And I think the deeper value shift that would need to occur on the woman’s side is to stop treating pick-up technique as a tool in the intragender competition for status. Adopting ‘enthusiastic consent’ means abandoning the idea that a woman’s worth is based on the quality of man she can acquire, and treating the negotiation of sexual encounters as desirable for their own sake instead of merely as a signal. Luckily, culture is already shifting in that direction rather rapidly, so there isn’t nearly as much work to be done there as with men.
This is more or less one of the way the PUA/Game crowd model women’s behavior except that as they will tell you it is not in fact declining.
Maybe the whole thing could be framed in marketing terms
You seriously think that what is likely a deeply embedded aspect of human nature can be changed with a little marketing?
You seriously think that what is likely a deeply embedded aspect of human nature can be changed with a little marketing?
Hmm … consider the change in popular perceptions of homosexuality over the past fifty to seventy-five years. Or, for that matter, women’s economic role.
Things that people have in the past thought are “human nature” (or, more broadly, matters of “natural” and “unnatural”) turn out to be quite socially malleable over just a few generations.
We shouldn’t expect ourselves to be all that unusual in the course of human history; therefore, we should conclude that things that seem to us to be “human nature” — especially ones that inspire controversy and defensiveness — are likely to turn out to be socially malleable, too.
There are lots of other ways to interpret it! Forget not the words of the saints, that whenever you think there are two ways something could be, you should look for at least five ways. I’ll name one, and let you think of the other two:
3. People who exhibit homosexual behavior do so out of a choice to rebel self-destructively against what would be good for them.
(This is a somewhat secularized version of what I take to be the Catholic Church’s position on that particular matter.)
However, I think you mistook my point, which was a sort of self-sampling argument and not an argument about that particular topic. We shouldn’t take our own perceptions of what’s normal or natural very seriously on topics where we observe that there has been a lot of wibbly-wobbly change in perceptions of what’s normal or natural … because those topics are unusually likely to be ones where we’ve come to believe an unlikely local myth of normality or naturalness.
People who exhibit homosexual behavior do so out of a choice to rebel self-destructively against what would be good for them.
Which hasn’t been falsified either.
However, I think you mistook my point, which was a sort of self-sampling argument and not an argument about that particular topic. We shouldn’t take our own perceptions of what’s normal or natural very seriously on topics where we observe that there has been a lot of wibbly-wobbly change in perceptions of what’s normal or natural … because those topics are unusually likely to be ones where we’ve come to believe an unlikely local myth of normality or naturalness.
So are you claiming there are many societies out there where women don’t treat the dating game partially as a competition intragender status? Or is your idea of “avoiding self-sampling” limited to looking at the past 50 years of western culture and extrapolating?
This is more or less one of the way the PUA/Game crowd model women’s behavior except that as they will tell you it is not in fact declining.
You seriously think that what is likely a deeply embedded aspect of human nature can be changed with a little marketing?
Hmm … consider the change in popular perceptions of homosexuality over the past fifty to seventy-five years. Or, for that matter, women’s economic role.
Things that people have in the past thought are “human nature” (or, more broadly, matters of “natural” and “unnatural”) turn out to be quite socially malleable over just a few generations.
We shouldn’t expect ourselves to be all that unusual in the course of human history; therefore, we should conclude that things that seem to us to be “human nature” — especially ones that inspire controversy and defensiveness — are likely to turn out to be socially malleable, too.
… I’d be VERY interested to hear the rationale behind voting this comment down.
I don’t see who this is at all analogous. What’s the perceived embedded aspect of human nature you claim changed in your example?
There once was a popular perception that homosexuality was against human nature.
Quaint, ain’t it?
There are two ways to ways to interpret the italicized statement:
1) most humans do not want to engage in homosexual behavior.
2) people who want to engage in homosexual behavior are “deviant” and likely to exhibit other “deviant” behaviors.
Note that neither of these versions were falsified by “the change in popular perceptions of homosexuality over the past fifty to seventy-five years”.
There are lots of other ways to interpret it! Forget not the words of the saints, that whenever you think there are two ways something could be, you should look for at least five ways. I’ll name one, and let you think of the other two:
3. People who exhibit homosexual behavior do so out of a choice to rebel self-destructively against what would be good for them.
(This is a somewhat secularized version of what I take to be the Catholic Church’s position on that particular matter.)
However, I think you mistook my point, which was a sort of self-sampling argument and not an argument about that particular topic. We shouldn’t take our own perceptions of what’s normal or natural very seriously on topics where we observe that there has been a lot of wibbly-wobbly change in perceptions of what’s normal or natural … because those topics are unusually likely to be ones where we’ve come to believe an unlikely local myth of normality or naturalness.
Which hasn’t been falsified either.
So are you claiming there are many societies out there where women don’t treat the dating game partially as a competition intragender status? Or is your idea of “avoiding self-sampling” limited to looking at the past 50 years of western culture and extrapolating?