Psychoanalysis for me but not for thee

Update:  Zippy and I have agreed to disagree. Here is my most recent comment to Zippy at his site:

Dalrock:

I presume it is mutual that we are past the point where we might have a beer (or a scotch) and put all of this past us.

Not from my POV. I’d buy you a beer tomorrow.

I’ve given this a bit of thought and while we clearly don’t (and won’t) see eye to eye on this issue I’ve given it awful hard to you personally and you are responding here with a great deal of grace. You even offered again after I continued. That can’t have been easy and in my book is a very manly gesture.

If you are still so inclined, I propose we agree to disagree on this issue, raise a virtual glass, and look forward to what we might learn from one another in the new year.

My prayers are for the best for you and yours in 2013, and that God will bless you.

Here is Zippy’s Reply:

Dalrock:
May Providence smile upon you, your family, and all of your projects in the new year.

If someone has one handy, please give Cane Caldo a hanky.

———————-  Original Post, Comments Now Closed  ———————-

Zippy Catholic accuses me and the manosphere of being caught in the grip of a cult in his most recent post Cynicism: the starry-eyed idealism of the nihilist:

Some of the commenters on this thread (either here or in trackback) might consider the extent to which their reactions confirm Lydia’s view. By forming what amounts to a cult around a somewhat useful social analysis akin to the Meyers-Briggs test they convince themselves that they know strangers on the Internet well enough to do personal over-the-wire psychoanalysis.

Note that he passive aggressively makes these claims about me without having the stones to either quote exactly what I’ve written which is wrong or even name me anywhere in the original post.  The links in context however are to a recent post of mine and an exchange I had on his blog with a commenter named Lydia (more later), and all of the commenters on the post are clear that he is coyly referring to me.  To the extent that they have unanimously misconstrued me as the target of his vague accusations he has not corrected them.

Zippy’s passive aggressiveness makes it difficult to lay out his charges in any logical form, but I’ll do my best.  His core argument appears to be that I’m guilty of psychoanalyzing Lydia instead of engaging her in rational debate.  My infraction is made especially serious because I am doing this using (and quoting) her own written words on the internet:

I generally consider over-the-wire psychoanalysis of total strangers to be a reductio ad absurdam of the point of view expressed.

Again, he doesn’t actually accuse me of being the person he is talking about, so perhaps instead of an accusation this is an excuse he is making on his and Lydia’s behalf.  It could be that he isn’t accusing me of over-the-wire psychoanalysis, but explaining why he is making an exception to his general objection to the practice.  At any rate, according to Zippy’s post something I (although not by quote or name) have done has proven Lydia right when she claimed that I was psychologically damaged (emphasis mine):

I think there are some valuable facts and insights in the manosphere. But by demonstrating the kinds of behaviors one expects from people in the grip of an ideology, manosphere commenters unwittingly show that the manosphere fosters precisely what Lydia contends it fosters in at least some men, e.g.:

A habitually cynical outlook. A continual view of sexual life as a matter of full-fledged conflict between the sexes.

and

But there are always occupational hazards in continually being immersed in certain kinds of evils. In this case, my conclusion is that the occupational hazard of being immersed (maybe perforce, because of one’s job, for example) in the situations in which women have ruined men’s lives is a particular level and type of jadedness and a damaging of that ability to see a woman as a gift.

I can only presume that whatever I did to cause Zippy to diagnose me as psychologically damaged and part of a dangerous cult relates to my written words over the internet, since I don’t know Zippy in person.

Later in the discussion he continues avoiding making an actual claim against me, and for the third time instead mysteriously refers to “some commentators”:

What some folks seem to be missing is that, while I may have disagreed with her about the prudential wisdom of exploring manosphere subjects, Lydia made a perfectly valid point (and indeed some commentators have unwittingly confirmed it): that the manosphere tends to produce an unreal cynicism in many of its participants.

Whoever it is and whatever they actually wrote, they have really stepped in it according to Zippy:

Part of the symptomology here is that folks just don’t seem to have a clue how utterly ludicrous it all is.

