I don’t think Harris is particularly strong in interviews. But Rogan is a very weak interviewer, in that he never pins people down on their answer. She could go on that show and pick up thousands of voters no question.
Skeptical of Rogan he is a bit more of a rightist a lot of the time and faux intellectual. Theo von would be an interesting interview bc he REALLY doesn’t pin people down. When he said something skeptical about Harris to Bernie, he responded with something along the lines of being a black women and getting to where she has gotten is no easy feat…theo’s response was a nod and “that’s true.”
Rogan's left / rightness is issue-by-issue. If Bernie said the same thing to Rogan do you think he'd push back? It's only marginally more likely and if he did he wouldn't argue with any halfway decent response he got.
I was going to say that a half-day event to pick up a few thousand votes would be a terrible ROI, but running the numbers shows doing events like that consistently for, say, 100 days could easily be the margin of victory in the popular vote. So maybe it's not such a bad ROI!
Do you think it is more politically beneficial to say “I used to support this thing you don’t like but now I repudiate that and support this thing you do like”, or to say “look at how much I support this thing you like”?
If you have been an extremely famous figure, famous for supporting the unpopular thing in the past, I can see that the former would be valuable. But I don’t think that describes Kamala Harris. Very few people actually paid attention to the early phases of the 2020 democratic primary, especially among people who are now swing voters.
Can you give some examples of when Kamala Harris has personally stated she changed her position? There's been lots of times some campaign spokesman--usually anonymously--has said so, but that's hardly the same thing.
She has personally stated positions that are in contrast to past positions she stated. Explicitly reminding people of the past position is not usually something you want to do while doing that, unless you are sure that nearly everyone remembers your past position.
I think part of the problem is that she doesn’t come across as the cool aunt — she comes across as the spacey aunt who’s, like, really into crystals. That’s a big turnoff for men.
Doesn’t mean she shouldn’t try - but I fear it could go very badly.
I...think that you are probably correct in reality, but it's funny to me, because I don't actually think's much gap between the personality of a crystal-gal vs. an ice-bath-bro, or an astrology chick vs. a tan-your-junk dude.
I think a lot of people have this impression of Rogan from 30 second clips of him being unusually credulous harvested from multiple 3 hour long podcasts a week he puts out but he's really not like a "tan your junk bro".
I always interpret this kind of comment to be "actually, I haven't seen her much in the media I pay attention to." I personally don't know what her daily schedule is and what kind of local media she is doing (maybe you do!) There are only seven states that matter and if she is doing the kind of media that will help move votes in those seven states but never doing anything national, whether it's 60 Minutes or Joe Rogan, then I'm fine with that.
maybe but I remember seeing tons of Walz hits in July (even on fox news) and they were all over social media, I have not seen any clips of either of them doing media since the 60 minutes thing. Maybe I'm following the wrong people on twitter tho.
It is the winning strategy. She isn't good off the cuff -- we've seen enough to know this, and trying to get better at it with 30 days left in the race is too risky. Run the ads, avoid any unscripted remarks and win.
All depends where you think things stand, right? I am at least hoping their risk-averse approach suggests their internal polls (or feedback "on the ground," or whatever) are giving them optimism. But if you have a 45% chance of winning, you can't afford to play prevent defense.
And heck, even with a 60% win probability, you don't play prevent defense.
"across as the spacey aunt who’s, like, really into crystals. That’s a big turnoff for men"
Is it? That sort of cliche just doesn't strike me as a big negative. The warm, nurturing, "safety first", school-principle-talking-about-equity-constantly type of female seems like it would be a big turnoff. On vibes I'd think someone like Elizabeth Warren would be a turnoff for men. Girl with crystals might actually be a girl who can get some shit done, although I'd personally be scared the same way I'd be scared of a RFK Jr.
I can't remember it ever coming up so I'm not sure. But that's more of a dating perspective.
I'm trying to imagine that I hear the PTA or School Board got a new head, who happens to be female, and I hear she's into astrology or spacey. And that seem not ideal for me, personally, but not a strong signal that she'd be unpopular or ineffective. I'm having a hard time imagining what the cool aunt counterexample would be.
TBH the kind of female that I imagine as really having their shit together and being able to perform would be like the moms I know who have 4 or 8 well-raised kids and still manage to have the time and energy to organize things, show up for volunteer stuff, manage a side-business etc... I can't think of any aunts who impress me nearly as much.
It’s a strong signal that she’s not a serious person.
Your last paragraph is spot on and IMO that’s part of Kamala’s male problem, she doesn’t give off that “competent mom” vibe. Of course Hillary did, and that didn’t resonate with men either (though I will note I very much liked it from her) - so maybe the lesson is women are going to be criticized no matter what they do.
If a man dislikes a warm/nurturing woman and a "schoolmarm" and an aunt type and a mom type and and and, maybe that's a sign that he just doesn't like women in general and/or only sees them as sex toys?
i mean to me she gives off ambitious lawyer vibes, do people have such little knowledge of women in a professional context they can only see a woman politician as an "aunt" or a "mom?"
I said this elsewhere but Hillary’s ‘intangibles’ problem was that she came off as a robot in a skin suit. Same sort of je ne sais quoi as pre-workout Zucc.
Sorry but this is just classic, sexist nonsense rhetoric. "Schoolmarm"? "Into astrology"? People who look for any excuse not to vote for a woman based on BS like this are not looking for "strength" in a candidate, they are whining for daddy's approval.
My kids call me "dada", so no. Was reaching for the common denominator word to capture the mentality of the kind of mini-male who whines and moans and tries to act tough by beating up on women rhetorically in order to fill the yawning gap in his masculinity created by his father's (probably well-deserved) lack of respect for him. "Father" seems too arch and "dad" too casual, while "daddy" better captures the juvenility of this sad creature, I think. Interesting stylistic question though...
"Little boys who can't handle powerful women" -- like Nurse Ratched (aka HIllary, aka "Her")?
OTOH, Kamala's use of the word "lethal" was a stroke of genius. Men could identify with that: they could envision the power being deployed on behalf of (rather than to constrain) them.
I don't think HRC was less martial or violence-coded than Harris could ever be. (See "Hilary Clintons Appalling Enthusiasm for War" from HuffPo circa 2016 among many such articles.). But I agree if you mean that Harris is just a better messenger overall because she has a calmer, more confident stage presence.
The reason Rogan hasn't had either candidate on is that Rogan does not want to have the candidates on. He doesn't need the publicity. He'd risk alienating a big chunk of his audience either way. There's no upside.
100%. She'd want to do interview prep to field some tougher questions, but just sounding reasonable and sounding sympathetic to the concerns of that audience would be useful.
I think as well, Walz should be doing this kind of interview. The pick of Walz was in part intended to show off a positive vision of masculinity -- rural guy who like to hunt and fish, knows car stuff, etc. And that's great. But you've gotta have that message reach its intended audience!
That would be awesome!!! Rogan’s not a tool. She’d all apart. All the bullshit couldn’t survive a 5 minute honest conversation much less 2 hours. Cool Aunt?!? It’d be cool to harvest all the material.
Off topic but my wife and I were talking about how the rules have shifted: whereas before you never looked at the comments because they were awful, now you read one paragraph and then look at the comments to see if anyone is cogently debunking the whole thing.
I think it has always mattered whether you are talking about something like a newspaper that has enabled comments because they thought it sounded like a good idea, or something like Reddit where the comments are basically the core functionality. It’s just that more and more of the internet is now the latter rather than the former.
also the forums many of the denizens here populate (including this one) are probably not representative of the internet at large. My city has a great hyper-local urban development forum (with a Jurassic interface ofc) that I kill a lot of time on, but that's a very very niche pursuit, and one that I'd guess is 95% male.
There was a great example of that just yesterday on the Your Local Epidemiologist substack. First comment was a really smart, thoughtful critique of the author's argument.
One thing that has happened that reinforces gender polarization is how in many elite institutions (that are predominantly controlled by Democrats or people with strong political affinity for that side of politics) treat men and boys as the problem.
The issue of workplace skills mismatch and deindustrialization? - that is a personal failure
The issue of real wages going down for decades for those not going to college (predominantly male) - a personal failure
Male sexuality - problematic (even though there are lots of horrible aspects and behaviors)
Boys falling behind in schools - it’s due to their behavioral issues
Boys and men are blamed for having bad behaviors and are told they are responsible for the bad structural things they happened to them. We are then socialized to bottle these things up.
According to extensive research I've conducted, Men make up 42% of college enrollees (see: the Pew article that was the first result when I googled the issue). Whenever we see those kinds of gender gaps in other arenas it is viewed as clear evidence of gender bias in the selection criteria, training programs that allow one to enter the arena, or some other harmful gender based element. But with college enrollment, its viewed as young men being lazier or not driven enough or not ambitious enough or generally not being up to snuff. Which may be true! But it's the only area I can think of with nearly a 20 point gender gap in an incredibly important field (college still has pretty outsized influence on long term success in our society) where we blame the people who aren't successful enough rather than looking to structural reasons for the gap and then trying to address those reasons.
I don’t see it as blame, to think of young men as being less likely to have the ambition or drive to go to college. It is somehow part of the structural explanation, but it’s unclear whether there is some structural thing upstream that causes that difference in motivations, or something structural issue that makes college too connected to this kind of personality trait.
When women are underrepresented in STEM fields I don't see anyone saying "those subjects are very difficult and women just lack the ambition or drive to do well in them". Anyone that did make that argument would be castigated.
And I'm not sure how it's not "blame"- it's literally saying something about the men themselves is the reason they're not pursuing college. I see very few people (some, but not many) looking to solve the structural problems that are causing the differences in motivation. More people are just saying men are not doing their part to work harder and be more successful. It's a common complaint from the women who are trying to find decent men to date- they're saying these young men are losers and unmotivated. They're not saying "these young men are being left behind and forgotten, and that's why they're not more successful."
I’m not sure where you’re looking if you don’t see anyone saying that there are differences in the kinds of interests women and men have that lead women to go into fields other than science. (There’s some of it in this comment section.) You’re right that there’s usually pushback, but there’s also usually pushback (again, including in this comment section) on the idea that men aren’t going to college because of lack of ambition.
Also, there’s a real difference between “this is something you are doing that is counterproductive for your success” and “you are blameworthy for this thing you are doing that is counterproductive for your success”. Mere attribution of causal responsibility is not the same as a moral judgment (though many people slip quickly between them).
A decade or two ago, lots of academic fields went through a period of soul-searching about whether a combative style of argument was pushing away women (ie, exactly the sort of explanation that depends on an intrinsic difference between men and women to explain) and there was some self-conscious change in style of interaction in the fields, that most people think has been good regardless of whether or not it is relevant for gendered differences. But this is all compatible with not *blaming* women for not liking combative interactions.
There’s a version of the story about young men in college where the issue is that men are less likely to have the kind of ambition that gets you to sit still in a chair for hours at a time, and that therefore we should change the structure of schooling to be more open to different styles of ambition, that might be similarly worthwhile regardless of whether or not it is an important explanation of the gender gap.
There may be a disconnect where you're talking about "desire to do STEM vs. some other useful thing" and you're right that lots of people say that makes women go into other fields than science.
But Testing123 is not saying "don't blame this on a lack of interest", Testing is saying "don't start saying this is a lack of ambition and drive"
I can see where you two might be reading this very differently from each other.
As A.D. pointed out, there's a big difference between "they want to do something else" and "they're incapable of doing X" or "they're too lazy to do X". People aren't looking at the male drop off in college enrollment numbers and saying "ehh, men just want to be successful doing other things."
"Also, there’s a real difference between “this is something you are doing that is counterproductive for your success” and “you are blameworthy for this thing you are doing that is counterproductive for your success”. Mere attribution of causal responsibility is not the same as a moral judgment (though many people slip quickly between them)."
Is there? I fail to see the difference in this instance. The "something that you are doing" in this instance that men are accused of is being lazy and lacking ambition to achieve, and that's why they're not working hard enough to be academically successful. The attribution of causal responsibility in this discussion is absolutely a moral judgment of inherent failing.
If I said "Kenny Easwaran posts bad comments on Slow Boring, and that's because he is too lazy to research what he's talking about" would you think I was just making a causal statement about my claim that your comments are bad (to be clear- you post good comments! Always enjoy reading your stuff :). Just using this as an example of how it comes across when we say people are too lazy to be doing better)? If the commentary was more "men are lacking the social supports necessary to do well academically" (which, I agree, SOME people do make) then it would be an attempt to ascribe causality to the issue and work towards solutions. But if the issue is laziness and lack of ambition then the solution is laid at the feet of the lazy unambitious person- get off your ass and work harder. It's absolutely a moral assignment of blame for failure.
I think the surprise is, what ISN'T said is "how are universities failing young men by not being more welcoming to them" the way it is said about women in STEM fields.
If people are really saying “young men are too lazy”, then yes, that is victim blaming. I didn’t think that’s the point that is coming up in serious discussion. (I’m thinking more of things like Richard Reeves in Of Boys and Men than of things like JD Vance in Hillbilly Elegy, where laziness may be the claim.)
I thought the serious discussion on this issue was about the different kinds of success teenage boys and girls are motivated by, and the fact that schooling is set up in ways that are more compatible with the things girls like (sitting still and paying attention rather than running around, or whatever). I also think this discourse has its own problems, but that’s what I took to be the focus, not the worst kind of discourse here.
Richard Reeves' book, Of Boys and Men, is about exactly this.
His research suggests that policies have an enormous effect, and that many well-intentioned incentives for boys/men fail and only reward girls/women. He is scrupulous in explaining that the success of women in such a short period of time is excellent and called for--and he argues that more attention should be spent on figuring out how to motivate and support boys/men without making it a zero-sum conflict.
I think that everything you've said here is true, and the reason this hasn't been addressed yet re: male enrollment in college is because the change happened SO swiftly, and was originally addressing the opposite situation.
Pushes to get women into college started and succeeded wildly over the course of a short 30 years, and men have just started lagging in the last 10. Everybody is still so caught up with empowering women and girls, and can't believe that it's been so successful maybe we need to pivot to boys and men so soon.
I agree with you, but I’d prefer we just came up with a set of standards that work and make sense and stopped trying to catch up to this empowerment see saw
All kidding aside, I think that's absolutely a component of it. My expectation is that more men enroll in trade schools than women do.
But that still gets us to the societal response to the dip in male enrollment, which doesn't say "men are ambitiously seeking out trade school opportunities that better align with their desires than 4 year colleges/unis do", and instead the explanation is frequently "men would rather play video games and live in basements than get educated and attain wealth and status".
ETA: Just realized I don't think I was addressing your question directly. The stats I'm citing are for 4 year colleges/universities, so the trade schools wouldn't be included.
I think the male coded position on those questions is that they’re all basically correct. People need to take responsibility for their own problems. I think a reasonable, male coded complaint is that this is applied *only* (but properly) to men.
