this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2025
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Big brain tech dude got yet another clueless take over at HackerNews etc? Here's the place to vent. Orange site, VC foolishness, all welcome.

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Need to let loose a primal scream without collecting footnotes first? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid: Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful you’ll near-instantly regret.

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If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cut’n’paste it into its own post — there’s no quota for posting and the bar really isn’t that high.

The post Xitter web has spawned soo many “esoteric” right wing freaks, but there’s no appropriate sneer-space for them. I’m talking redscare-ish, reality challenged “culture critics” who write about everything but understand nothing. I’m talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. They’re inescapable at this point, yet I don’t see them mocked (as much as they should be)

Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldn’t be surgeons because they didn’t believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I can’t escape them, I would love to sneer at them.

(Semi-obligatory thanks to @dgerard for starting this.)

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

As many writers (perhaps most eloquently George Orwell) have observed, women seem more attracted than men to the idea of being moral enforcers.

Ah, thanks Paul for validating my disdain for Orwell at least.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

Considering popes, priests in general, politicians etc are usually male (historically) i have a feeling these quotes also exclude some groups from being moral enforcers.

It also neatly ignores social pressures, which provides good reasons for women being into certain types of 'moral enforcement'. Either because 'it is their duty to protect the kids' or the revolutionary idea that people are all people and should have equal rites, bodily autonomy, a political voice etc.

But nope: "me and the boys agree, this wokeness stuff is for girls".

This all makes me wonder, we know he has proofreaders who help him. Did he either get rid of all the people who disagree with him, or did they give up, as some people dont want understand the other side they just want to argue their forever cause they believe they are correct (so disagreement is a massive waste of time).

E:

Thanks to Sam Altman, Ben Miller, Daniel Gackle, Robin Hanson, Jessica Livingston, Greg Lukianoff, Harj Taggar, Garry Tan, and Tim Urban for reading drafts of this. [emph mine, the names that really jumped out to me]

Ah. Also 1 name which jumps out to me as prob a woman. Let me google her. Ah right. His wife, and co-founder.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

George was writing his stories in the 40s, so at least has "product of his time" as an excuse.

Paul's just a flat out piece of shit to be writing this nearly 100 years later.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

Fair, though in Orwell's case the misogyny is not accidental either, but an essential aspect of the mostly conservative ideology he adopted for 1984 (contempt for the working class, linguistic purism, just really being a little too enamoured with his perfect crystal of unending oppression etc).

[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

I've never heard of anyone describing 1984 that way, could you elaborate on your points or link to some analysis?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 hours ago

I read it in high school. Iirc, the main character in 1984 deeply hates a woman he works with and his violent fantasies about her are tied up in his desire to rebel against the regime. He later overcomes his desire to commit violence against her by having sex with her. His contempt for her fairly leapt off the page when I read it. I'm sure it's arguable what Orwell meant or intended.

In another scene, the middle-class protagonists watch a working-class woman hanging out washing and tell themselves that if there was any hope for freedom, it lay in "the proles" (members of the mass underclass, like that woman). But the way they look at her and talk about her is dehumanizing.

It's probably easier to just read 1984 yourself and make up your own mind. it's not a very long book.