I’m starting to get the impression that this “feminine imperative” business is basically a big ad hominem. She’s a woman, she disagrees with Zippy prudentially on the value of engaging with the manosphere, so she’s not only wrong she’s also some kind of biological evo-psych robot spouting untruths (err, even though she has a point) … but of course she just can’t help herself because she is Team Woman.

Good grief.

I’ll stand by while Zippy works up the courage to name this nameless manosphere commenter(s), quote the offending text(s), and lay out a clear rational case against them.  In the meantime, I’ll offer some context of the original exchange he is referring to.

Back in August a commenter named Lydia on Zippy’s site objected to my post Losing control of the narrative.  However, instead of using facts and logic to refute my points (any of them), she chose to psychoanalyze me and convince Zippy’s readers not to listen to me lest they too become mentally damaged.  This kind of psychoanalysis-in-lieu-of-debate is predictable to the point of being tedious, which is the point behind the The Catalogue of Anti-Male Shaming Tactics.  I didn’t initially point this out because facts and logic are on my side;  my strong initial preference is to engage in an exchange of ideas and not to personally defeat an ideological opponent.  Making it personal gives up my main advantage, and also would prevent me from possibly learning something knew.  Unfortunately the initial focus of the discussion fell Lydia’s way.  Fellow blogger Chris of Dark Brightness called Lydia out for her childish emotionalism and use of petty psychoanalysis to avoid discussion as a preface to making his logical case:

Lydia.

You are offended by Dalrock. Particularly some of the things people say there. Or perhaps CL and SevenMan. Or the fact that I’m a Prot.

Get over it and grow up. Those of us who have sat and listened to people who have lost their family… and heard it so many times that you know what comes next in the script… are not getting good and clear messages from the pulpit.

At the first hint that Lydia would be called on her irrational and emotional tactics, Zippy the white knight galloped in*:

FYI, Lydia is Protestant, and will be treated like the lady she is.

With the imminent threat to Lydia’s delicate sensibilities averted, Zippy then went back to allowing Lydia to derail the discussion until another commenter called Lydia out on what she was doing:

Reading these comments reminds me once again why it is absolutely futile and a complete waste of time to debate serious issues with 99.9% of all women.

We have several men commenting, using logic, references, concrete facts. And then we have Lydia who just rationalizes away emotionally. She doesn’t like the message, in fact she takes umbrage at it. She doesn’t like the criticism of the sisterhood and because of this she villifies the entire manosphere. It’s a classic case of hamsterlympics.

Zippy suited up once again and galloped to Lydia’s rescue:

You haven’t truly tasted irony until you’ve seen someone lecture Lydia McGrew about using facts, logic, and reason.

This was the tone Zippy the moderator set early on, allowing Lydia to derail the discussion and rebuking anyone who would point out her refusal to argue facts, logic, and reason.  Since Zippy seemed to be caught between his fear of offending the boss and his obvious interest in having the discussion, I pleaded with the person in charge that we might be permitted to have a rational discussion:

Lydia,

I gather that you don’t like me. While that isn’t my preference I’m ok with that. What I’m more interested in is which of my arguments you disagree with. Do you think men shouldn’t be weary of marrying a woman who has made marriage last on her priority list? You mention young women you know who aren’t like that. Why then would you not want young men to prefer women who make marriage a priority? Why defend the ones acting badly in the name of the ones acting well?

As for my view of marriage, I am a passionate proponent of lifetime marriage. It is because of this I take great issue with those who turn it into a farce.

Lydia responded dismissively and continued her tack of marginalizing me as obsessive and dangerous to women:

I’m not in the slightest defending women who are acting badly.

I’m trying to restore culture. I don’t think that can be well done by undermining chivalry, encouraging base cynicism about women generally, obsessing over wicked women, and permitting and even encouraging coarse and lewd talk about women.

Zippy responded that pointing out the obvious and backing it up with facts and logic is something different than cynicism:

I guess I am having a hard time seeing cynicism in a script of how things actually, a great deal more commonly than hen’s teeth, go. And I expect a young man who knows that that is how things commonly go (and why) to be in a position to make better decisions than a young man who doesn’t know it.

