Sunday School

[UnseenParticipant]

Simon Paynton wrote:

To buy a woman all her drinks or an expensive dinner puts her under an obligation.  She might prefer to pay for them herself to avoid that.

And yet, many women who think of themselves as feministic still yearn for the benefits of chivalry. The best of two worlds.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

When it comes to being civil and polite, I treat all people equally unless they have given me a reason not to do so.  I will hold a door open for any person. 99% of the time a thanks or a smile is offered in return.  The times neither is forthcoming are of no concern to me.  Good manners cost nothing.

[UnseenParticipant]

@ Simon

I’m still searching for that successful matriarchy. Patriarchy has a history of working. As for egalitarianism, that isn’t a system in the way patriarchy and matriarchy are. It’s a description of implementation. Both matriarchies and patriarchies can be  egalitarian or nonegalitarian.

[UnseenParticipant]

One of the constant intellectual needs we have is to always be ready think “Maybe I got it all wrong,” and for that we need iconoclasts to kind of slap us in the face with the unthinkable.

In the arena of this discussion, nobody can do that better than Camille Paglia. Here she argues that men are the weaker sex and that that basically (and strangely) is the male superpower.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

Whenever I go on a date I often ask her if she is happy for me to pay. Almost always it’s “Let’s go Dutch”. Once, in a higher end restaurant, I heard the words “I will get it this time and you can pay the next time” and delivered with a smile. Great, I will even get a few extra sachets of ketchup so, I replied, returning the smile.

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

Unseen wrote:

Both matriarchies and patriarchies can be egalitarian or nonegalitarian.

They’re both dominance hierarchies.

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

Simon Paynton wrote:

They’re both dominance hierarchies.

I think they operate through a mixture of coercion and consent.

[UnseenParticipant]

Simon Paynton wrote:

Unseen wrote:

Both matriarchies and patriarchies can be egalitarian or nonegalitarian.

They’re both dominance hierarchies.

That’s a prejudicial characterization. Men or women can have a predominant role in terms of decision-making by being deferred to rather than lording over the other gender.

[UnseenParticipant]

Simon Paynton wrote:

Simon Paynton wrote:

They’re both dominance hierarchies.

I think they operate through a mixture of coercion and consent.

Coercion OR consent. Of course, in a large-scale complex society as in the West, it’s neither one nor the other. Those who disagree with the arrangement may feel coerced, but the coercion  comes not from the other gender but from having to defer to the majority.

You see, it’s not just men who are comfortable in a society led mostly by males. Men and women often run for the same office and more often than not, the men win, which wouldn’t be possible without substantial female support.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 1 month ago by  Unseen.

[jakelafortParticipant]

Yo estoy Iroquois.

Matrilineal oh boy.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

They are not the only such societies.

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Fellow Unbelievers,

Yesterday, I encountered something at work that kept me up most of the night.

I was having problem sync-ing up my smartphone and getting a price for a customer, but finally managed. The woman behind this customer was visibly impatient and started removing her items from the register’s conveyor belt. I said: “I have the price now. I’ll get you right away.”

I then rang up the customer with the pricing issue, bade them to come again, then started ringing up the woman’s order.

She then apologized for her impatience and said: “It’s just that I needed to get somewhere. My husband was recently killed in a car wreck by a 79-year-old man who ran a red light. He left me with two children and pregnant with another on the way.”

She also said she was a stay-at-home Mom–what the young folks today call Trad-Wives. She has one of her children with her, a precious little boy about a year old. Also, she said she was going to have to move after this and she just had so much on her!

I could do nothing but ring her order as quick as I could and say: “I am sorry, Ma’am! My kindest thoughts go out to you, your children, and your loved ones!”

Ever since that moment, I’ve been turning over in my mind how hard it’s going to be for her and her children.

I can’t even imagine being in either their position or the position of the old man responsible for her husband’s death.

Yes, auto insurance can set her whole on the family auto and hopefully the old man had it and the husband had enough comprehensive to make up the difference.

Yes, life insurance could provide for the family’s needs assuming the husband had it.

Yes, both forms of insurance are wonderful services of Capitalism, albeit, not as free from interference as it could be.

But, as yet, not insurance, not the best politico-economic system, not prayers, not even the most rational of thoughts can turn back time or bring the dead back to life or replace what that woman and her children lost!

All of this just makes the whole battle-of-the-sexes over courtesy and societal roles and language and pronouns and media tropes and memes into a bunch of senseless, trifling falderal!

It all gets me too depressed dwelling on it. It is yet another punctuation mark on the fact that an Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omnibenevolent God cannot have a place in a Universe where such calamity and suffering exist.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 1 month ago by  TheEncogitationer. Reason: Punctuation and spelling

[jakelafortParticipant]

Enco the sad stories are almost endless.

That is why we need to be better than libertarian. Capitalism is inherently problematic in many ways. And i am no communist/socialist. Nevertheless to offset the great advantage of the few who through any measure of fairness have not earned it dole for the unfortunate.

[UnseenParticipant]

@ Enco

If every family made a living wage from one income source and had one stay at home parent, our society would be much healthier physically and mentally.

Having someone at home to send them off or take them to school on time, to greet them or pick them up afterward, to make sure they do their homework and get to bed early enough to get the needed rest, while the kids would (because they are kids) might feel micromanaged they would also feel loved. And…they’d be much safer at the same time.

“Greed is good” capitalism plays a big role in keeping such a society from happening

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Jake and Unseen,

What makes the fate of this woman and her children so perilous is that the “Stimulus” of Trump and Biden and the inflation it has wrought makes the Dollar worth less and less with the passage of time. Inflation is a Conqueror Worm monster that hits everyone and hits the poor the hardest.

And the “Stimulus”, the “War On Poverty,” and the extension of Medicare/Medicaid to cover almost everything are just Mini-Me versions of Universal Basic Income (UBI.) The full-bore version everyone touts would make the Dollar worthless and destroy our nation’s economy.

The original UBI was productive labor without an income tax where the productive at any level could keep and invest the fruits of their labor. With that and zero inflation, one income could support a household and more incomes could build a fortune.

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