not a poor who can't afford separate thick-walled bedrooms, are you?" Naturally Americans now consider it immoral to act the way normal non-upper-class folk behave. Naturally.
It's clear children shouldn't see their parents naked after the childhood amnesia period, but beyond that I don't know how it's supposed to work. Maybe that's why sex under covers is traditional: because it was assumed the kids would be wandering around and would otherwise visually witness something everyone would prefer they didn't. In modern times it's just women having a woman moment.
Another thing we learn is that "holy matrimony" was a power grab.
In Reality, marriage occurs between exactly two people: man and woman. If they sign an oath saying they're married, then they are, because lies are bad mmmkay. Yes, marriage is sacred, but of course Christianity is profane and thus has nothing to do with marriage. Because it is profane, it tried to manically seize marriage for itself. It is not a coincidence that the end result of Christianity seizing marriage was a divorce-positive regime. Know them fruits etc. Later the hyper-Christian Fascist State seized marriage from the Church. The problem is regular folk letting anyone meddle in the first place.
"It could be hard to tell, in other words, whether one was engaging in legal married sex or illicit and illegal fornication."
It is not fornication if a) you don't have sex with any woman you don't at some point have kids with and b) you marry and stay married to every woman you have kids with, in the sense of the kid living with both a mother and a father. Anyone claiming you need to do more or less is a liar and a Satanist. The exact timing doesn't matter as long as you don't try to rules-lawyer it.
It's fornication because Gnon will have words with anyone who fornicates. E.g. women hate casual sex. Of course Americans hate themselves so Americoid women like Tinder exactly because it is obligatory self-harm.
P.S. The idea that most people are unattractive is a modern notion. It's because they're malnuourished. Overstressed, overworked, sick, and fed scraps even the pigs won't touch. Deodorant and sometimes birth control makes you stinky and shampoo makes you greasy. Folk who eat sleep until rested, real food, exercise, and don't pollute their skin look perfectly acceptable unless they have a bone deformity.
Don't be a dumb prat: Catholic families don't have 13 kids out of a sense of duty.
Strong response from you Parisian, why?
ReplyDeleteCouple of things, Al.
Marriage necessarily removes polygamy. One man, one woman.
This means your high tier man can only pick one wife. Of course they cheat, but it doesn't really matter because he only has legal obligation to provide for his wifes children.
Marriage as a technology serves two purposes to society. One, it stops the most desirable men from monopolising all of the women. Two, it necessary links sex, reproduction, and the care and investment in children.
You want sex? You *will have to pay for the children*. This also has some synergy with goal one, since, even if you as a woman manage to get impregnated by a high tier, married man, you are going to the poor house.
>P.S. The idea that most people are unattractive is a modern notion
It's a modern notion that we only take into account female views. Most *men* are unnattractive, because most men are not in the top 20% of men.
Women don't love Tinder because of self harm (well, a bit probably), but because it allows them to feel the rush of mating with a high tier man.
It's like the next step from the social control that birth control creates. Step one : You can control if you get pregnant. Step whatever we're up to : Tinder
Regarding ancient times and "how did people have sex". Less than we currently do, since, less privacy as you note. And, remember, every union may have resulted in an additional child, and therefore costs; have to be a bit more conservative.
What's a healthy sex habit? Understanding that sex is for babies, not for entertainment.
He erased my disgusted commnents, and left that response, probably to see how clever it would seem by itself. But I don't care, and won't explain it beyond the below note.
ReplyDeleteI don't think either of you understand sex, not even slightly. And as for the "olden days", the Romans fucked their brains out, and plenty of others too. Prostitution was not even forbidden.
Nick Land thinks sex is only for babies, too, so you've formed a Trinity if there ever was one. I've run into more poignant Trinities, but I'm not going to plagiarize.
ReplyDeleteI didn't say that one should only have sex to create a baby. I said that you need a fundamental understanding that sex is for procreation, not entertainment, to have a healthy sex habit.
Any motivation can be weaponised, or become pathological. The sex drive is literally the reproductive drive.
Disintegrating sex from procreation is the same as disintegrating food from nutrition.
Fast food is addictive food, but not food that is good for the body. You see?