He reiterated this a bit further down:

Lydia:
I am certainly not saying that I see no cynicism, etc in the manosphere! What I am saying is that the “narrative” in the post I linked, while bluntly stated, is a true account of how things actually go a significant amount of the time; and I am further saying that most young people considering marriage, possibly excepting those living in true enclaves like the Amish, are better off knowing these things than not knowing them.

I tried several more times to very gently encourage Lydia to switch from emotionally psychoanalyzing me to discussing the ideas at hand.  As I mentioned in a previous post, she flat out refused.  While Zippy feared displeasing Lydia, he continued the plea for her to allow an actual discussion:

Dalrock wrote:

At some point can we … have a real discussion?

I think it is important. Possibly that is because I have a son. Four or five years ago he and his friends were all effectively in one of those protected enclaves I’ve been talking about. After the financial crisis hit, gradually over time a bunch of his friends drifted out of the enclave: a second parent had to go to work and thus the kids had to go to public school is the most common thread. The dads have absolutely no idea what their kids face, and the kids are often more willing to talk to me than their own dads. I’ve already seen some of the dynamic at work with some older kids who’ve since graduated high school, and it isn’t pretty.

In making his case for talking about the issue and not how evil Dalrock is, Zippy pointed out that he has learned “actual facts” by reading my blog:

Believe it or not, I’ve learned some actual facts by reading Dalrock. If you haven’t, by all means don’t read it.

Despite my persistently responding to her insults with courteous requests to discuss the issue and not me she continued with more of the same:

I’m sure you have. That doesn’t counteract the big picture I’m arguing for. One could probably also learn some actual facts about black crime by reading Chimpout. I believe there’s actually a blog called that. And I would be willing to bet there are rampaging misandrogist feminist sites out there from which one could learn some facts one hadn’t known before about wife abuse. I recommend not doing so, though.

The discussion continued with Lydia calling the shots and Zippy and Chris trying to convince her to have an actual discussion.  For some time Lydia accused Zippy of maligning a future daughter in law by noting the prevalence of divorce porn and frivolous divorce:

For example, as I said, you should be able to think about this stuff without maligning a future daughter-in-law. This portrays women as somehow determined by the outside world to behave wickedly and destroy everyone’s life (including, what the manosphere doesn’t seem to realize, her own life in a very real sense) on a whim. Wow, that’s darned insulting. *Not one* of my close female friends is “resisting divorce porn.” The idea is risible.

All of this eventually wore down Zippy’s patience:

Lydia:
Something about this thread has destroyed your ability to read, and therefore your ability to properly attribute ideas.

In the first place, “as I understand it, the claim is …” means that I am describing a series of claims. It doesn’t mean that I am asserting them all as true, and most certainly not in an unqualified way.

In the second place, nobody has ever suggested that any of these claims “implies that all women” anything. Statistical claims like “90% of the women I went to college with were not suitable for marriage” inherently and obviously don’t mean “all”. That’s partly why your personal experience (and mine) is not ultimately relevant here.

I think Dalrock had a point earlier in the thread when he said that you were accusing in vague terms while suggesting that you are immune from the requirement to prove the accusation. Now you are starting to do it to me. Just stop it.

And after she continued Zippy wrote:

Once again I can’t figure out what I’ve actually written that you are disagreeing with. You seem to be taking all sorts of things for granted though, in addition to attributing things to me that I haven’t said.

After even more failed attempts to engage in a discussion with Lydia Zippy wrote:

When it comes to this subject, Lydia, I can only conclude that you don’t want to understand. I’ve seen what it looks like when you do want to understand, and this isn’t what it looks like.

Exasperated, Zippy followed up with:

So that’s it, eh? We aren’t going to actually, you know, engage the subject matter? To even think about the plight of the average twenty something Joe Shmoe who wants marriage and a family, and is uniquely hampered in that pursuit in a way never before seen, and subjected to phenomenal systematic risk, is to make ourselves ritually impure? Really?