The answer seems to obviously be in some cases people need to take more responsibility for their own lives but the government should help when there are clear significant patterns that are socially destructive. Whether real or imagined at a policy level, at a rhetorical level which half of that sentence each party uses seems almost entirely dependent on demographics
One thing I have come to think is that what it means to be a man is simply “taking responsibility for problems that aren’t necessarily your fault.” It’s duty. It’s obligation. These values seem devalued in modern popular culture.
This is why I find Trump, his deflection, and finger pointing so immature and so unbecoming of what it means to be a man.
Maybe this is a better description of what it means to be an adult, but I don’t want to project such expectations on women when they have so many unique burdens themselves.
I largely agree with you about what it means to be a man and I think it's a real shame that's not what most people in modern popular culture feel, but kind of to my point, Democrats are going to have a hard time making this case when they systematically suggest criminals ought not be held responsible for things that _are_ their fault or that abortion is a fine way to avoid becoming a father (a comment of Milan's on this thread that you threw a like at)
That Trump personally is an utter failure at taking responsibility for any of the many evils he does is obvious, and the Republican party seems to be limited in their conception of personal obligations to "I can't literally do crime or kill others," but even that to my eye puts them closer to my view of male duty/obligation to my eye than Democrats who seem to have anathematized the very idea of personal responsibility (except for a small group of rich folks on whom they, to a significant extent I'd say rightly, try to place the duty of paying to fix every social ill)
I've seen Milan say that he himself believes that, which I frankly see as pretty gross, and was the context in which I was seeing your like of it (which I didn't go hunting for but noticed when looking if you had a blog). My apologies for misreading that
The central insight of adults dealing with stuff that is "not their fault" is that "fault" is not a useful construct for a huge number of situations you confront, whether by virtue of the unassailable logic of determinism or the futility of fighting the iron clad arrow of time. "Dealing with it" is the core virtue and the essential skill -- minimizing the downside and maximizing the outcome.
Agree with the sentiment, but I think a lot of women would tell you that large parts of their lives are dominated by assuming responsibility for problems that are not necessarily their (or anybody's) fault. I think of this as the core realization of adulthood, rather than a specifically male thing.
Hence why I suggested at the end why it might just be what defines adulthood.
What irks me is how so many men want to shirk responsibility, duty, and their obligations. Trump is emblematic of this moral defect.
I guess I think men should take a greater share of responsibility for fixing problems they didn’t cause because they don’t have the biological burdens of childbirth.
Missed that - sorry. Agree about Trump as the extreme case, but also about a certain male character type that tends to coast on a cushion of "male privilege" (widespread social acceptance of cloddish behavior, no expectation to equally share burdens of child-rearing, housework, parental care, etc.), secure in the belief that women will always be there to pick up the slack.
The pattern is obvious and it's a pattern of behavior that is like tailor-made poison for progressive organizations who are naturally credulous about claims of identity-based rights.
To be a little more nuanced, I do think that original claims from second wave feminists about literal men's clubs being the locus of power and access to power were correct and true, and integrating those centers of power was the right move.
But there is an obvious situation happening now where men aren't allowed to have men-only spaces, and they snarkily, sometimes cruelly, but ultimately correctly point out that feminists and women complaining about trans women invading women's spaces is exactly the same.
"It's also become problematic for men to have spaces that are geared towards men."
I'm a woman, as noted elsewhere in the thread, and I practice karate. The dojo is predominantly male, and there have been multiple cases where I'm the only woman at a practice.
Is this space "geared towards men"? Certainly it is de facto, although not de jure. Nobody is stopping women from joining; women just tend to be less interested in an activity that involves the risk of being punched in the face. AFAIK our dojo leader hasn't made any specific efforts to recruit more women, but when a woman does show up and wants to practice, he treats her with respect, as he does me.
Is our dojo a "problematic" space? Not as far as I can tell. There's no Feminist Police descending on our dojo saying, "Your membership is only 16% female! Shame on you!!!"
One very, very important point: we are a very traditional style of Japanese karate, and part of our code of ethics is "stay away from social media." There are some exceptions, like training videos on YouTube, but you simply DO NOT take a selfie at practice and post it on social media with a "Watch me #slay at practice! #madskillz!!!" It just simply isn't done, and it keeps the internet outrage brigade from finding us and yelling at us.
Am I somehow spoiling this traditionally male space by existing in it while female? Are my male instructor and colleagues secretly rolling their eyes and thinking, "Man, I wish drosophilist wasn't here, then we'd all be free to hold belching contests and tell d*ck jokes"? I would like to think not.
I understand this is n = 1, a somewhat niche example, but we have lots of men at the dojo who are just really good people - honest, disciplined, strong without being macho bullies - and I don't think anyone is making them feel like "they are the problem."
*I* don't think that your dojo is a problematic space, but there's absolutely an informal "Feminist Police" mode of thought out there that does exactly that sort of thing. As the parent of two sons born in the early 2010s, I can tell you this is a very common theme in children's media produced in the last decade or so -- (1) there's a depiction of some group involving the main character(s) that is exclusively or overwhelmingly male, (2) the main character(s) are confronted with this fact and asked what are they going to do about it, (3) the main character(s) bewail the fact that they do not have more girls/women in their group and set out to make efforts to actively recruit girls/women, and (4) there is usually no dissension or pushback to #2 or, if a character does question it, the story communicates very clearly that character is BAD for having expressed doubt about why the group needs to make a special effort to recruit girls/women.
I think it's very important to disambiguate between two very different possibilities:
1. My group is overwhelmingly male because we're a bunch of sexist a-holes who make women feel bad and drive them away. This is bad! Solution: stop being a sexist a-hole.
2. My group is overwhelmingly male because we're centered around an interest that just happens to appeal to men much more so than women: martial arts, computer science, welding, the "ratsphere." This isn't necessarily bad, and there's nothing to be done. And if you think this is bad, then you should think book clubs and knitting and quilting circles and personal advice column readership should work hard to recruit more men, to be logically consistent!
Scott Alexander had an interesting column on this on Slate Star Codex.
No, but you haven't insisted on any changes. Good for you, in the most honest sense!
On the other hand, I watched a HEMA group fall into this exact pit, complete with a paragraph in the new CoC about 'no social media posts promoting fascism, sexism, transphobia, racism, or ableism. Our safe space extends outside the training room!'
Hell, *I* wouldn't want to hang out with people whose social media posts promote fascism or racism or sexism, so I can't really blame that HEMA group. Maybe it's just as well that I have never looked at the dojo members' social media posts. Ignorance is bliss?
Of course, if that HEMA group defines "transphobia" as "we don't have women fight biologically male participants, even those who identify as transwomen/nonbinary" and "ableism" as "you must be physically capable of wielding a sword/bow/spear to participate," then yeah, I see the problem.
Again, it's a variation on what I said in my comment above: is the code of conduct an expression of excessive wokeness that looks for microaggressions behind every tree, or is it an anodyne "let's all be nice to each other" statement against a-holery?
That's all well and good until supporting some local politician or having a fairly anodyne political belief (“I think we should support Israel” / “I think we need to address illegal immigration”) becomes “promoting x”.
The problem with the CoC was that there was never a need for it (there wasn't one at all) until certain people joined, and then they insisted on having one for ‘their protection’. Then it was obvious that they intended on deploying it against people with political views they didn't like. This is how the cycle goes, as I outlined it in my OP
On one hand good point, on the other, based on the terminology used you can probably guess which of the two it was as long as the reporting is accurate.
I’d add onto srynerson’s statement with my prediction: you’d only have a “war of the sexes” type issue at your dojo if there were to be an attempt to change the rules of communication-style.
The rules of communication at the dojo are simple. The teacher gives orders, we follow orders. When the teacher says "Any questions?" you're allowed to ask questions about a given technique and stuff. And you can always interrupt for urgent things like "I got a blister on my foot, I'm bleeding on the floor, please excuse me while I get a Band-Aid and wipe up" (true story, happened to me a few practices ago).
Yes, it's very authoritarian in its way, but it works because we all respect our teacher and we're there by choice. If you don't like it, the door is over there, bye.
I’m a woman and cannot understand in any way women’s opposition to nuclear power. 28% *strongly oppose*? Where is that level of antagonism coming from?
I’d guess it’s tied in with whatever is causing the general divergence on “risky” technology. Men are also relatively more supportive of pesticides, use of genetically modified foods, genetically modifying people, use of animals in lab testing, and human space exploration.
Even just within energy, men like nuclear, yes, but they also like fracking and offshore drilling.
Is that a like of "risky" technologies or "technology" in general? There's the classic "men like things, women like people" split, and technology is very much about "things".
But I agree it's probably tied to the general divergence on tech.
Hard to say, men are also more in favor of AI in general and driverless cars specifically, and men are more in favor of lab grown meat, but all of that could be construed as risky I think.
If you look at social media, which generally isn't viewed as risky, women got into it more quickly and I think are still the heavier users. And I'd be surprised if there was a gender gap in views of Apple, Amazon, etc.
Vibes: "it sounds / feels risky". Understanding details like the 1 in X thousand cancer risk caused by living near a coal plant is just well beyond the capabilities of most voters.
So I'm guessing a lot of the gender divergence in support is a vibe thing among uninformed voters. Among people with a firmer understanding of the pros and cons maybe the gender gap is closer.
I think the explanations above are all good, but I also think there is a bit of a "fruit of the poisonous tree" kind of thing going on. Nuclear power was invented by men for the purpose of committing violence, and so its fruits are tainted and inherently suspicious.
This is a funny comment but I guess I should note that I don't really see this as a specifically feminist perspective. That is, I think even completely apolitical women are likelier than men to feel distaste and dread about physical violence, war, etc. I don't think it's at all a self-consciously anti-male thing.
I disagree with the mechanisms others here are suggesting. I think women tend to be far more concerned with "safe environments" in the context of the literal environment while men tend to see safe environments in a more adversarial way. With all the caveats of averages and overlapping distributions that Matt started his piece with, if you go more insane you can see this more clearly. 5G tower conspiracy theories seem to be a primarily female phenomenon where the idea of some ambient force is knocking off the balance of the environment. Men get much more sucked in by QAnon sort of stuff where there are very particular people doing very particular evil. If you go more normal, guys are more likely imagine people breaking into their houses and think owning a gun is important for their safety, and women are more likely imagine their house being slowly but surely flooded with radiation that makes their kids sick.
1) Radiation poisoning affects fertility and birth in pronounced ways.
2) Ionizing Radiation is a novel and not widely understood threat vs more mundane threats like car exhaust. Are brains are wired to focus on novel threats.
3) Probably, this might be a stretch, the link to cancer and all the focus on breast cancer research and awareness has made women more sensitive than men (men I assume are less receptive to messaging on breast cancer.)
I think part of opposition to nuclear power has always been opposition to nuclear weapons. Some people just blur them together, but also they have been connected very closely (though they are much less so now, but lots of people haven't updated on that).
Women are more hostile to the military and weapons so that could be a contributing factor to them being hostile to nuclear power.
None of these explanations seem very convincing. The opposition to nuclear power appears to be stronger among women than the demand for stricter gun control. I’m in the minority in that I like both guns and nuclear power, but surely the “danger vibes” and the actual danger from guns are greater than from a power plant. I wish an anti-nuke woman would weigh in here.
My guess is that this is a “men like technology” thing, just as more men than women like fast cars, computer games, riding mowers, leaf blowers, airplanes, space ships, sci fi, etc.
Why is this? Idk, maybe it’s related to testosterone, hah!
First, I think MY is right in that there are plenty of dude-coded positions that are consistent with existing or not that far removed from existing D stances. There's no need to re-invent the wheel, and it's really only through the teens that I think this slipped.
Where a lot of this may be coming from I think is education, on two particular fronts. One is that the divergence may be downstream of education polarization. Don't tell anyone on Twitter, but women are quickly becoming the more educated sex and the gap is even bigger when you focus in on, say, black men versus black women.
The other place where I see an issue is public schools. Conservatives worry about wokeness run amok, partisan indoctrination, etc. But who is to say the reaction to left activist ideas won't be the opposite? What if people come to see it as part of the older generations' silly, neurotic obsessions, kind of like how us in the Millenial and GenX generations look back on DARE? I think there is a better chance something like that happens, especially with young men, and that the experience serves to create skepticism about left of center politics generally as they enter adulthood.
A little bit, yes. I'm not really into the idea of expressly male lobbying, not that what I've read of him leans too hard into that. But he has influenced some of my thinking on my most important social function, that being raising my two sons into something resembling successful adults.
I read Of Boys and Men twice, bought 11 copies to give to parent and educator friends, and have met him in person, and listened to probably 6 or 7 interviews with him about that book.
The last thing I’d describe him as is someone expressly lobbying for boys or men.
He goes out of his way in his book and in every interview I’ve heard to laud the gains of feminism, and repeatedly assert that this should not be viewed as a reason to *cut back* on women’s programs or progress—just a gentle prod to give attention to boys and men at the same time.
He details policy ideas as well, noting that some policies meant to be sex neutral end up working only for girls and women, but others have succeeded in encouraging boys and men—because the data show that boys and men respond differently.
To clarify I've never read him as being anti-women or anti feminism at all. I've also found little to disagree with on the occasions I've come across articles on his substack. I think there are a bunch of aspects to the way we approach education and socialization that don't work as well for boys and that we ought to be adaptable both because it's the right thing to do and for our own benefit.
That said, where I do have some discomfort is with a path that leads to the interest group-ification of men. I've never read him as calling for that either, but I worry that may be what people are hearing. Bigger picture I think we'll be better off with fewer people internalizing the idea that they've been failed by various structures or society or the system or what have you.
As Bo said I think a big part of it is that the culture of the Democratic Party is not nearly as open to “traditional masculinity” as the culture of the GOP.
Minor example: remember how much of a thing Brat was for Democrats online over the summer? Remember how basically no Democrats on line got invested in the Kendrick/Drake beef? Think about who listens to each artist.
Another minor test: what elected Democrat would young men be interested in doing a workout with?
Why do you think the weightlifting space is so conservative... well at least the male weightlifting side.
My theory is weightlifting is one of those endeavors where it takes sacrifice, hard work to succeed, and the results are directly proportional to the effort. (leaving out steroids). This is basically root conservatism at its core...
As an aside.... I would like to see a survey on peoples view on TRT (testosterone replacement therapy) by gender and political party. When I first went on TRT... after being medically diagnosed even... it was surprising how many people frowned upon it, questioned it... and they were universally on the left.
Extreme distance running is actually one of the few physical feats where women outperform men, interestingly enough.
Nevertheless, I’d argue that weight lifting and running engage different parts of both the brain and body, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see studies saying that the former boosts T more than the latter.
There's also a clear missing variable. Few women pursue weightlifting because in current aesthetic conventions, feminine beauty requires being lithe or at most "toned" rather than muscular. Weightlifting is thus an overwhelmingly male pursuit (versus e.g. distance running) that draws people attracted to highly masculine spaces.