Consider the attitude of the morbidly obese towards food. They eat for food pleasure. It kills them.
>the Romans fucked their brains out, and plenty of others too.
And where, pray tell, is their civilisation?
I don't understand the argument you're trying to make.
Sex is fun and feels good. No one denies that. Should that be the only thing that motivates people, chasing pleasure?
Okay, okay, whatever. I was blessed with good genes and don't ever have to watch my diet, except never eat junk food. So I do eat food purely for pleasure, since it coincides with healty diet. I never eat food for "nutrition", it just fortunately coincides. Most aren't lucky that way. It will never kill me because I am svelte and for some reason only want healthy food--but it's not because they're "healthy", it's because I like them.
ReplyDelete>the Romans fucked their brains out, and plenty of others too.
And where, pray tell, is their civilisation?
What civilization ever lasted all thatlong that was that important? I don't know, but I doubt they gave much thought to these "philosophical" matters of procreation and sex pleasure, just did them both. They were successful for a very long time, as were the Greeks, so tell me a civilization which lasted longer and was more splendid than these two who were always procreating and pleasuring and in general producing civilizations whose magnicence last to this day. Germany, Britain, France, etc, all produced extraordinry, exmemplary civilizationg, it doesn't matter how long. US will surely be shorter than any of these, and Russia hasn't either. China? Even Alrenous says the Han are dead ubstead web I screamed that I couldn't stand that thought of "Han Hegemony" that Nick kept going on about (gut admittedly had to do with making money. Egypt was the oldest wasn't it? Look where there are now.)
I disagree that sex cannot be used for both procreaction and "entertainment". Even if Procreation is more important and noble, the entertainment value is simply peerless. I do it every chance I get.
>Okay, okay, whatever. I was blessed with good genes and don't ever have to watch my diet,
ReplyDeleteOh so, because you suffer no deleterious effects from a poor diet, you can eat just for pleasure. Would you encourage those who do suffer from eating a poor diet to moderate their diet, or just enjoy it?
>Most aren't lucky that way.
Yes. So if we apply your personal philosophy to everyone - "Eat what you enjoy", what's going to happen? Lots of people aren't lucky and will just get sick and die.
"Most aren't lucky" that they can have random casual non procreative sex without some kind of deleterious effect.
>I doubt they gave much thought to these "philosophical" matters of procreation and sex pleasure, just did them both.
And yes - they didn't think about it, just did it because it was fun - their implicit ideology is "it's fun, it feels good, so do it as much as possible".
That's a point of view guaranteed to lead to collapse.
>I disagree that sex cannot be used for both procreaction and "entertainment"
I didn't say "never". I said that if you maintain a point of view that the entertainment value of sex is its primary value, you will not have a healthy sex habit. There are, yes, a group of people who will not suffer an obvious or immediately bad effect.
You need to pay dues to the game. Winning a game is fun only because you can lose; if you just cheat and win all the time you start to become jaded with the game.
But if you set up your social signalling that "sex is fun you should do it for fun", a large number of people are going to have a bad time. Society/ civilisation cannot work well if this point of view is the norm.
Do you not understand this point? Al makes it all the time.
Winning constantly and artificially is bad for the psyche.
>It's pleasurable but pointless to use cheat codes on games
>food pleasure
>etc etc etc etc
I had not disagreed with you. It was important to put in what YOU left out. It looks like you just repeated yourself. I wouldn't say that "a large number of people are going to have a bad time" was something you ought allow happen if possible.
ReplyDeleteTrouble is you lean only one way, even if that *procreation way* should be the primary way, You never ever lean the other way even if it's less profound. Just because it's not the most profound does not mean it's not important. Same for Alrenous, who says the same things you say all the time about sex. I don't have to buy it, just because I agree on the basic things. As for "paying dues to the game", I do not have to do this so I can join some club with these tenets you two have (and others) any more than he has to think ballerinas are litle more than whores. (I assume he thinks that, although he never says anything, except to trash composers like Xennakis same thing.) You think a person has to join every aspect of a group to even talk to them?
And while we're at it, Alrenous is interesting, of course, but does say a lot of things as if they couldn't be more obvious--and they'e not.
I didn't leave anything out. I think you assumed that I meant "enjoying sex is bad" as opposed to what I thought was clear.