Zippy never did get Lydia’s permission to have an actual discussion on the issue (vs how dangerous and damaged I am).  He ultimately gave up on the thread and wrote a new post about the experience titled Between Dalrock and a Hard Case:

In the comments of the last post we learned that Dalrock’s influence is so powerful (Update: see here for today’s mind-ray promoting Game) that I’ve lost the capacity to think for myself. But before the lights of reason wink out completely and I sink into the testosterone Hive Mind, I’d like to explore a question raised in the thread.

Without going into excruciating detail on all of these points, suffice to say that I am puzzled by the claim that it is simply ludicrous and absolutely beyond the pale to even consider the possibility that, in the general case, in our present state of culture and law, a young man who makes marriage a priority and makes good choices will have a materially harder time getting married, starting a family, and staying married than a young woman who makes marriage a priority and also makes good choices.

And that was that.  The only thing which seems to have prompted Zippy to conclude that Lydia was right about me all along is this recent post of mine.

*After I pointed out how absurd Zippy’s pouncing on Chris was later on in the thread Zippy apologized to Chris.

Edit:  I see that while I was writing this post Zippy was writing another post, Cultural Marxism in the manosphere.  In this he continues his practice of neither quoting the actual arguments he is ostensibly refuting nor naming whom he is referring to.  It ends with:

I’ve got some advice for you, manosphere fellas: if you want to be taken seriously by people who care about the truth try putting some more distance between yourselves and your putative enemies.

This entry was posted in Chivalry, Denial, Foolishness, Traditional Conservatives. Bookmark the permalink.

122 Responses to Psychoanalysis for me but not for thee

  1. Zippy says:

    Dalrock:
    The only thing which seems to have prompted Zippy to conclude that Lydia was right about me all along …

    You’ve got your conclusions all wrong, which isn’t surprising because you’ve also got your premises wrong.

    I haven’t said that “Lydia was right about [Dalrock personally] all along”. (Apparently me not saying that is an example of passive aggressiveness.)

    I said something quite different from that, actually, and since I’ve already said it I don’t see the purpose of repeating it here.

    all of the commenters on the post are clear that he is coyly referring to me.

    Gosh, that’s right. Everything is about you.

  2. Svar says:

    I didn’t know you get so bitchy whenever you have your periods, Dalcock.

  3. Dalrock says:

    Zippy this really is amazing. You quoted accusations she made specifically against me, and linked to my post on the feminine imperative as proof that she was right. You then followed up in the discussion with (emphasis mine):

    I’m starting to get the impression that this “feminine imperative” business is basically a big ad hominem. She’s a woman, she disagrees with Zippy prudentially on the value of engaging with the manosphere, so she’s not only wrong she’s also some kind of biological evo-psych robot spouting untruths (err, even though she has a point) … but of course she just can’t help herself because she is Team Woman.

    Given that the post you linked to was:

    1) About the feminine imperative and quoted Lydia extensively.
    2) Written by me.

    How can you claim you weren’t referring to me?

  4. maxsnafu says:

    Are you saying he was wrong, that it wasn’t about Dalrock? It sure seemed to be.

  5. Zippy says:

    Dalrock:
    Yes, you kicked it all off with your post. Nevertheless, no, it isn’t all about you.

    I wrote my posts after reading articles all over the place, after the tenth or twelfth time some manosphere commenter claimed to know Lydia’s personal motivations, yadda yadda yadda, because oh my gawd this is Just How Women Work according to the Feminine Imperative!

    It is stupid beyond words, dumber than the proverbial bag of hammers. Sorry, but it just is. do any of these people live in actual real life? Know any actual real women? Seriously?

    I do think that:

    (1) Lydia did make a valid substantive point in that old thread, not about you personally, but about what participation in the manosphere generally does to some men. We discuss that in the comboxes to my posts.

    (2) This latest “feminine imperative” fad, especially as it played out at SSM’s and Rollo’s, is basically a manosphere version of cultural Marxism.

  6. tweell says:

    If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s… a witch!?! Well, in any case, not a Dalrock duck. Cough.

  7. gdgm+ says:

    I’ve concluded that Zippy and followers live in an alternate universe… that doesn’t correspond to the realities many of us have encountered. Shrug.