“ the results are directly proportional to the effort”
My understanding is that’s laughably inaccurate. Results form a bell curve like distribution. On the left some people are exercise non-responders even in a clinical setting. They lift and gain no muscle mass (IIRC some actually lose muscle mass). On the right you have people who get great, almost steroid like, results with comparatively little effort.
You are incorrect. There is no such thing as a non-responder. It is true that there is variability in response... but given protein intake, and lifting to failure... there will be hypertrophy (muscle growth)... and in fact, new weightlifters will always show newbie gains. Its just people tend to not know how to lift or fail to adequately fuel their bodies.
I think you underweight how important protein consumption and proper practice are.
As a hairstylist, I had to remind myself constantly that many clients—as high as 40%—did not actually know how to use shampoo and conditioner properly. Blew my mind, but also explained their negative reviews of products.
But it isn’t really “proportional” to effort. Lifting more frequently or heavily than a certain (not very intense) amount, increases one’s gains far less than focusing on diet and sleep.
“ The studies showed that, on aggregate, endurance training increased people’s endurance. But when the researchers examined individual outcomes, the variations were staggering. Some people had improved their endurance by as much as 100 percent, while others had actually become less fit, even though they were following the same workout routine.
Age, sex and ethnicity had not mattered, the researchers noted. Young people and old had been outliers, as had women and men, black volunteers and white. Interestingly, nonresponse to endurance training ran in families, the researchers discovered, suggesting that genetics probably plays a significant role in how people’s bodies react to exercise.
Since then, other researchers have found that people can have extremely erratic reactions to weight training regimens, with some packing on power and mass and others losing both.
And a study published last year concentrating on brief bouts of intense interval training concluded that some people barely gained endurance with this type of workout, while others flourished, greatly augmenting their fitness.”
"On the right you have people who get great, almost steroid like, results with comparatively little effort."
I think the spoiler here is that those steroid-like results are because those people are, in fact, on steroids. It is way more wide spread in use than most people (i.e. most people who don't spend much time in gyms) think.
The other factor is that the "results" that most people think of (6-packs, well defined muscle lines, "being cut", etc) here don't come from the gym, they come from the kitchen. If you are on a bad diet, but lifting 3-4 times a week, you will get stronger, feel better, etc, but you won't really look much different.
The normal range for serum testosterone is 300-1000 nanograms per deciliter. Someone at the high end of normal or even naturally high is going to do dramatically better than someone at the low end of normal or just naturally somewhat lower than normal.
I think you’re misunderstanding what “directly proportional” means here. Maybe better phrased as “MY results are directly proportional to MY effort.”
That doesn’t mean that if I work harder than you I’ll see better results than you. But it does mean that if I work harder this year than I did last year, I’ll see better results.
“ But it does mean that if I work harder this year than I did last year, I’ll see better results.”
No.
“ Since then, other researchers have found that people can have extremely erratic reactions to weight training regimens, with some packing on power and mass and others losing both.”
I’d love to see the paper that says strength training with even passably competent programming can reliably cause detraining.
The paper you linked above about endurance training basically says that individuals have individual responses to standardized training regimes… something which most practitioners already know. Adaptation requires progressive overload, and overload is defined from your personal baseline.
I think the character traits list you have there is all present in endurance athletes and that seems like a much more liberal group.
I lift a decent amount too and something just feels very different about the kind of person who really gets deep into these events on average but it’s not that people running for 3 hours before dawn don’t believe in sacrifice.
That last question is… odd. Many/most elected officials are old(er) and not in great physical shape, and that’s ok. You elect them to govern, not to have a workout or a beer with.
Maybe AOC would be up to going for a run or a long bike ride?
If you want politicians to have serious experience in anything other than politics, then they're not going into politics much before 40 and they won't get to the top level much before 50, so most politicians are going to be old enough that physical fitness has dropped a lot since their youths.
I don't have a problem with most senior politicians being 50-70, I do have a problem with having Pelosi *and* McConnell *and* Schumer *and* Biden *and* Trump all being at the top at once. Harris and Jeffries and Johnson are more of the age I expect senior politicians to be.
Don't get me wrong, an occasional very young of very old politician is a good thing. Having an AOC (actually she's not that young any more, so maybe a Max Frost) and a Biden around just to ensure that different perspectives are included is good. But the majority of electeds should be 40-70 and the most leaders in their 50s or 60s.
I agree with this completely. This is my concern that things have gotten too skewed to the upper end. Harris really isn't a senior politician. She is only just over the median age in the house and well below the median in the senate. I'd be fine with 50-70 as you've laid out, but our current distribution is more like 60-80.
It'd take a constitutional amendment at the federal level, but I'd like a rule saying that no-one can be elected to a term that will extend beyond their 80th birthday.
I would like to push back on that a bit. I think, “Village Elders” have been running the show (in villages) since before recoded history. I seems likely that this is a feature, not a bug and, in fact, mature wisdom beats the hot headed-ness of youth when it comes to governmental decisions.
>"America’s public elementary schools are probably the place most infused with progressive sensibilities..."
It's funny that Matt states this without any doubt or qualification, and yet progressives always say conservatives are lying when conservatives make the same statement. There is a lot to dislike about Chris Rufo, but on the above statement he and Matt are in agreement.
This is just a general phenomenon where conservatives lie so much that the default progressive response is "that's a lie" when in reality they mean "you're correct and i just disagree that X is bad"
see also the idea that elites disrespect the opinions of the masses on immigration and are deliberately trying to maintain higher immigration levels than normal people want. this is an extremely conservative coded statement, and most progs would say it's a lie.
of course, it's true AND it's also true that the 'masses' are morons and i don't really care what they think except insofar as they have to be placated for electoral reasons
Yes, completely certain. They lie incessantly, without hesitation. They do not care about truth, or reality, or facts. By happenstance, they occasionally care about a thing that is actually happening, but just as often they are content to make something up entirely.
This is not the sort of thing that anyone who doesn't already believe it can be convinced of, unfortunately. But consider something like e.g. the recent blowup over Haitians eating pets in Springfield. Never happened. JD Vance admitted he was lying about it to put media attention on immigrant communities.
Or, of course, the biggest lie of the recent pack: the fact that most GOP electeds will tell you the election was stolen from Donald Trump.
I used to feel this way, circa 2020. It seemed so obviously one-sided.
I no longer feel that way at all, but it took a lot of exploration of news and opinions outside the mainstream to see that democrats are not so saintly after all. And there’s no way to say that concisely without sounding like a conspiracy theorist.
Except, their point is exactly the reverse of one another. Matt's point is that despite teachers being progressive they can't get little boys to stop playing war. Rufo's point is that because teachers are progressive, they'll indoctrinate your children and turn them into little marxists.
If you say so. I've certainly seen concerns about separation of church and state, ensuring charter schools provide reasonable levels of education rather than simply being fraudulent (also a concern with public schools) and the slow death of public services being offered as public services rather than as contracting officers for private parties to provide services, but I don't remember seeing anything like that.
Is there any doubt that teachers aren’t frustrated by their inability to keep boys from warring and play fighting, though?
And there is plenty of research that modern k-12 schools emphasize behaviors and traits more commonly found in girls, which absolutely leads to penalizing boys.
To the extent that the gap between young men and women exists ideologically, I think a lot of it can be ascribed to the fact that a lot of young men are in a cohort where they are being outperformed educationally and professionally by women. There's a sense for some people that the world has turned against them while they are also being lectured about how men suck and have it easier. Since Dems are increasingly seen as a party for (neurotic?) professional women, it's not surprising some young men would feel alienated from the party even if Dems take savvier policy positions to try to combat the drift.
There's also a lot of discussion about how right wing "manosphere" content online is radicalizing young men. I'm not sure how true this is (I am somewhat skeptical) but the discussion inevitably becomes very scoldy which probably further compounds the problem.
Every time I read about gender differences, I feel like a mutant weirdo freak, because I'm a woman, but my positions tend to code as masculine. I strongly support nuclear energy. I think the death penalty should be used very sparingly and only in cases where the evidence is overwhelming, but I believe there are cases where it's justified, like some depraved serial rapist-torturer-killer or the Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg. I was a bit startled when Kamala said that line about the "most lethal military in the world," but I agreed with her: *someone* is going to have the most powerful military, and I'd much rather it were us than Russia or China or North Korea.
Of course, I am one of the 14% of Slow Boring commentariat that is female, so I am in no way representative of women. Also, I love Star Wars - the original trilogy, the Thrawn novels, The Clone Wars, some episodes of Rebels were really good - and I don't like the Disney+ Star Wars content other than Andor. The Acolyte straight up sucked.
I'm the opposite, I'm a man whose positions tend to code as feminine. Reading through this article it was strange finding myself on the "women" side of so many issues, though it was mostly the "violence"-related issues, since I tended to side more with my gender in the "science and technology" section. I think I am just averse to violence to general. It would explain a lot of my opinions from my dislike of American gun culture to my general apathy towards contact sports.
drosophilist, I hear you, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that you happily engage as part of the 14% female SBers. Why? I don’t think we know yet, but I do think these traits are correlated.
When I was 5 and being baptized (I know a little late in the game for that), I used one of the candles as a gun and started shooting it at the priest. I distinctly remember the priest saying "boys will be boys."
Reminds me of social dancing in 7th grade during PE. There we were, "slow" dancing to Elvis, as close as we ever got to our shorter male classmates. The boys were having finger gun battles using us as shields. (What a way to lead!)
I remember when i was a kid i watched the VHS of Commando and wanted to gear myself up like Arnie, only to find the toy guns were too unrealistic to really match it without a lot of spray paint or electrical tape.
Nowadays i've gone through the toy sections of stores and man, it'd have been so much easier to get tac'd up as a kid today.
Repainting toys is a very easy project and it's a shame more kids don't get a chance to do it.
I know it's not really relevant to your situation since you are no longer a child. Just saying that a cheap can of Rustoleum 2x, and two craft paints (black and a silver metallic) for a grand total of like $15 could have given you a sweet gun.
My wife grew up with her sister and her mom mostly, and her dad worked long hours. We had a girl first. She was thoroughly surprised when our son, as soon as he could walk, started grabbing sticks and hitting everything with them.
A friend of my mom’s raised her only son with her husband on a sailboat from 2-5. She assiduously avoided any “violent” toys or media. One day the son met some other kids on some island, the boys used sticks as swords, and from that moment on the son was obsessed with wielding imaginary weapons.
First off, it's a great column, but I have to reply because Yglesias baited me with his mischaracterization of vibesology, of which I am a proponent.
OF COURSE, Democrats have issues they feel strongly about. So do Republicans! The argument is that this doesn't really apply to the persuadable voters who decide elections, who often not only lack strong opinions about the issues, but frequently *DO NOT EVEN KNOW WHAT THE ISSUES ARE*! On my Facebook feed, a woman I used to work with posted a picture of cheese she took at her local grocery store, and she wrote that while she despises Donald Trump, she is voting for him because the price of cheese is now too high. And that is your typical undecided voter's thought process when settling on a decision. I asked her what impact she thought that Trump's tariffs were going to have on prices: I am confident from her response that she doesn't know what a tariff is.
Look, any position can be taken too far. In truth, I support a popularism-infused vibesology. I DO think that policies influence voting behavior at the margins. But that works by influencing the views of people who are TRUSTED by these election-deciding, idiot (excuse me, "low information") voters. If a politician proposes something radical, that is something that gets picked up on by these dimwits when they hear conversations with their pastors / co-workers / friends / siblings / etc. And the importance of candidate policy positions are SWAMPED by factors often outside the control of those candidates. Like the price of gasoline or whatever.
My main concern with popularism is that I sometimes I see it used as an excuse to either betray progressive values, or else do nothing. I believe that the reason to win elections is to go do stuff -- to actually spend the political capital that you accrue. And you win those elections through a sensible blend of position-taking and aggressive vibesology.
Anyway, I really enjoyed reading today's column. Feel free to tear me a new one in the replies, but I won't be able to respond. Busy moving at the moment and just don't have the time.
1,000% agree with your first paragraph. Every time I read an interview with a swing voter is an enraging experience, they seem to lack any understanding of cause & effect.
In general American politics is bizarre because the arena in which it takes place is shaped by a very large number of people who are actually pretty well informed, all things considered, and have very strong political opinions. In most countries, politically engaged people are at least somewhat elastic -- e.g. shifts from Tories to Labour/LibDem in the UK, or from Liberals to Conservatives in Canada, but in the United States this basically does not occur. So all elections are decided by people who, as you rightly point out, are incredibly stupid, which creates this weird perception that *American voters writ large* are stupid.
That's interesting. My assumption would be that it would work the same everywhere. I'm in Germany at the moment, and my sense (without looking at the data) is that the least informed voters are the ones who are most likely to jump-ship, although it's probably true that you get more movement inside of a coalition (e.g., a former SPD voter casting a vote for the Greens).
My read is that Europeans have no grasp of how US politics works and do not understand that the views of right-wing rural communities are enormously overrepresented in the US political system. (By giving rural states like Wyoming, with 600,000 people, the same amount of power in the Senate as the state of California, with its 39 million; through the Electoral College; etc.) This gives Europeans the false impression that Americans are more right-wing than they actually are.
I'd be interested in giving this issue a closer look. Could be that you're totally right. If you have some articles, send them my way!
I mean, in general the Republican Party wins 46-49% of the national vote depending on the election. The difference between 47 and 51 is huge for majoritarians purposes but for purposes of "what do Americans think?" it's negligible.
About half of Americans support the Republican Party, and about half don't.
It's a fair point, but it has a huge impact on public policy for several reasons: 1) a lot of the kinds of policies that European (pseudo)intellectuals point to as evidence of their superiority simply cannot be passed in the American context precisely because of these anti-democratic features of the US political system, and in many cases would not have passed in Europe, if Europe had those same features; and 2) even when the Dems have a trifecta, our public policy must pander to the Dems from the most conservative states in the country, rather than what the majority of Dems actually want.
This kind of circles back around to what I was saying above. I just don't think the fact that 46-49% of voters support Republicans means that 46-49% of the public supports the GOP agenda. I question what percentage of voters even know where the GOP stands on the issues. (NOTE: I am absolutely NOT suggesting, as progressives often do online, that the typical voter is some latent / closeted hardcore leftist who will vote for the Dems if they do Marxism. Instead, my argument is that huge percentages of voters are ignorant and relatively uninterested in politics, and that this observation applies to Europeans, too.)
I love Europe and Europeans. As I've said in response to other Slow Boring articles, I view Europe the same way I do America: there are problems, but also a lot to admire. But one thing I can't stand about Europeans is the smug sense of superiority that I encounter, which is utterly unjustified by the facts. Trust me: these people are idiots. (I say that with tongue partially in cheek. But their best-selling newspapers are tabloids. I recently got into a conversation with a college-educated professional who didn't understand how his nation's health system worked. Etc.)