ReplyDeleteFood is to fuel your body, not for entertainment.
Same thing.
>Trouble is you lean only one way,
I lean the way of considering the thing as its whole. I'm not sure why that would be troubling.
Why would you think its troubling to consider a thing in its totality?
The problem that western civ mostly has with sex is that it pretends that it is only for entertainment. It's not.
>As for "paying dues to the game", I do not have to do this so I can join some club with these tenets you two have
You've missed my point. When I say "pay dues to the game" I mean, play the rules and accept that the potential for loss is part of what makes winning meaningful.
If you play monopoly, you can just reach your hand into the bank and take the money you want, while sticking your middle finger up at the banker and other players. You don't technically win, though, although you can tell yourself that since you hold all the cash you won.
What qualifies as entertainment? Or is entertainment interdit and just louche compared to all versions af *hearth and home".
ReplyDeleteIs ANY art entertainment, or is it all schlock? Is all entertainment schlock? This is where Alrenous and I started off, he was not convincing in any way (I thought he would be), but I tried to listen only to find out that I did not care what he thought about Art, not in any way. He knows nothing about it. He made no attempt to listen to me, I who know a thousand times more than he does in this realm (I admit almost no other realms, and I truly do not care.)
I'm putting this in, because if you have points that I was mistaken about above, you will get nowhere when it comes to Art, because I am an artist--musician and writer and very accomplished. I cannot see why food and sex cannot be entertainment as well, only why they should not be primarilyentertainment as well.
(I'm going to copy this so if you delete it, I'll still have it. I'm bored hearing the whisperings of how music and dance are frivolous. I could be rude, but I won't. Suffice it to say that New York doesn't seem nearly as bad as it did a few weeks ago.)
I'm not going to address the other matters, which I consider finished.
>What qualifies as entertainment? Is ANY art entertainment, or is it all schlock? Is all entertainment schlock?
ReplyDeleteWhat would any of it mean to an ant, or a dog?
I'm not arguing that entertainment has no value. It has A Value, as does art. As does an ant, as does a star, as does empty space.
> I cannot see why food and sex cannot be entertainment as well, only why they should not be primarily entertainment as well.
That's what I said? Primarily, sex must be remembered to be for procreation.
Hmm. Let me put it to you this way.
Do you think art should be judged primarily for its commercial value?
Sex has its purpose, procreation, and it is entertaining.
Art has its purpose, entertainment, and it has commercial value.
>music and dance are frivolous.
I can eat neither. Relatively, they are. To die for art is not noble. As an aside :P
Art can be equally worthwhile if it's commercial or not. Either are valid if they are superior. But no, I don't think it should be "judged primarily for its commercial value.
ReplyDeleteWell, we did talk about rillettes and terrines. It's not so far to truffles and morels; these these are definitely not required to sustain one, but you'll remember that they are *good for you* but they are still going to be in the category *entertainment food*.
You're a good-natured fellow, with a good sense of humour, and I'm glad you came since I was taking part over a year ago. As for Alrenous, I don't find him good-natured in the same sense, but he's irresistible for this outrageous huge brain (with those few exceptions I pointed out, as well as having few social skills--not to mention not even wanting them), and I can't seem to be able to stay away. He's always worth reading even when there's an enormous dissonance. After all, as I said, I still can't be forced to go along with him or anybody I'm not an "American that way".
Good show.
>But no, I don't think it should be "judged primarily for its commercial value.
ReplyDeleteAnd so, what would happen to the state of art if we judged it primarily for its commercial value?
> in the category *entertainment food*.
As the food industry has decided that entertainment > nutrition, what has happened to peoples health?
So too this has happened as we have made similar decisions about sex and sexuality.
> As for Alrenous, I don't find him good-natured in the same sense,
I think Alrenous patience is less than mine. But then, he is a much more productive writer than I am so I definitely do not mind. I see that you get it, just that you don't get that you get it. I don't mind trying to reframe what I'm saying to fit inside your vision of reality better.
I'm not arguing against you, per se, I'm arguing that your argument is my argument.
>even when there's an enormous dissonance
That's why he's worth reading. Think of the dissonance that the earth not being the centre of the universe caused.