  8. Faust says:

    This is an astonishing example of passive-aggressiveness in action. It’s particularly funny in light of the fact that it was just discussed two posts down from this one! To copy/paste again the quote you took from Vox Day…

    ” …passive-aggressive behavior is an intentional attack on another individual made with at least some degree of plausible deniability concerning the attack, the intent, or the target. The reason for the plausible deniability because the passive-aggressive individual wants to be able to attack someone else without giving his target a justification for striking back.

    Should he be questioned, the passive-aggressive attacker will usually affect to deny he was making an attack, or that he intended any such thing, or that the person he was obviously attacking was, in fact, the target….”

    And immediately after you write this, Zippy makes a post attacking you, without calling you out by name, and then denies he’s done so! He’s followed the script down to the very letter.

    Between this and your previous discussion of female solipsism, this blog could be used as a psychology textbook.

  9. Ok zippy, it’s not about Dalrock. Then can we assume that Dalrock is not an example? And who is it about? There must be at least one specific blogger that you can name, or specific passage that you can quote. If not, then you lacked integrity when you wrote that post and it is a black mark on your character.

  10. @zippy
    “I wrote my posts after reading articles all over the place, after the tenth or twelfth time some manosphere commenter claimed to know Lydia’s personal motivations, yadda yadda yadda, because oh my gawd this is Just How Women Work according to the Feminine Imperative!

    It is stupid beyond words, dumber than the proverbial bag of hammers.”

    She acted in a very predictable way according to the models of feminine behavior that have be constructed here and other places. To assume her motivations were the same as the models motivations when her actions so closely followed is common sense.

  11. @zippy
    I wrote my first comment before refreshing and seeing your latest. You may disregard it.

  12. CrisisEraDynamo says:

    So let me get this straight.

    Telling men about the very real social, sexual, and legal risks of modern marriage, and warning them of society’s attempts to hide these risks, is not to be done ever. These risks exist independently of what any particular man thinks of women.

    Remember that most men are taught that women are made of sugar, spice, and everything nice, that women are princesses and queens and such. When they later learn of the risks of marriage and what most women have observably done, they will certainly become cynical about marriage. Under the current legal and social regime, there’s nothing to be optimistic about regarding marriage.

    Men have to do all the work of supporting a family without getting the family. That’s what modern marriage boils down to.

  13. MackPUA says:

    Oh look its zippy the twatoholic again … lol

    Trust a mangina to defer to a woman & attack anyone who brings absolute irrefutable facts …

    Anyone can suck up to a woman, it takes a REAL man to give her REAL strength

    Which is WHY the MRA & the Manosphere is so valuable to not just men, but also women, as it brings the masculine virtue of fact, reason & honesty, & justice in the form of the greater good for all men …

    It’s precisely these values which makes men so vital to a childs development, his ingrained sense of justice & need for strength

    Ironically people like zippy the twatoholic, & lydia, prove just how malformed, & misinformed & dysfunctional manginas & feminists are when it comes to their hole digging expeditions ….

    Your hole digging expedition needs more hamsters guys…

    Sooooo its time for another hole digging expedition …

    I predict not only will zippy & his cohorts of delusional followers, dig their holes deeper, by denying everything

    But theyll also skewer Dalrock for pointing out their hole digging …

    The hole digging expedition never ends … lol

  14. Dropit says:

    This feels wrong. I’m a frequent reader of this blog, and gained plenty of insight without its sudden intra-Sphere defensive bent. Beware the Streisand Effect. Better to ignore slander and push forward with a strong case (and at some point, action), than to become embroiled in a pointless he-said she-said that feeds a need for drama but fails to enlighten.

    Feel free to NOT allow this through moderation if you desire; it is written for the internet entity Dalrock to read, more than readers of his blog.

  15. Anonymous Reader says:

    Can’t help but wonder if this is not a case of “let’s you and him fight”. Lydia McGrew’s name is now being bandied about by ruffians and stinky boys (with boy-cooties, no doubt) in the androsphere, so Someone Should Do Something. Lydia can’t, she’s “just a girl” when it comes to dealing with reaping what she sowed, under the rules of DHMIAG, so obviously the job falls into ZippyCatholic’s lap.