There is a well known gender gap on the question of "is space cool" and "should we spend money to do cool stuff in space". I think Democrats in general would benefit from moving away from Obama's influence on this question, he convinced so many of them that space exploration is dumb and a waste of money.
Ancillary observation. I am a huge weightlifter... its my main hobby.
Over the last few years, I've seen a huge increase in teenagers and Gen Z getting interested in the gym... weightlifting and bodybuilding. And for whatever reason... the gym space tends to be conservative. Even the women who are into fitness are more likely to lean conservative.
I don't think its causal effect (gym driving people conservative), but its definitely a trend I've noticed.
I weight lift, but also have gotten into running marathons a fair bit post college. My sense is that the running space is also seeing a huge increase in numbers, but it's a comparatively left coded activity. Good that young people are exercising more though!
Weightlifting is "help yourself" which fits into conservative philosophy. As opposed to something like therapy, which is "get help from others" which is clearly more in the direction of feminine and liberal philosophy.
i think it is probably causal. lifting weights is very fair -- you get out what you put in for a long time before individual genetics starts to matter. if a big part of your life takes place in a very fair arena, a conservative philosophy makes a lot more sense.
“Fitness” is gender-segregated, not gender-disproportionate. The girlies love yoga, Zumba, step classes, water aerobics, free dance, and all the other “softer” modes of exercise.
this is actually too bad. Women suffer from age related muscle loss (sarcopenia) even more than men do. Age related muscle loss is a major contributor to quality of life and mobility issues... to falls, balance, etc...
Weightlifting is the only intervention that can halt it. Women... especially older women should skip the softer modes of exercise and pump some iron.
I agree. My side gig is as a fitness teacher (mostly dance/spin/kickboxing) and I always try to encourage clients to do weight-training exercises either in our classes or outside them. Functional strength and comfortable movement are the highest goals of fitness in my opinion and it’s terrible that women are dissuaded from some of the most effective formats because of the fear of looking “bulky.” Back when I got my first group fit certification, the course actually instructed us not to use the word “muscles” around women because it would “scare them off”, which remains a top ten dipshit thing I’ve heard.
Violence is cool and all— especially when I experience it through a screen and can’t get hurt— but sex is much better. Liberals have become increasingly censorious about sex. This is an electoral liability. A sex-positive female politician could turn her gender into an advantage. If young men thought Harris would bring us closer to the sexual mores of the Netherlands or Norway, they would vote for her at far higher rates.
To an extent, feminism, especially first wave feminism, has liberated men. Men can now choose between empowered career women and more traditional types. This is really quite awesome. I don’t have to work my fingers to the bone to “be a man,” I can work less, earn half the money and still hold my head high. Empowered women can seek erotic and personal fulfillment in relationships rather than viewing marriage as more of an economic arrangement. Empowered women don’t need alimony and don’t have to view every breakup as a disaster. They can have flings and lovers and enjoy their bodies. Unfortunately, many feminists are censorious and seem uncomfortable with the fact that men prefer fit, attractive, pleasant women. Harris is a fit, attractive woman who can be a cool girl when she wants to be. She should let her hair down and be sex positive.
But what would it actually look like to be more sex positive? I don't know if "let your hair down" is the answer. The classic dilemma for female leaders is that if your personality is too warm you're called a slut, and if it's too cold you're called a bitch, and there's a very narrow zone of acceptable behavior in between.
I think another problem is the pool of voters Harris needs to win across the swing states. Are they the ones who want more sex positive behavior from the potential first female president?
I think the answer is expressing approval of young unmarried couples and romantic relationships short of marriage. Make Republicans the churched up scolds who think you have to wait til marriage.
What does approval mean in this context? There's no shortage of those relationships in the US, but also the evidence is very strong that people are usually less satisfied in them than if they marry.
If not for Dobbs this would be beyond a lost cause. Hawk Tuah projects a Republican aura — the antithesis of a dour self-appointed censor with a bedazzled cane.
Not exactly a pillar of feminine elegance and beauty, but the sort of girl that gets with immature college guys.
One way would be to talk frankly about her relationship with her mentor, the much older Willie Brown. She could open up about how it was unconventional, and there was a large age gap, but she doesn't regret it. That would be her real, first-hand experience of being sex-positive. But somehow I don't think she's going to talk about any of that.
If Trump/Vance or Republican electeds a start calling Harris a slut, that would only help her. “You raped a women in a department store and call me slut because I had boyfriends. Pathetic!”
I think when you look at pop music since the pandemic it's very evident that we haven't culturally figured out what to do with male sexuality since Me-Too. Olivia Rodrigo, Sabrina Carpenter, Charli XCX etc sing a lot about sex, I think I also read Beyonce's 2022 album was her "horniest yet."
But on the male side we have like Benson Boone and Noah Kahan, basically sad sacks with no apparent agency in life. Even MJ Lenderman who I really like is singing sad songs. Contrast that to the early '10s when you had Drake, Kanye, the Weeknd, etc. Those guys were all clearly horny in a way that probably crossed the line of what's appropriate in some respects but at least they were interesting and somewhat authentic. Even the indie rockers of the 2000s were kind of dirtbags--go listen to the lyrics on the early career albums by The National, also people like the Strokes and Interpol were clearly writing "party" music (drugs and sex).
I'm not sure it's a coincidence that all your "sad boys" were White and all your "horny guys" were Black - the cultural expectations for what each type of artist will sing about is very different.
There's definitely been a measurable (although not gigantic) decline in the popularity of rappers.
I think The Weeknd is just between album cycles and it's not clear if he's going to be dropping off the face of the earth like Katy Perry or will be back with a vengeance soon.
Also, Million Dollar Baby by Tommy Richman has been really big this year and that's a horny song
yeah I have no idea why some music ends up being more popular than other music but Troye Sivan is definitely a big step below Sabrina Carpenter or whatever. Seems like all the momentum for popular men is in country now, Morgan Wallen, Kane Brown, Shaboozey, etc. etc. etc.
Millennial third wave feminism was generally very sex positive, as contrasted with 1970s second wave feminism. (First wave feminism is usually thought of as 1920s suffragism.)
Gen Z in general seems much more skeptical about sex - they’re having less of it, and even the straight men among them seem more likely to think it’s inappropriate in movies and TV. Among queer people there’s been an observation that older generations want to have sex and younger generations want to have gender. (This helps give gay bars new reason to exist, when the apps were killing them a decade ago, but they’re becoming different types of places.)
Look, I disagree with David Abbott, must be a day that ends in "-y"!
(I kid, David, I kid)
I don't think that's it at all. Sure, on the margins you may find some barstool bros or whatever they're called who would vote for Harris if she were more sex-positive. But the mainstream conservative critique of the Democrats is just the opposite: that they preach sexual liberation and alternative lifestyles like same-sex marriage and polyamory, but in their private lives they are fuddy-duddy traditionalists who get married, have their children after they're married, and don't get divorced.
Rather than sex positivity, such conservatives want Democrats to preach more traditional morality: marriage is good, having children out of wedlock is bad, you should stay together for the sake of your children. (Of course, conservatives also support a twice-divorced serial adulterer, but I digress.) "Luxury beliefs" and all that.
That’s the mainstream _intellectual conservative_ critique. Ever meet an undecided voter in Pennsyltucky who even knows that bourgeois Manhattanites get heterosexually married and have 2.1 kids in their mid-30s after reaching serious financial stability?
I mean, Hilary to Kamala within a couple election cycles feels like a lot of progress on this gradient. It's hard to imagine a successful female Democratic politician in this era being censorious and anti-sex given the male-dominated arenas in which they have necessarily participated throughout their careers. I suppose this could change over time, but it's not my read on the up and coming generations.
Among all the factors listed here, I think censorship of speech and cancel culture are probably the biggest reasons. Men like to talk trash (both liberals and conservatives), either for fun or to let off steam and then forget all about it the next day. The penalty for doing that has become unacceptably high, specially if they are about race or gender or some protected group. DEI and AA is another area where most men (moderates and conservatives) favor meritocracy over diversity and representation.
Several of my lib friends, including the lib woman i was sorta dating at the time, lost their minds over the “world’s most lethal military” line. I was like, what do you suppose a military should be other than lethal af?! So disappointing 🤦🏽♂️
I'll say for the hundredth time she should just go on Rogan and be affable. Lean into the cool aunt vibes. Gotta hunt where there's ducks.
Maybe she’s worried Rogan would ask her point blank if she explicitly disavows some of her most leftist 2019 positions.
I don’t think Harris is particularly strong in interviews. But Rogan is a very weak interviewer, in that he never pins people down on their answer. She could go on that show and pick up thousands of voters no question.
Skeptical of Rogan he is a bit more of a rightist a lot of the time and faux intellectual. Theo von would be an interesting interview bc he REALLY doesn’t pin people down. When he said something skeptical about Harris to Bernie, he responded with something along the lines of being a black women and getting to where she has gotten is no easy feat…theo’s response was a nod and “that’s true.”
She should do both. Prep hard for the interviews etc but it’s a great opportunity to reach out to marginal voters.
Rogan's left / rightness is issue-by-issue. If Bernie said the same thing to Rogan do you think he'd push back? It's only marginally more likely and if he did he wouldn't argue with any halfway decent response he got.
I was going to say that a half-day event to pick up a few thousand votes would be a terrible ROI, but running the numbers shows doing events like that consistently for, say, 100 days could easily be the margin of victory in the popular vote. So maybe it's not such a bad ROI!
Great opportunity to say she does
Does she?
Many of them, yes.
She needs to make it explicit then. At least if she’s dead set on winning PA.
Do you think it is more politically beneficial to say “I used to support this thing you don’t like but now I repudiate that and support this thing you do like”, or to say “look at how much I support this thing you like”?
If you have been an extremely famous figure, famous for supporting the unpopular thing in the past, I can see that the former would be valuable. But I don’t think that describes Kamala Harris. Very few people actually paid attention to the early phases of the 2020 democratic primary, especially among people who are now swing voters.
Can you give some examples of when Kamala Harris has personally stated she changed her position? There's been lots of times some campaign spokesman--usually anonymously--has said so, but that's hardly the same thing.
She has personally stated positions that are in contrast to past positions she stated. Explicitly reminding people of the past position is not usually something you want to do while doing that, unless you are sure that nearly everyone remembers your past position.
Rogan's comments after the debate showed some respect simply for the fact that she looked stronger and smarter than Donnie boy up there.
I don't know how she feels about spicy food, but she could go on Hot Ones. As long as she finished I think that would earn her some guy points.
Hot Ones would be great!
I think part of the problem is that she doesn’t come across as the cool aunt — she comes across as the spacey aunt who’s, like, really into crystals. That’s a big turnoff for men.
Doesn’t mean she shouldn’t try - but I fear it could go very badly.
I...think that you are probably correct in reality, but it's funny to me, because I don't actually think's much gap between the personality of a crystal-gal vs. an ice-bath-bro, or an astrology chick vs. a tan-your-junk dude.
I think a lot of people have this impression of Rogan from 30 second clips of him being unusually credulous harvested from multiple 3 hour long podcasts a week he puts out but he's really not like a "tan your junk bro".
He is not, but he doesn't push back on them enough for my tastes.
I don’t want sunburn on my privates….
some of the problem is just she doesn't do any media at all so she isn't really shaping her image so people can say whatever they want.
I always interpret this kind of comment to be "actually, I haven't seen her much in the media I pay attention to." I personally don't know what her daily schedule is and what kind of local media she is doing (maybe you do!) There are only seven states that matter and if she is doing the kind of media that will help move votes in those seven states but never doing anything national, whether it's 60 Minutes or Joe Rogan, then I'm fine with that.
maybe but I remember seeing tons of Walz hits in July (even on fox news) and they were all over social media, I have not seen any clips of either of them doing media since the 60 minutes thing. Maybe I'm following the wrong people on twitter tho.
Funny you mention Walz, because I opened YouTube the other day and the first video was him on WeRateDogs taking about his rescue dog: https://youtu.be/Spiwlde4kys?si=YSaUMCe8s50G2eA4
It’s cute, and it’s about 5% politics and 95% dogs.
Echelon Insights recent polling found most voters had seen Trump/Vance in interviews, Harris/Walz in ads.
It is the winning strategy. She isn't good off the cuff -- we've seen enough to know this, and trying to get better at it with 30 days left in the race is too risky. Run the ads, avoid any unscripted remarks and win.
All depends where you think things stand, right? I am at least hoping their risk-averse approach suggests their internal polls (or feedback "on the ground," or whatever) are giving them optimism. But if you have a 45% chance of winning, you can't afford to play prevent defense.
And heck, even with a 60% win probability, you don't play prevent defense.
"across as the spacey aunt who’s, like, really into crystals. That’s a big turnoff for men"
Is it? That sort of cliche just doesn't strike me as a big negative. The warm, nurturing, "safety first", school-principle-talking-about-equity-constantly type of female seems like it would be a big turnoff. On vibes I'd think someone like Elizabeth Warren would be a turnoff for men. Girl with crystals might actually be a girl who can get some shit done, although I'd personally be scared the same way I'd be scared of a RFK Jr.
How many guys do you know who like it when a woman is really into astrology? It’s the same vibe.
Though I agree with you that the schoolmarm is also a turnoff.
I can't remember it ever coming up so I'm not sure. But that's more of a dating perspective.
I'm trying to imagine that I hear the PTA or School Board got a new head, who happens to be female, and I hear she's into astrology or spacey. And that seem not ideal for me, personally, but not a strong signal that she'd be unpopular or ineffective. I'm having a hard time imagining what the cool aunt counterexample would be.
TBH the kind of female that I imagine as really having their shit together and being able to perform would be like the moms I know who have 4 or 8 well-raised kids and still manage to have the time and energy to organize things, show up for volunteer stuff, manage a side-business etc... I can't think of any aunts who impress me nearly as much.
It’s a strong signal that she’s not a serious person.
Your last paragraph is spot on and IMO that’s part of Kamala’s male problem, she doesn’t give off that “competent mom” vibe. Of course Hillary did, and that didn’t resonate with men either (though I will note I very much liked it from her) - so maybe the lesson is women are going to be criticized no matter what they do.
If a man dislikes a warm/nurturing woman and a "schoolmarm" and an aunt type and a mom type and and and, maybe that's a sign that he just doesn't like women in general and/or only sees them as sex toys?
i mean to me she gives off ambitious lawyer vibes, do people have such little knowledge of women in a professional context they can only see a woman politician as an "aunt" or a "mom?"
I said this elsewhere but Hillary’s ‘intangibles’ problem was that she came off as a robot in a skin suit. Same sort of je ne sais quoi as pre-workout Zucc.