    Because the alternative – to just let it go – is unthinkable. Letting it go would entail not trying to have the last word, and if there is anything women want, it’s having the last word, either personally or better still by proxy.

    The irony of all this is a delicious one. Truths about women are leaking into TradCon thinking. ZippyCatholic clearly has learned something about attraction from reading Athol’s book, hence his silent refusal regarding my challenge that he betaize himself (in support of the notin that Game is merely a placebo, or even less). Driveby bloviator King A. Matthew King has been seen making somewhat informed observations about feminist protesters over at Rollo’s. “GK Chesterton” kinda sorta admitted some truths about feral female humans before he quit commenting.

    Here is my prediction. Truths about women -the Feminine Imperative and all that flows from it, from hypergamy to a desire for serial polyandry to attractions that shift during the menstrual cycle, etc. – will continue to seep into the minds of TradCon men. In time, they will come to agree with the vast majority of things discovered (or in some cases more accurately, rediscovered) in the androsphere. They may well take the route Cane Caldo showed, and call all theses ideas and concepts by different names, in order to sanitize them of the dirty man-cooties. But they will come to realize that pedestalization of women is a poor form of religion, and that attempting to protect women from every bad thing, especially the bad outcomes of bad behavior, is not really “traditional” or “conservative”.

    Like the feminists who now shriek that “everyone knows” some parts of family law are unfair to men, and only nasty MRA’s stand in the way of really fixing things (which only feminists are qualified to do, of course) , the TradCons will at some point in the future proclaim that “everyone knows” women have their own reproductive agenda that is good for families and their children but only when properly channeled and controlled. They’ll insist that they always knew this, and never, ever denied the existence of a Feminine Imperative, and that only their way is the best and proper way to control the FI.

  16. FuriousFerret says:

    Can anyone enlighten me why we care about Zippy to begin with?

    He doesn’t believe in anything that anyone says here. He’s simply another Catholic tradcon wagging his finger.

    If you believe that what most of what Rollo, Roosh,Dalrock and CH is saying isn’t the truth, then you really aren’t part of the manosphere to begin with.

    Whether you believe in that Game is moral or not is another narrative, but saying that these things don’t exist and denying what constitutes women’s true sexual nature is a person that isn’t apart of the ‘sphere at all since these are core concepts of it.

  17. IrishFarmer says:

    I haven’t seen this much drama since…

  18. I thought for the longest time that Zippy was a woman. And with his incessant white knighting, and denial of red pill truth, how can you blame me? When a so called man says something like this: “But before the lights of reason wink out completely and I sink into the testosterone Hive Mind”, I have my doubts. If anyone is a good little soldier to the feminine imperative, its Zippy.

  19. Bill says:

    The amazing thing is that some men will actually waste time and energy trying to logically discuss substantive issues with women and their androgynous mangina hangers on. Buy a dog.

  20. Anonymosu Reader says:

    Alpha Mission
    I thought for the longest time that Zippy was a woman.

    It is an interesting and curious thing that traditional, conservative men often tend to write and argue like women. There seems to be a correlation between how much of a White Knight a given man is, and how feminine his writing/arguing style is. But that could just be my own mistaken impression. It might be worth giving some thought to, maybe.

  21. gregariouswolf says:

    I’m starting to believe chivalry is simply feminism rebranded for the socon market.

  22. Sharrukin says:

    As a result the kind of “discussion” cultural Marxism fosters is the ultimate in preaching to the choir and shouting down the heretics: propositions are not evaluated objectively, and what a member of an oppressor class says is rejected not because it has been evaluated against objective standards but because it comes from an oppressor: ad hominem writ large.

    If you followed what went on with Lydia, this is a rather close description of what she was doing and what Zippy (somewhat reluctantly) backed her up on. There was no discussion of facts, just personal attacks and shrieking, which Zippy pointed out.

    Zippy may be upset that people are talking about Lydia’s psychology and motivation in place of her rational arguments, but given that she presented no rational argument, how else could anyone respond to rampant emotionalism other than agreement, or a questioning of the cause of the emotional outburst?