Sorry but this is just classic, sexist nonsense rhetoric. "Schoolmarm"? "Into astrology"? People who look for any excuse not to vote for a woman based on BS like this are not looking for "strength" in a candidate, they are whining for daddy's approval.
Do you say “daddy” a lot in your day-to-day life? Strange way to put this.
My kids call me "dada", so no. Was reaching for the common denominator word to capture the mentality of the kind of mini-male who whines and moans and tries to act tough by beating up on women rhetorically in order to fill the yawning gap in his masculinity created by his father's (probably well-deserved) lack of respect for him. "Father" seems too arch and "dad" too casual, while "daddy" better captures the juvenility of this sad creature, I think. Interesting stylistic question though...
"Little boys who can't handle powerful women" -- like Nurse Ratched (aka HIllary, aka "Her")?
OTOH, Kamala's use of the word "lethal" was a stroke of genius. Men could identify with that: they could envision the power being deployed on behalf of (rather than to constrain) them.
I don't think HRC was less martial or violence-coded than Harris could ever be. (See "Hilary Clintons Appalling Enthusiasm for War" from HuffPo circa 2016 among many such articles.). But I agree if you mean that Harris is just a better messenger overall because she has a calmer, more confident stage presence.
The reason Rogan hasn't had either candidate on is that Rogan does not want to have the candidates on. He doesn't need the publicity. He'd risk alienating a big chunk of his audience either way. There's no upside.
She went on All the Smoke recently, which feels like a good move in this type of direction.
100%. She'd want to do interview prep to field some tougher questions, but just sounding reasonable and sounding sympathetic to the concerns of that audience would be useful.
I think as well, Walz should be doing this kind of interview. The pick of Walz was in part intended to show off a positive vision of masculinity -- rural guy who like to hunt and fish, knows car stuff, etc. And that's great. But you've gotta have that message reach its intended audience!
I continue to maintain she should go on Hot Ones.
(ETA: I don't particularly watch Hot Ones, I just think it's a good vibe for her.)
Trump has been on literally every tech bro, man-coded podcast. The fact that Harris hasn't even been on any is a huge miss by her team.
And Walz! He'd be great on those shows.
That would be awesome!!! Rogan’s not a tool. She’d all apart. All the bullshit couldn’t survive a 5 minute honest conversation much less 2 hours. Cool Aunt?!? It’d be cool to harvest all the material.
Harris should come out strongly in favor of internet forum commenting, particularly Substack. She would kill it.
Just don't endorse the WaPo comment section. How that ended up a cesspool I'll never know, but it did.
Or NYT 😵💫
I would pedantically defend forum culture as being very different from [blog -> comment] culture, which is what Substack is.
She has explicitly said ``first rule: don't look at the comments'' in one of the interviews. How is that for an anti-endorsement?
Off topic but my wife and I were talking about how the rules have shifted: whereas before you never looked at the comments because they were awful, now you read one paragraph and then look at the comments to see if anyone is cogently debunking the whole thing.
I think it has always mattered whether you are talking about something like a newspaper that has enabled comments because they thought it sounded like a good idea, or something like Reddit where the comments are basically the core functionality. It’s just that more and more of the internet is now the latter rather than the former.
also the forums many of the denizens here populate (including this one) are probably not representative of the internet at large. My city has a great hyper-local urban development forum (with a Jurassic interface ofc) that I kill a lot of time on, but that's a very very niche pursuit, and one that I'd guess is 95% male.
There was a great example of that just yesterday on the Your Local Epidemiologist substack. First comment was a really smart, thoughtful critique of the author's argument.
One thing that has happened that reinforces gender polarization is how in many elite institutions (that are predominantly controlled by Democrats or people with strong political affinity for that side of politics) treat men and boys as the problem.
The issue of workplace skills mismatch and deindustrialization? - that is a personal failure
The issue of real wages going down for decades for those not going to college (predominantly male) - a personal failure
Male sexuality - problematic (even though there are lots of horrible aspects and behaviors)
Boys falling behind in schools - it’s due to their behavioral issues
Boys and men are blamed for having bad behaviors and are told they are responsible for the bad structural things they happened to them. We are then socialized to bottle these things up.
According to extensive research I've conducted, Men make up 42% of college enrollees (see: the Pew article that was the first result when I googled the issue). Whenever we see those kinds of gender gaps in other arenas it is viewed as clear evidence of gender bias in the selection criteria, training programs that allow one to enter the arena, or some other harmful gender based element. But with college enrollment, its viewed as young men being lazier or not driven enough or not ambitious enough or generally not being up to snuff. Which may be true! But it's the only area I can think of with nearly a 20 point gender gap in an incredibly important field (college still has pretty outsized influence on long term success in our society) where we blame the people who aren't successful enough rather than looking to structural reasons for the gap and then trying to address those reasons.
I don’t see it as blame, to think of young men as being less likely to have the ambition or drive to go to college. It is somehow part of the structural explanation, but it’s unclear whether there is some structural thing upstream that causes that difference in motivations, or something structural issue that makes college too connected to this kind of personality trait.
Maybe blame is or isn't the right word, but certainly the contrast with how women-in-STEM is talked about is pretty stark.
When women are underrepresented in STEM fields I don't see anyone saying "those subjects are very difficult and women just lack the ambition or drive to do well in them". Anyone that did make that argument would be castigated.
And I'm not sure how it's not "blame"- it's literally saying something about the men themselves is the reason they're not pursuing college. I see very few people (some, but not many) looking to solve the structural problems that are causing the differences in motivation. More people are just saying men are not doing their part to work harder and be more successful. It's a common complaint from the women who are trying to find decent men to date- they're saying these young men are losers and unmotivated. They're not saying "these young men are being left behind and forgotten, and that's why they're not more successful."
I’m not sure where you’re looking if you don’t see anyone saying that there are differences in the kinds of interests women and men have that lead women to go into fields other than science. (There’s some of it in this comment section.) You’re right that there’s usually pushback, but there’s also usually pushback (again, including in this comment section) on the idea that men aren’t going to college because of lack of ambition.
Also, there’s a real difference between “this is something you are doing that is counterproductive for your success” and “you are blameworthy for this thing you are doing that is counterproductive for your success”. Mere attribution of causal responsibility is not the same as a moral judgment (though many people slip quickly between them).
A decade or two ago, lots of academic fields went through a period of soul-searching about whether a combative style of argument was pushing away women (ie, exactly the sort of explanation that depends on an intrinsic difference between men and women to explain) and there was some self-conscious change in style of interaction in the fields, that most people think has been good regardless of whether or not it is relevant for gendered differences. But this is all compatible with not *blaming* women for not liking combative interactions.
There’s a version of the story about young men in college where the issue is that men are less likely to have the kind of ambition that gets you to sit still in a chair for hours at a time, and that therefore we should change the structure of schooling to be more open to different styles of ambition, that might be similarly worthwhile regardless of whether or not it is an important explanation of the gender gap.
There may be a disconnect where you're talking about "desire to do STEM vs. some other useful thing" and you're right that lots of people say that makes women go into other fields than science.
But Testing123 is not saying "don't blame this on a lack of interest", Testing is saying "don't start saying this is a lack of ambition and drive"
I can see where you two might be reading this very differently from each other.
As A.D. pointed out, there's a big difference between "they want to do something else" and "they're incapable of doing X" or "they're too lazy to do X". People aren't looking at the male drop off in college enrollment numbers and saying "ehh, men just want to be successful doing other things."
"Also, there’s a real difference between “this is something you are doing that is counterproductive for your success” and “you are blameworthy for this thing you are doing that is counterproductive for your success”. Mere attribution of causal responsibility is not the same as a moral judgment (though many people slip quickly between them)."
Is there? I fail to see the difference in this instance. The "something that you are doing" in this instance that men are accused of is being lazy and lacking ambition to achieve, and that's why they're not working hard enough to be academically successful. The attribution of causal responsibility in this discussion is absolutely a moral judgment of inherent failing.
If I said "Kenny Easwaran posts bad comments on Slow Boring, and that's because he is too lazy to research what he's talking about" would you think I was just making a causal statement about my claim that your comments are bad (to be clear- you post good comments! Always enjoy reading your stuff :). Just using this as an example of how it comes across when we say people are too lazy to be doing better)? If the commentary was more "men are lacking the social supports necessary to do well academically" (which, I agree, SOME people do make) then it would be an attempt to ascribe causality to the issue and work towards solutions. But if the issue is laziness and lack of ambition then the solution is laid at the feet of the lazy unambitious person- get off your ass and work harder. It's absolutely a moral assignment of blame for failure.
I think the surprise is, what ISN'T said is "how are universities failing young men by not being more welcoming to them" the way it is said about women in STEM fields.
If people are really saying “young men are too lazy”, then yes, that is victim blaming. I didn’t think that’s the point that is coming up in serious discussion. (I’m thinking more of things like Richard Reeves in Of Boys and Men than of things like JD Vance in Hillbilly Elegy, where laziness may be the claim.)
I thought the serious discussion on this issue was about the different kinds of success teenage boys and girls are motivated by, and the fact that schooling is set up in ways that are more compatible with the things girls like (sitting still and paying attention rather than running around, or whatever). I also think this discourse has its own problems, but that’s what I took to be the focus, not the worst kind of discourse here.
Richard Reeves' book, Of Boys and Men, is about exactly this.
His research suggests that policies have an enormous effect, and that many well-intentioned incentives for boys/men fail and only reward girls/women. He is scrupulous in explaining that the success of women in such a short period of time is excellent and called for--and he argues that more attention should be spent on figuring out how to motivate and support boys/men without making it a zero-sum conflict.
I think that everything you've said here is true, and the reason this hasn't been addressed yet re: male enrollment in college is because the change happened SO swiftly, and was originally addressing the opposite situation.
Pushes to get women into college started and succeeded wildly over the course of a short 30 years, and men have just started lagging in the last 10. Everybody is still so caught up with empowering women and girls, and can't believe that it's been so successful maybe we need to pivot to boys and men so soon.
I agree with you, but I’d prefer we just came up with a set of standards that work and make sense and stopped trying to catch up to this empowerment see saw
An excellent point- thanks for highlighting!
You want me to do even MORE extensive research?! I'm still worn out from this morning's google search.
All kidding aside, I think that's absolutely a component of it. My expectation is that more men enroll in trade schools than women do.
But that still gets us to the societal response to the dip in male enrollment, which doesn't say "men are ambitiously seeking out trade school opportunities that better align with their desires than 4 year colleges/unis do", and instead the explanation is frequently "men would rather play video games and live in basements than get educated and attain wealth and status".
ETA: Just realized I don't think I was addressing your question directly. The stats I'm citing are for 4 year colleges/universities, so the trade schools wouldn't be included.
I think the male coded position on those questions is that they’re all basically correct. People need to take responsibility for their own problems. I think a reasonable, male coded complaint is that this is applied *only* (but properly) to men.
The answer seems to obviously be in some cases people need to take more responsibility for their own lives but the government should help when there are clear significant patterns that are socially destructive. Whether real or imagined at a policy level, at a rhetorical level which half of that sentence each party uses seems almost entirely dependent on demographics
One thing I have come to think is that what it means to be a man is simply “taking responsibility for problems that aren’t necessarily your fault.” It’s duty. It’s obligation. These values seem devalued in modern popular culture.
This is why I find Trump, his deflection, and finger pointing so immature and so unbecoming of what it means to be a man.
Maybe this is a better description of what it means to be an adult, but I don’t want to project such expectations on women when they have so many unique burdens themselves.
I largely agree with you about what it means to be a man and I think it's a real shame that's not what most people in modern popular culture feel, but kind of to my point, Democrats are going to have a hard time making this case when they systematically suggest criminals ought not be held responsible for things that _are_ their fault or that abortion is a fine way to avoid becoming a father (a comment of Milan's on this thread that you threw a like at)
That Trump personally is an utter failure at taking responsibility for any of the many evils he does is obvious, and the Republican party seems to be limited in their conception of personal obligations to "I can't literally do crime or kill others," but even that to my eye puts them closer to my view of male duty/obligation to my eye than Democrats who seem to have anathematized the very idea of personal responsibility (except for a small group of rich folks on whom they, to a significant extent I'd say rightly, try to place the duty of paying to fix every social ill)
I liked Milan’s point because it is an apt description of many young men’s perspectives.
𝖸̶𝖾̶𝖺̶𝗁̶ ̶𝗌̶𝗈̶𝗋̶𝗋̶𝗒̶.̶ ̶ ̶𝖩̶𝗎̶𝗌̶𝗍̶ ̶𝗇̶𝗈̶𝗍̶𝗂̶𝖼̶𝖾̶𝖽̶ ̶𝗂̶𝗇̶ ̶𝗉̶𝖺̶𝗌̶𝗌̶𝗂̶𝗇̶𝗀̶ ̶𝗒̶𝗈̶𝗎̶ ̶𝗁̶𝖺̶𝖽̶ ̶𝗅̶𝗂̶𝗄̶𝖾̶𝖽̶ ̶𝗂̶𝗍̶ ̶𝖻̶𝖾̶𝖼̶𝖺̶𝗎̶𝗌̶𝖾̶ ̶𝗂̶𝗍̶ ̶𝗅̶𝗈̶𝗈̶𝗄̶𝖾̶𝖽̶ ̶𝗅̶𝗂̶𝗄̶𝖾̶ ̶𝗒̶𝗈̶𝗎̶ ̶𝗆̶𝗂̶𝗀̶𝗁̶𝗍̶ ̶𝗁̶𝖺̶𝗏̶𝖾̶ ̶𝗒̶𝗈̶𝗎̶𝗋̶ ̶𝗈̶𝗐̶𝗇̶ ̶𝖻̶𝗅̶𝗈̶𝗀̶ ̶𝖨̶ ̶𝗐̶𝖺̶𝗌̶ ̶𝖼̶𝗎̶𝗋̶𝗂̶𝗈̶𝗎̶𝗌̶ ̶𝗍̶𝗈̶ ̶𝗅̶𝗈̶𝗈̶𝗄̶ ̶𝖺̶𝗍̶.̶ ̶ ̶𝖨̶ ̶𝖺̶𝗀̶𝗋̶𝖾̶𝖾̶ ̶𝗍̶𝗁̶𝖺̶𝗍̶'̶𝗌̶ ̶𝗁̶𝗈̶𝗐̶ ̶𝖺̶ ̶𝗅̶𝗈̶𝗍̶ ̶𝗈̶𝖿̶ ̶𝗒̶𝗈̶𝗎̶𝗇̶𝗀̶ ̶𝗆̶𝖾̶𝗇̶ ̶𝗌̶𝖾̶𝖾̶ ̶𝗂̶𝗍̶ ̶𝖺̶𝗇̶𝖽̶ ̶𝖨̶ ̶𝖿̶𝗂̶𝗇̶𝖽̶ ̶𝗍̶𝗁̶𝖺̶𝗍̶ ̶𝗋̶𝖾̶𝖺̶𝗅̶𝗅̶𝗒̶ ̶𝗌̶𝖺̶𝖽̶/̶𝗎̶𝗇̶𝖿̶𝗈̶𝗋̶𝗍̶𝗎̶𝗇̶𝖺̶𝗍̶𝖾̶.̶ ̶
Edit to be clearer:
I've seen Milan say that he himself believes that, which I frankly see as pretty gross, and was the context in which I was seeing your like of it (which I didn't go hunting for but noticed when looking if you had a blog). My apologies for misreading that
The central insight of adults dealing with stuff that is "not their fault" is that "fault" is not a useful construct for a huge number of situations you confront, whether by virtue of the unassailable logic of determinism or the futility of fighting the iron clad arrow of time. "Dealing with it" is the core virtue and the essential skill -- minimizing the downside and maximizing the outcome.
So you want to give a man total control over a woman’s body because he finds both condoms and personal responsibility for his choices inconvenient?
Yikes.
Agree with the sentiment, but I think a lot of women would tell you that large parts of their lives are dominated by assuming responsibility for problems that are not necessarily their (or anybody's) fault. I think of this as the core realization of adulthood, rather than a specifically male thing.
Hence why I suggested at the end why it might just be what defines adulthood.
What irks me is how so many men want to shirk responsibility, duty, and their obligations. Trump is emblematic of this moral defect.
I guess I think men should take a greater share of responsibility for fixing problems they didn’t cause because they don’t have the biological burdens of childbirth.
Missed that - sorry. Agree about Trump as the extreme case, but also about a certain male character type that tends to coast on a cushion of "male privilege" (widespread social acceptance of cloddish behavior, no expectation to equally share burdens of child-rearing, housework, parental care, etc.), secure in the belief that women will always be there to pick up the slack.
It's also become problematic for men to have spaces that are geared towards men.
The cycle is thus:
Men have a space
You must let women in.
You must change the rules to accommodate what the women want.
You must ban anyone who doesn't follow the new rules.
"If you don't like the rules, go make your own space!"
Repeat.
This creates an endless cycle where men are informed that they are the problem.
Identical to trans women’s inclusion in women’s spaces. Many men have pointed it out, and many a woman is now contemplating it.
The pattern is obvious and it's a pattern of behavior that is like tailor-made poison for progressive organizations who are naturally credulous about claims of identity-based rights.
To be a little more nuanced, I do think that original claims from second wave feminists about literal men's clubs being the locus of power and access to power were correct and true, and integrating those centers of power was the right move.
But there is an obvious situation happening now where men aren't allowed to have men-only spaces, and they snarkily, sometimes cruelly, but ultimately correctly point out that feminists and women complaining about trans women invading women's spaces is exactly the same.
"It's also become problematic for men to have spaces that are geared towards men."
I'm a woman, as noted elsewhere in the thread, and I practice karate. The dojo is predominantly male, and there have been multiple cases where I'm the only woman at a practice.
Is this space "geared towards men"? Certainly it is de facto, although not de jure. Nobody is stopping women from joining; women just tend to be less interested in an activity that involves the risk of being punched in the face. AFAIK our dojo leader hasn't made any specific efforts to recruit more women, but when a woman does show up and wants to practice, he treats her with respect, as he does me.
Is our dojo a "problematic" space? Not as far as I can tell. There's no Feminist Police descending on our dojo saying, "Your membership is only 16% female! Shame on you!!!"
One very, very important point: we are a very traditional style of Japanese karate, and part of our code of ethics is "stay away from social media." There are some exceptions, like training videos on YouTube, but you simply DO NOT take a selfie at practice and post it on social media with a "Watch me #slay at practice! #madskillz!!!" It just simply isn't done, and it keeps the internet outrage brigade from finding us and yelling at us.
Am I somehow spoiling this traditionally male space by existing in it while female? Are my male instructor and colleagues secretly rolling their eyes and thinking, "Man, I wish drosophilist wasn't here, then we'd all be free to hold belching contests and tell d*ck jokes"? I would like to think not.
I understand this is n = 1, a somewhat niche example, but we have lots of men at the dojo who are just really good people - honest, disciplined, strong without being macho bullies - and I don't think anyone is making them feel like "they are the problem."
*I* don't think that your dojo is a problematic space, but there's absolutely an informal "Feminist Police" mode of thought out there that does exactly that sort of thing. As the parent of two sons born in the early 2010s, I can tell you this is a very common theme in children's media produced in the last decade or so -- (1) there's a depiction of some group involving the main character(s) that is exclusively or overwhelmingly male, (2) the main character(s) are confronted with this fact and asked what are they going to do about it, (3) the main character(s) bewail the fact that they do not have more girls/women in their group and set out to make efforts to actively recruit girls/women, and (4) there is usually no dissension or pushback to #2 or, if a character does question it, the story communicates very clearly that character is BAD for having expressed doubt about why the group needs to make a special effort to recruit girls/women.
I think it's very important to disambiguate between two very different possibilities:
1. My group is overwhelmingly male because we're a bunch of sexist a-holes who make women feel bad and drive them away. This is bad! Solution: stop being a sexist a-hole.
2. My group is overwhelmingly male because we're centered around an interest that just happens to appeal to men much more so than women: martial arts, computer science, welding, the "ratsphere." This isn't necessarily bad, and there's nothing to be done. And if you think this is bad, then you should think book clubs and knitting and quilting circles and personal advice column readership should work hard to recruit more men, to be logically consistent!
Scott Alexander had an interesting column on this on Slate Star Codex.
No, but you haven't insisted on any changes. Good for you, in the most honest sense!
On the other hand, I watched a HEMA group fall into this exact pit, complete with a paragraph in the new CoC about 'no social media posts promoting fascism, sexism, transphobia, racism, or ableism. Our safe space extends outside the training room!'
Hell, *I* wouldn't want to hang out with people whose social media posts promote fascism or racism or sexism, so I can't really blame that HEMA group. Maybe it's just as well that I have never looked at the dojo members' social media posts. Ignorance is bliss?
Of course, if that HEMA group defines "transphobia" as "we don't have women fight biologically male participants, even those who identify as transwomen/nonbinary" and "ableism" as "you must be physically capable of wielding a sword/bow/spear to participate," then yeah, I see the problem.
Again, it's a variation on what I said in my comment above: is the code of conduct an expression of excessive wokeness that looks for microaggressions behind every tree, or is it an anodyne "let's all be nice to each other" statement against a-holery?
That's all well and good until supporting some local politician or having a fairly anodyne political belief (“I think we should support Israel” / “I think we need to address illegal immigration”) becomes “promoting x”.
The problem with the CoC was that there was never a need for it (there wasn't one at all) until certain people joined, and then they insisted on having one for ‘their protection’. Then it was obvious that they intended on deploying it against people with political views they didn't like. This is how the cycle goes, as I outlined it in my OP
Good point.
On one hand good point, on the other, based on the terminology used you can probably guess which of the two it was as long as the reporting is accurate.
I’d add onto srynerson’s statement with my prediction: you’d only have a “war of the sexes” type issue at your dojo if there were to be an attempt to change the rules of communication-style.
The rules of communication at the dojo are simple. The teacher gives orders, we follow orders. When the teacher says "Any questions?" you're allowed to ask questions about a given technique and stuff. And you can always interrupt for urgent things like "I got a blister on my foot, I'm bleeding on the floor, please excuse me while I get a Band-Aid and wipe up" (true story, happened to me a few practices ago).
Yes, it's very authoritarian in its way, but it works because we all respect our teacher and we're there by choice. If you don't like it, the door is over there, bye.
Wait, is this a round about way of mocking gamerz ™?
(I get your point though.)
I used to be a gamers, so the joke would be on me. And it's exactly what happened to Reddit, modulo ‘women’ → ‘marginalized people or what have you’.
I’m a woman and cannot understand in any way women’s opposition to nuclear power. 28% *strongly oppose*? Where is that level of antagonism coming from?
I'm also a woman who supports nuclear power. There are dozens of us! Dozens!
I’d guess it’s tied in with whatever is causing the general divergence on “risky” technology. Men are also relatively more supportive of pesticides, use of genetically modified foods, genetically modifying people, use of animals in lab testing, and human space exploration.
Even just within energy, men like nuclear, yes, but they also like fracking and offshore drilling.
Is that a like of "risky" technologies or "technology" in general? There's the classic "men like things, women like people" split, and technology is very much about "things".
But I agree it's probably tied to the general divergence on tech.
Hard to say, men are also more in favor of AI in general and driverless cars specifically, and men are more in favor of lab grown meat, but all of that could be construed as risky I think.
If you look at social media, which generally isn't viewed as risky, women got into it more quickly and I think are still the heavier users. And I'd be surprised if there was a gender gap in views of Apple, Amazon, etc.
Social media is the most "people" of all those technologies as well.
Vibes: "it sounds / feels risky". Understanding details like the 1 in X thousand cancer risk caused by living near a coal plant is just well beyond the capabilities of most voters.
So I'm guessing a lot of the gender divergence in support is a vibe thing among uninformed voters. Among people with a firmer understanding of the pros and cons maybe the gender gap is closer.
I think the explanations above are all good, but I also think there is a bit of a "fruit of the poisonous tree" kind of thing going on. Nuclear power was invented by men for the purpose of committing violence, and so its fruits are tainted and inherently suspicious.
Many people are saying that nuclear power is made by and for the patriarchy. It is known. :)
You might think you were kidding, but . . . https://inkstickmedia.com/breaking-the-mold-of-nuclear-patriarchy/
This is a funny comment but I guess I should note that I don't really see this as a specifically feminist perspective. That is, I think even completely apolitical women are likelier than men to feel distaste and dread about physical violence, war, etc. I don't think it's at all a self-consciously anti-male thing.
I disagree with the mechanisms others here are suggesting. I think women tend to be far more concerned with "safe environments" in the context of the literal environment while men tend to see safe environments in a more adversarial way. With all the caveats of averages and overlapping distributions that Matt started his piece with, if you go more insane you can see this more clearly. 5G tower conspiracy theories seem to be a primarily female phenomenon where the idea of some ambient force is knocking off the balance of the environment. Men get much more sucked in by QAnon sort of stuff where there are very particular people doing very particular evil. If you go more normal, guys are more likely imagine people breaking into their houses and think owning a gun is important for their safety, and women are more likely imagine their house being slowly but surely flooded with radiation that makes their kids sick.
But ofc I have no idea and am just guessing
1) Radiation poisoning affects fertility and birth in pronounced ways.
2) Ionizing Radiation is a novel and not widely understood threat vs more mundane threats like car exhaust. Are brains are wired to focus on novel threats.
3) Probably, this might be a stretch, the link to cancer and all the focus on breast cancer research and awareness has made women more sensitive than men (men I assume are less receptive to messaging on breast cancer.)
I think part of opposition to nuclear power has always been opposition to nuclear weapons. Some people just blur them together, but also they have been connected very closely (though they are much less so now, but lots of people haven't updated on that).
Women are more hostile to the military and weapons so that could be a contributing factor to them being hostile to nuclear power.
"The '70s" is my default answer.
None of these explanations seem very convincing. The opposition to nuclear power appears to be stronger among women than the demand for stricter gun control. I’m in the minority in that I like both guns and nuclear power, but surely the “danger vibes” and the actual danger from guns are greater than from a power plant. I wish an anti-nuke woman would weigh in here.
My guess is that this is a “men like technology” thing, just as more men than women like fast cars, computer games, riding mowers, leaf blowers, airplanes, space ships, sci fi, etc.
Why is this? Idk, maybe it’s related to testosterone, hah!
Not sure. There are some good arguments against more / too much nuclear energy, but "risk" is not one of them.
First, I think MY is right in that there are plenty of dude-coded positions that are consistent with existing or not that far removed from existing D stances. There's no need to re-invent the wheel, and it's really only through the teens that I think this slipped.
Where a lot of this may be coming from I think is education, on two particular fronts. One is that the divergence may be downstream of education polarization. Don't tell anyone on Twitter, but women are quickly becoming the more educated sex and the gap is even bigger when you focus in on, say, black men versus black women.
The other place where I see an issue is public schools. Conservatives worry about wokeness run amok, partisan indoctrination, etc. But who is to say the reaction to left activist ideas won't be the opposite? What if people come to see it as part of the older generations' silly, neurotic obsessions, kind of like how us in the Millenial and GenX generations look back on DARE? I think there is a better chance something like that happens, especially with young men, and that the experience serves to create skepticism about left of center politics generally as they enter adulthood.
You read any of Richard Reeves’ stuff?
A little bit, yes. I'm not really into the idea of expressly male lobbying, not that what I've read of him leans too hard into that. But he has influenced some of my thinking on my most important social function, that being raising my two sons into something resembling successful adults.
I read Of Boys and Men twice, bought 11 copies to give to parent and educator friends, and have met him in person, and listened to probably 6 or 7 interviews with him about that book.
The last thing I’d describe him as is someone expressly lobbying for boys or men.
He goes out of his way in his book and in every interview I’ve heard to laud the gains of feminism, and repeatedly assert that this should not be viewed as a reason to *cut back* on women’s programs or progress—just a gentle prod to give attention to boys and men at the same time.
He details policy ideas as well, noting that some policies meant to be sex neutral end up working only for girls and women, but others have succeeded in encouraging boys and men—because the data show that boys and men respond differently.
To clarify I've never read him as being anti-women or anti feminism at all. I've also found little to disagree with on the occasions I've come across articles on his substack. I think there are a bunch of aspects to the way we approach education and socialization that don't work as well for boys and that we ought to be adaptable both because it's the right thing to do and for our own benefit.
That said, where I do have some discomfort is with a path that leads to the interest group-ification of men. I've never read him as calling for that either, but I worry that may be what people are hearing. Bigger picture I think we'll be better off with fewer people internalizing the idea that they've been failed by various structures or society or the system or what have you.
As Bo said I think a big part of it is that the culture of the Democratic Party is not nearly as open to “traditional masculinity” as the culture of the GOP.
Minor example: remember how much of a thing Brat was for Democrats online over the summer? Remember how basically no Democrats on line got invested in the Kendrick/Drake beef? Think about who listens to each artist.
Another minor test: what elected Democrat would young men be interested in doing a workout with?
Why do you think the weightlifting space is so conservative... well at least the male weightlifting side.
My theory is weightlifting is one of those endeavors where it takes sacrifice, hard work to succeed, and the results are directly proportional to the effort. (leaving out steroids). This is basically root conservatism at its core...
As an aside.... I would like to see a survey on peoples view on TRT (testosterone replacement therapy) by gender and political party. When I first went on TRT... after being medically diagnosed even... it was surprising how many people frowned upon it, questioned it... and they were universally on the left.
Totally agree with your theory on weightlifting. It’s the key example of hard work leading to results.
Seems totally wrong. Distance running shares literally all of these traits except it's harder to cheat via steroids
Extreme distance running is actually one of the few physical feats where women outperform men, interestingly enough.
Nevertheless, I’d argue that weight lifting and running engage different parts of both the brain and body, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see studies saying that the former boosts T more than the latter.
There's also a clear missing variable. Few women pursue weightlifting because in current aesthetic conventions, feminine beauty requires being lithe or at most "toned" rather than muscular. Weightlifting is thus an overwhelmingly male pursuit (versus e.g. distance running) that draws people attracted to highly masculine spaces.
It’s a transparent euphemism for ‘guys who lift weights tend to do so because they want to be physically strong and get tons of pussy’
My weekly running group struggles to get women to join us, we used to have some consistent ones, but it’s pretty much all dudes
I’d be willing to take it a step further and query whether weight lifting nudges individuals of both sexes toward the center/conservatism.
“ the results are directly proportional to the effort”
My understanding is that’s laughably inaccurate. Results form a bell curve like distribution. On the left some people are exercise non-responders even in a clinical setting. They lift and gain no muscle mass (IIRC some actually lose muscle mass). On the right you have people who get great, almost steroid like, results with comparatively little effort.
You are incorrect. There is no such thing as a non-responder. It is true that there is variability in response... but given protein intake, and lifting to failure... there will be hypertrophy (muscle growth)... and in fact, new weightlifters will always show newbie gains. Its just people tend to not know how to lift or fail to adequately fuel their bodies.
I think you underweight how important protein consumption and proper practice are.
As a hairstylist, I had to remind myself constantly that many clients—as high as 40%—did not actually know how to use shampoo and conditioner properly. Blew my mind, but also explained their negative reviews of products.
Great example! "There's no way you could be getting that basic thing wrong" is usually false
But it isn’t really “proportional” to effort. Lifting more frequently or heavily than a certain (not very intense) amount, increases one’s gains far less than focusing on diet and sleep.
“ There is no such thing as a non-responder.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/03/well/move/is-your-workout-not-working-maybe-youre-a-non-responder.html
What are the citations on that article, for those who can't access it?
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11427769/
“ The studies showed that, on aggregate, endurance training increased people’s endurance. But when the researchers examined individual outcomes, the variations were staggering. Some people had improved their endurance by as much as 100 percent, while others had actually become less fit, even though they were following the same workout routine.
Age, sex and ethnicity had not mattered, the researchers noted. Young people and old had been outliers, as had women and men, black volunteers and white. Interestingly, nonresponse to endurance training ran in families, the researchers discovered, suggesting that genetics probably plays a significant role in how people’s bodies react to exercise.
Since then, other researchers have found that people can have extremely erratic reactions to weight training regimens, with some packing on power and mass and others losing both.
And a study published last year concentrating on brief bouts of intense interval training concluded that some people barely gained endurance with this type of workout, while others flourished, greatly augmenting their fitness.”
"On the right you have people who get great, almost steroid like, results with comparatively little effort."
I think the spoiler here is that those steroid-like results are because those people are, in fact, on steroids. It is way more wide spread in use than most people (i.e. most people who don't spend much time in gyms) think.
The other factor is that the "results" that most people think of (6-packs, well defined muscle lines, "being cut", etc) here don't come from the gym, they come from the kitchen. If you are on a bad diet, but lifting 3-4 times a week, you will get stronger, feel better, etc, but you won't really look much different.
The normal range for serum testosterone is 300-1000 nanograms per deciliter. Someone at the high end of normal or even naturally high is going to do dramatically better than someone at the low end of normal or just naturally somewhat lower than normal.
I think you’re misunderstanding what “directly proportional” means here. Maybe better phrased as “MY results are directly proportional to MY effort.”
That doesn’t mean that if I work harder than you I’ll see better results than you. But it does mean that if I work harder this year than I did last year, I’ll see better results.
“ But it does mean that if I work harder this year than I did last year, I’ll see better results.”
No.
“ Since then, other researchers have found that people can have extremely erratic reactions to weight training regimens, with some packing on power and mass and others losing both.”
I’d love to see the paper that says strength training with even passably competent programming can reliably cause detraining.
The paper you linked above about endurance training basically says that individuals have individual responses to standardized training regimes… something which most practitioners already know. Adaptation requires progressive overload, and overload is defined from your personal baseline.
Reliably cause detaining in 1 in 100 or 1 in 1000 individuals keep in mind. And at the other extreme people age making near miraculous progress.
It’s not really a fat-tailed distribution though.
I think the character traits list you have there is all present in endurance athletes and that seems like a much more liberal group.
I lift a decent amount too and something just feels very different about the kind of person who really gets deep into these events on average but it’s not that people running for 3 hours before dawn don’t believe in sacrifice.
That last question is… odd. Many/most elected officials are old(er) and not in great physical shape, and that’s ok. You elect them to govern, not to have a workout or a beer with.
Maybe AOC would be up to going for a run or a long bike ride?
I would like to push back on this a bit. It is not in fact ok that most elected officials are old. Gerontocracy is not a good thing.
If you want politicians to have serious experience in anything other than politics, then they're not going into politics much before 40 and they won't get to the top level much before 50, so most politicians are going to be old enough that physical fitness has dropped a lot since their youths.
I don't have a problem with most senior politicians being 50-70, I do have a problem with having Pelosi *and* McConnell *and* Schumer *and* Biden *and* Trump all being at the top at once. Harris and Jeffries and Johnson are more of the age I expect senior politicians to be.
Don't get me wrong, an occasional very young of very old politician is a good thing. Having an AOC (actually she's not that young any more, so maybe a Max Frost) and a Biden around just to ensure that different perspectives are included is good. But the majority of electeds should be 40-70 and the most leaders in their 50s or 60s.
I agree with this completely. This is my concern that things have gotten too skewed to the upper end. Harris really isn't a senior politician. She is only just over the median age in the house and well below the median in the senate. I'd be fine with 50-70 as you've laid out, but our current distribution is more like 60-80.
It'd take a constitutional amendment at the federal level, but I'd like a rule saying that no-one can be elected to a term that will extend beyond their 80th birthday.
I would like to push back on that a bit. I think, “Village Elders” have been running the show (in villages) since before recoded history. I seems likely that this is a feature, not a bug and, in fact, mature wisdom beats the hot headed-ness of youth when it comes to governmental decisions.
>Another minor test: what elected Democrat would young men be interested in doing a workout with?<
Is Martin O'Malley still in politics?
I remember those biceps running for president.
Maryland governor's are apparently roped up (let's conveniently ignore Larry).
Kamala should call up Halle Barry and John Wick and go cut an ad:
https://youtu.be/Xii9_oWQ7HY?si=udnjrkQ6vSuOYda2
AOC.
Didn’t Kamala say: “they not like us”?
Yeah, I saw the video with Taraji P. Henson. Not one of Kamala’s best moments, came off really staged.
More interested in Wes Moore’s, he’s huge
https://www.washingtonian.com/2024/08/02/maryland-governor-wes-moore-suits-up-with-maryland-football-wait-what/
Saw a video of Jamaal Bowman benching 405 for multiple reps
That was from the SocDem's now discontinued "Progressive Overload for Gaza" training program...
>"America’s public elementary schools are probably the place most infused with progressive sensibilities..."
It's funny that Matt states this without any doubt or qualification, and yet progressives always say conservatives are lying when conservatives make the same statement. There is a lot to dislike about Chris Rufo, but on the above statement he and Matt are in agreement.
This is just a general phenomenon where conservatives lie so much that the default progressive response is "that's a lie" when in reality they mean "you're correct and i just disagree that X is bad"
see also the idea that elites disrespect the opinions of the masses on immigration and are deliberately trying to maintain higher immigration levels than normal people want. this is an extremely conservative coded statement, and most progs would say it's a lie.
of course, it's true AND it's also true that the 'masses' are morons and i don't really care what they think except insofar as they have to be placated for electoral reasons
Are you sure that conservatives lie more than progressives? Could it be that they're correct, and you just disagree that X is bad?
Yes, completely certain. They lie incessantly, without hesitation. They do not care about truth, or reality, or facts. By happenstance, they occasionally care about a thing that is actually happening, but just as often they are content to make something up entirely.
This is not the sort of thing that anyone who doesn't already believe it can be convinced of, unfortunately. But consider something like e.g. the recent blowup over Haitians eating pets in Springfield. Never happened. JD Vance admitted he was lying about it to put media attention on immigrant communities.
Or, of course, the biggest lie of the recent pack: the fact that most GOP electeds will tell you the election was stolen from Donald Trump.
I used to feel this way, circa 2020. It seemed so obviously one-sided.
I no longer feel that way at all, but it took a lot of exploration of news and opinions outside the mainstream to see that democrats are not so saintly after all. And there’s no way to say that concisely without sounding like a conspiracy theorist.
You think you’re not one of the masses ?
"Progressives say something different than they mean." You've almost got this!
Except, their point is exactly the reverse of one another. Matt's point is that despite teachers being progressive they can't get little boys to stop playing war. Rufo's point is that because teachers are progressive, they'll indoctrinate your children and turn them into little marxists.
The difference in the points is understood but progressives frequently dispute the factual claim which seems to not be in doubt
Eh, so we want to distinguish between :
"America’s public elementary schools are probably the place most infused with progressive sensibilities..."
And:
"Your public elementary school is infused with progressive sensibilities..."
Or, more specifically:
"Your child's kindergarten teacher is infused with progressive sensibilities..."
Those very much aren't the same thing, let alone their frequent co-traveller:
"And it's trying to turn your kid into a gay trans furry marxist who craps in the litter box they secretly keep in the bathroom."
But as soon as any sort of charter school bill comes out it’s wall to wall panic about taxpayers shelling out for Evangelical madrasas.
If you say so. I've certainly seen concerns about separation of church and state, ensuring charter schools provide reasonable levels of education rather than simply being fraudulent (also a concern with public schools) and the slow death of public services being offered as public services rather than as contracting officers for private parties to provide services, but I don't remember seeing anything like that.
Do you ever find it a little strange how irrationality only ever exists on the side you aren’t on?
Is there any doubt that teachers aren’t frustrated by their inability to keep boys from warring and play fighting, though?
And there is plenty of research that modern k-12 schools emphasize behaviors and traits more commonly found in girls, which absolutely leads to penalizing boys.
Reality has a well-known liberal bias
Found Paul Krugman's burner account
To the extent that the gap between young men and women exists ideologically, I think a lot of it can be ascribed to the fact that a lot of young men are in a cohort where they are being outperformed educationally and professionally by women. There's a sense for some people that the world has turned against them while they are also being lectured about how men suck and have it easier. Since Dems are increasingly seen as a party for (neurotic?) professional women, it's not surprising some young men would feel alienated from the party even if Dems take savvier policy positions to try to combat the drift.
There's also a lot of discussion about how right wing "manosphere" content online is radicalizing young men. I'm not sure how true this is (I am somewhat skeptical) but the discussion inevitably becomes very scoldy which probably further compounds the problem.
Thank you for a fascinating piece, Matt Y!
Every time I read about gender differences, I feel like a mutant weirdo freak, because I'm a woman, but my positions tend to code as masculine. I strongly support nuclear energy. I think the death penalty should be used very sparingly and only in cases where the evidence is overwhelming, but I believe there are cases where it's justified, like some depraved serial rapist-torturer-killer or the Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg. I was a bit startled when Kamala said that line about the "most lethal military in the world," but I agreed with her: *someone* is going to have the most powerful military, and I'd much rather it were us than Russia or China or North Korea.
Of course, I am one of the 14% of Slow Boring commentariat that is female, so I am in no way representative of women. Also, I love Star Wars - the original trilogy, the Thrawn novels, The Clone Wars, some episodes of Rebels were really good - and I don't like the Disney+ Star Wars content other than Andor. The Acolyte straight up sucked.
I'm the opposite, I'm a man whose positions tend to code as feminine. Reading through this article it was strange finding myself on the "women" side of so many issues, though it was mostly the "violence"-related issues, since I tended to side more with my gender in the "science and technology" section. I think I am just averse to violence to general. It would explain a lot of my opinions from my dislike of American gun culture to my general apathy towards contact sports.
How much ya bench?
drosophilist, I hear you, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that you happily engage as part of the 14% female SBers. Why? I don’t think we know yet, but I do think these traits are correlated.
Agree with all except “turn every stick into a toy gun or sword, depending on the stick”
Depends on the mood! Most sticks can be imagined into a gun or a sword.
When I was 5 and being baptized (I know a little late in the game for that), I used one of the candles as a gun and started shooting it at the priest. I distinctly remember the priest saying "boys will be boys."
Saying "pew pew" in a church would have been an exceptional pun for a 5 year old.
That's hilarious.
Sounds very Jesuit of him.
Curious to learn why (I'm not catholic but am curious)
Jesuits and Franciscan Priests tend to be chiller than other sects.
Reminds me of social dancing in 7th grade during PE. There we were, "slow" dancing to Elvis, as close as we ever got to our shorter male classmates. The boys were having finger gun battles using us as shields. (What a way to lead!)
Sadly, that is also the most common defense to charges of sexual misconduct in the ecclesiastical courts...
I remember when i was a kid i watched the VHS of Commando and wanted to gear myself up like Arnie, only to find the toy guns were too unrealistic to really match it without a lot of spray paint or electrical tape.
Nowadays i've gone through the toy sections of stores and man, it'd have been so much easier to get tac'd up as a kid today.
Repainting toys is a very easy project and it's a shame more kids don't get a chance to do it.
I know it's not really relevant to your situation since you are no longer a child. Just saying that a cheap can of Rustoleum 2x, and two craft paints (black and a silver metallic) for a grand total of like $15 could have given you a sweet gun.
My wife grew up with her sister and her mom mostly, and her dad worked long hours. We had a girl first. She was thoroughly surprised when our son, as soon as he could walk, started grabbing sticks and hitting everything with them.
A friend of my mom’s raised her only son with her husband on a sailboat from 2-5. She assiduously avoided any “violent” toys or media. One day the son met some other kids on some island, the boys used sticks as swords, and from that moment on the son was obsessed with wielding imaginary weapons.
First off, it's a great column, but I have to reply because Yglesias baited me with his mischaracterization of vibesology, of which I am a proponent.
OF COURSE, Democrats have issues they feel strongly about. So do Republicans! The argument is that this doesn't really apply to the persuadable voters who decide elections, who often not only lack strong opinions about the issues, but frequently *DO NOT EVEN KNOW WHAT THE ISSUES ARE*! On my Facebook feed, a woman I used to work with posted a picture of cheese she took at her local grocery store, and she wrote that while she despises Donald Trump, she is voting for him because the price of cheese is now too high. And that is your typical undecided voter's thought process when settling on a decision. I asked her what impact she thought that Trump's tariffs were going to have on prices: I am confident from her response that she doesn't know what a tariff is.
Look, any position can be taken too far. In truth, I support a popularism-infused vibesology. I DO think that policies influence voting behavior at the margins. But that works by influencing the views of people who are TRUSTED by these election-deciding, idiot (excuse me, "low information") voters. If a politician proposes something radical, that is something that gets picked up on by these dimwits when they hear conversations with their pastors / co-workers / friends / siblings / etc. And the importance of candidate policy positions are SWAMPED by factors often outside the control of those candidates. Like the price of gasoline or whatever.
My main concern with popularism is that I sometimes I see it used as an excuse to either betray progressive values, or else do nothing. I believe that the reason to win elections is to go do stuff -- to actually spend the political capital that you accrue. And you win those elections through a sensible blend of position-taking and aggressive vibesology.
Anyway, I really enjoyed reading today's column. Feel free to tear me a new one in the replies, but I won't be able to respond. Busy moving at the moment and just don't have the time.
1,000% agree with your first paragraph. Every time I read an interview with a swing voter is an enraging experience, they seem to lack any understanding of cause & effect.
In general American politics is bizarre because the arena in which it takes place is shaped by a very large number of people who are actually pretty well informed, all things considered, and have very strong political opinions. In most countries, politically engaged people are at least somewhat elastic -- e.g. shifts from Tories to Labour/LibDem in the UK, or from Liberals to Conservatives in Canada, but in the United States this basically does not occur. So all elections are decided by people who, as you rightly point out, are incredibly stupid, which creates this weird perception that *American voters writ large* are stupid.
That's interesting. My assumption would be that it would work the same everywhere. I'm in Germany at the moment, and my sense (without looking at the data) is that the least informed voters are the ones who are most likely to jump-ship, although it's probably true that you get more movement inside of a coalition (e.g., a former SPD voter casting a vote for the Greens).
My read is that Europeans have no grasp of how US politics works and do not understand that the views of right-wing rural communities are enormously overrepresented in the US political system. (By giving rural states like Wyoming, with 600,000 people, the same amount of power in the Senate as the state of California, with its 39 million; through the Electoral College; etc.) This gives Europeans the false impression that Americans are more right-wing than they actually are.
I'd be interested in giving this issue a closer look. Could be that you're totally right. If you have some articles, send them my way!
I mean, in general the Republican Party wins 46-49% of the national vote depending on the election. The difference between 47 and 51 is huge for majoritarians purposes but for purposes of "what do Americans think?" it's negligible.
About half of Americans support the Republican Party, and about half don't.
It's a fair point, but it has a huge impact on public policy for several reasons: 1) a lot of the kinds of policies that European (pseudo)intellectuals point to as evidence of their superiority simply cannot be passed in the American context precisely because of these anti-democratic features of the US political system, and in many cases would not have passed in Europe, if Europe had those same features; and 2) even when the Dems have a trifecta, our public policy must pander to the Dems from the most conservative states in the country, rather than what the majority of Dems actually want.
This kind of circles back around to what I was saying above. I just don't think the fact that 46-49% of voters support Republicans means that 46-49% of the public supports the GOP agenda. I question what percentage of voters even know where the GOP stands on the issues. (NOTE: I am absolutely NOT suggesting, as progressives often do online, that the typical voter is some latent / closeted hardcore leftist who will vote for the Dems if they do Marxism. Instead, my argument is that huge percentages of voters are ignorant and relatively uninterested in politics, and that this observation applies to Europeans, too.)
I love Europe and Europeans. As I've said in response to other Slow Boring articles, I view Europe the same way I do America: there are problems, but also a lot to admire. But one thing I can't stand about Europeans is the smug sense of superiority that I encounter, which is utterly unjustified by the facts. Trust me: these people are idiots. (I say that with tongue partially in cheek. But their best-selling newspapers are tabloids. I recently got into a conversation with a college-educated professional who didn't understand how his nation's health system worked. Etc.)
Next book idea for MY: "The Cheese is Too Damn High"
Do all "Joe"s have a similar low opinion / distain for idiotic low-information voters? I feel very seen right now...
hahaha! Let's unite!
Thinking of the pro-science funding position, I wonder if Mark Kelly does better than the average Democrat with men. Astronauts are cool.
There is a well known gender gap on the question of "is space cool" and "should we spend money to do cool stuff in space". I think Democrats in general would benefit from moving away from Obama's influence on this question, he convinced so many of them that space exploration is dumb and a waste of money.
Ancillary observation. I am a huge weightlifter... its my main hobby.
Over the last few years, I've seen a huge increase in teenagers and Gen Z getting interested in the gym... weightlifting and bodybuilding. And for whatever reason... the gym space tends to be conservative. Even the women who are into fitness are more likely to lean conservative.
I don't think its causal effect (gym driving people conservative), but its definitely a trend I've noticed.
I weight lift, but also have gotten into running marathons a fair bit post college. My sense is that the running space is also seeing a huge increase in numbers, but it's a comparatively left coded activity. Good that young people are exercising more though!
You are a bipartisan exerciser!
100% agree with this. Though I think Running is probably more 50/50 split.... whereas weightlifting is 80/20
We don't even have to mention MTG and CrossFit.
Of course we dont have to mention crossfit... the crossfitters will tell us all about it.
So fucking true.
I think all those groups in spandex on bikes every weekend (or the retired guys any day) is also left coded.
Nah. That’s a lot of finance bros. Probably exactly the kind of person this article is about - not fans of Trump but don’t like Democrats.
Ten years of clubs and it never did anything for me other than make me super skinner.
Now I do like 6 miles of running a week. Ain’t got the time for it.
This is funny. I did clubs for awhile. I got called out by a coach once for wearing headphones on a run. It was so weird.
I liked having a schedule to be accountable and people to push me but I wasn’t out here trying to chat with people.
That was it for me in groups.
As am I, to someone who thinks she dies after a mile.
haha... definitely a thing on TikTok
Weightlifting is "help yourself" which fits into conservative philosophy. As opposed to something like therapy, which is "get help from others" which is clearly more in the direction of feminine and liberal philosophy.
spot on
i think it is probably causal. lifting weights is very fair -- you get out what you put in for a long time before individual genetics starts to matter. if a big part of your life takes place in a very fair arena, a conservative philosophy makes a lot more sense.
Very curious of the effects on testosterone levels for lifting vs running.
I think there's already research out there about testosterone levels and political affliliation.
Weightlifting increases testosterone.
Sprinting increases testosterone.
Long distance running decreases testosterone.
Not surprised to hear this!
“Fitness” is gender-segregated, not gender-disproportionate. The girlies love yoga, Zumba, step classes, water aerobics, free dance, and all the other “softer” modes of exercise.
this is actually too bad. Women suffer from age related muscle loss (sarcopenia) even more than men do. Age related muscle loss is a major contributor to quality of life and mobility issues... to falls, balance, etc...
Weightlifting is the only intervention that can halt it. Women... especially older women should skip the softer modes of exercise and pump some iron.
I agree. My side gig is as a fitness teacher (mostly dance/spin/kickboxing) and I always try to encourage clients to do weight-training exercises either in our classes or outside them. Functional strength and comfortable movement are the highest goals of fitness in my opinion and it’s terrible that women are dissuaded from some of the most effective formats because of the fear of looking “bulky.” Back when I got my first group fit certification, the course actually instructed us not to use the word “muscles” around women because it would “scare them off”, which remains a top ten dipshit thing I’ve heard.
Violence is cool and all— especially when I experience it through a screen and can’t get hurt— but sex is much better. Liberals have become increasingly censorious about sex. This is an electoral liability. A sex-positive female politician could turn her gender into an advantage. If young men thought Harris would bring us closer to the sexual mores of the Netherlands or Norway, they would vote for her at far higher rates.
To an extent, feminism, especially first wave feminism, has liberated men. Men can now choose between empowered career women and more traditional types. This is really quite awesome. I don’t have to work my fingers to the bone to “be a man,” I can work less, earn half the money and still hold my head high. Empowered women can seek erotic and personal fulfillment in relationships rather than viewing marriage as more of an economic arrangement. Empowered women don’t need alimony and don’t have to view every breakup as a disaster. They can have flings and lovers and enjoy their bodies. Unfortunately, many feminists are censorious and seem uncomfortable with the fact that men prefer fit, attractive, pleasant women. Harris is a fit, attractive woman who can be a cool girl when she wants to be. She should let her hair down and be sex positive.
But what would it actually look like to be more sex positive? I don't know if "let your hair down" is the answer. The classic dilemma for female leaders is that if your personality is too warm you're called a slut, and if it's too cold you're called a bitch, and there's a very narrow zone of acceptable behavior in between.
I think another problem is the pool of voters Harris needs to win across the swing states. Are they the ones who want more sex positive behavior from the potential first female president?
If you bore young men as swing voters, the answer is “YES!!!”
I think the answer is expressing approval of young unmarried couples and romantic relationships short of marriage. Make Republicans the churched up scolds who think you have to wait til marriage.
What does approval mean in this context? There's no shortage of those relationships in the US, but also the evidence is very strong that people are usually less satisfied in them than if they marry.
Approval means praising and showing concern for those people. It means making Fred feel like Kamala wants him to get laid.
There are few things that I would like less than for the President or a candidate thereof to be concerned about my sex life. Talk about creepy.
The evidence is very strong for a correlation but not for a causal relationship.
If not for Dobbs this would be beyond a lost cause. Hawk Tuah projects a Republican aura — the antithesis of a dour self-appointed censor with a bedazzled cane.
Not exactly a pillar of feminine elegance and beauty, but the sort of girl that gets with immature college guys.
One way would be to talk frankly about her relationship with her mentor, the much older Willie Brown. She could open up about how it was unconventional, and there was a large age gap, but she doesn't regret it. That would be her real, first-hand experience of being sex-positive. But somehow I don't think she's going to talk about any of that.
Omg I would love it if she did, and the women who it would off hate Trump and love abortions so much they would vote for her anyway
If Trump/Vance or Republican electeds a start calling Harris a slut, that would only help her. “You raped a women in a department store and call me slut because I had boyfriends. Pathetic!”
I think when you look at pop music since the pandemic it's very evident that we haven't culturally figured out what to do with male sexuality since Me-Too. Olivia Rodrigo, Sabrina Carpenter, Charli XCX etc sing a lot about sex, I think I also read Beyonce's 2022 album was her "horniest yet."
But on the male side we have like Benson Boone and Noah Kahan, basically sad sacks with no apparent agency in life. Even MJ Lenderman who I really like is singing sad songs. Contrast that to the early '10s when you had Drake, Kanye, the Weeknd, etc. Those guys were all clearly horny in a way that probably crossed the line of what's appropriate in some respects but at least they were interesting and somewhat authentic. Even the indie rockers of the 2000s were kind of dirtbags--go listen to the lyrics on the early career albums by The National, also people like the Strokes and Interpol were clearly writing "party" music (drugs and sex).
we need more party music and less handwringing over what is “appropriate.”
haha. true. I love Yeezus but "I'm in it" definitely makes me squirm.
I'm not sure it's a coincidence that all your "sad boys" were White and all your "horny guys" were Black - the cultural expectations for what each type of artist will sing about is very different.
could be. for some reason though white guys seem to be having a moment (at least on XM pop radio lol).
There's definitely been a measurable (although not gigantic) decline in the popularity of rappers.
I think The Weeknd is just between album cycles and it's not clear if he's going to be dropping off the face of the earth like Katy Perry or will be back with a vengeance soon.
Also, Million Dollar Baby by Tommy Richman has been really big this year and that's a horny song
There’s been a re-bifurcation in music taste between young nonblack and black males.
Yes I think this is probably true with the rise in country and country-adjacent music and corresponding relative decline in rap
Troye Sivan is pretty much exactly what you’re describing for and runs right into a no don’t be sexy like that from mainstream audiences.
yeah I have no idea why some music ends up being more popular than other music but Troye Sivan is definitely a big step below Sabrina Carpenter or whatever. Seems like all the momentum for popular men is in country now, Morgan Wallen, Kane Brown, Shaboozey, etc. etc. etc.
This is movies, not music, but I think Timothy Chalamet is the male counterpart to Sabrina Carpenter.
I heard he’s coming out with a new brand of tea, I think it’s called Kahan Chai.
Millennial third wave feminism was generally very sex positive, as contrasted with 1970s second wave feminism. (First wave feminism is usually thought of as 1920s suffragism.)
Gen Z in general seems much more skeptical about sex - they’re having less of it, and even the straight men among them seem more likely to think it’s inappropriate in movies and TV. Among queer people there’s been an observation that older generations want to have sex and younger generations want to have gender. (This helps give gay bars new reason to exist, when the apps were killing them a decade ago, but they’re becoming different types of places.)
Look, I disagree with David Abbott, must be a day that ends in "-y"!
(I kid, David, I kid)
I don't think that's it at all. Sure, on the margins you may find some barstool bros or whatever they're called who would vote for Harris if she were more sex-positive. But the mainstream conservative critique of the Democrats is just the opposite: that they preach sexual liberation and alternative lifestyles like same-sex marriage and polyamory, but in their private lives they are fuddy-duddy traditionalists who get married, have their children after they're married, and don't get divorced.
Rather than sex positivity, such conservatives want Democrats to preach more traditional morality: marriage is good, having children out of wedlock is bad, you should stay together for the sake of your children. (Of course, conservatives also support a twice-divorced serial adulterer, but I digress.) "Luxury beliefs" and all that.
Appealing to conservatives will not work. Appealing to politically unattached young men might
That’s the mainstream _intellectual conservative_ critique. Ever meet an undecided voter in Pennsyltucky who even knows that bourgeois Manhattanites get heterosexually married and have 2.1 kids in their mid-30s after reaching serious financial stability?
"A man is a not a plan. A man is a companion."
Fani Willis
And if he’s a really good companion, you can pay him with public funds your office controls and blow the biggest case you’ve ever handled!!
I mean, Hilary to Kamala within a couple election cycles feels like a lot of progress on this gradient. It's hard to imagine a successful female Democratic politician in this era being censorious and anti-sex given the male-dominated arenas in which they have necessarily participated throughout their careers. I suppose this could change over time, but it's not my read on the up and coming generations.
Among all the factors listed here, I think censorship of speech and cancel culture are probably the biggest reasons. Men like to talk trash (both liberals and conservatives), either for fun or to let off steam and then forget all about it the next day. The penalty for doing that has become unacceptably high, specially if they are about race or gender or some protected group. DEI and AA is another area where most men (moderates and conservatives) favor meritocracy over diversity and representation.
Several of my lib friends, including the lib woman i was sorta dating at the time, lost their minds over the “world’s most lethal military” line. I was like, what do you suppose a military should be other than lethal af?! So disappointing 🤦🏽♂️
Yep. And if the US doesn't have the world's most lethal military, then a country like Russia or China will.
I've warned you before for comments like this and I see you've been banned before. Dropping a one week ban here.