  23. Can some men turn the anthropological analyses of game into a cult? Sure, but that’s true of pretty much everything that makes claims about reality. C.S. Lewis coined the term “Bulverism” to describe over-the-wire-psychoanalysis: you assume your opponent is wrong and then explain his motivation for being wrong. I believe in the Feminine Imperative as described by Dalrock and others exists because 1) it matches my own observations; 2) Because it is coherent and internally consistent; and 3) Because alternative explanations are either nonexistent or based on wishful thinking about how women are instead of how they actually are.

    The Feminine Imperative is another permutation of female solipsism. If anyone believes it doesn’t exist, I’m open to alternative explanations.

  24. Anonymous Reader says:

    One more thing, Beefy – it is testable in the real world.Just like different public speaking techniques can be tried out in different venues, many of the aspects of the FI can be demonstrated in common, daily interactions. The alternative explanations have already been tested, and found to utterly fail.

  25. Mr Green Man says:

    This is a marketing campaign for Zippy’s white knight manual, right? Some men, you just can’t reach. If I wanted to read meandering double-talk and projection, I’d read Boundless or Al Mohler.

  26. Samson says:

    I do actually agree that over-immersion in the manosphere makes one cynical and removes some of the romance from life, forever. Whether this outweighs the benefits of learning the truth is unclear, but I think it’s more important than I used to. I often wish I had my innocence back.

  27. freebird says:

    “if you want to be taken seriously by people who care about the truth try putting some more distance between yourselves and your putative enemies.”
    Frankly I cannot make heads nor tails of this statement.
    Who has the truth and who is the enemy?
    Or are they the same entity?
    Near as I can tell he’s telling us to avoid ourselves because we’ve become our own enemies by examining the truth?
    Zippy,dude,she owes you a blowjob big time brother.
    All that heavy water carrying and no reward.

  28. Matthew says:

    Take a gander at Zippy’s position on usury. It’s so nuanced, he has a disclaimer: if you can’t summarize his position in such a way that he agrees you’ve understood him, you haven’t understood him.

    A Catholic who states that usury is still an important problem, but then defines it in so complex a manner that others (including Catholics conversant with the literature) can’t correctly summarize his position? He’s an operative.

  29. chris says:

    @ Furious Ferrit. The Zipster is an example of logic inside the tradosphere. He (along with some of the guys at the orthosphere) was involved in a long discussion about if we should — as a bunch of Christians — retreat into some form of subculture. If I recall correctly, he got his education in a very traditional Catholic university that functioned that way. (Which is something I approve of). I think he lives among a group of very tradtional people who all think the same way.

    This Amish like technique is one that a lot of people are considering. If you go over to SSM’s place yesterday one of the ugly parts of the current playa/slut culture is discussed by Elspeth and SSM — that their men could just leave. And there could have been some pride in that they have such cool husbands admixed in the anxiety: SSM and Elspeth are women, and we all have our fallen nature.

    The error that I think the Zipster is falling into is one that Protestants fall into all the time. It is that if we have a perfect community we will not have to deal with our fallen nature: attractive men will still get IoI and their wives will still worry. For we are not perfect, And the greater society no longer sees this behaviour as shameful.

    Which brings me back for a second to my comment to Lydia McGrew. I was making a process comment — quite a confrontational one — because she was trying to stuff the mess of our human lives under the carpet. (Yes, I am using the technical language of analysis. Have some psychodynamic training, but do not use it as (a) am on holiday (b) when I am at work, there is very little evidence that psychoanalysis works).

    Because the number of times I have seen men post suicide attempt after a breakup of marriage (defacto or not) and loss of access to their children… is such that I can write that script. And it ain’t anything from the stages of grief Kulbler-Ross talks about. The events of grief — loss of children, loss of any sense of stability and a future — occur daily, weekly, monthly. You get over them when the kids grow up or you are forced so far our of their lives that you can scar up. (You never heal).

  30. Jordan Winters says:

    “I often wish I had my innocence back.”

    So what you mean is, why oh why didn’t you take the Blue Pill?

  31. grey_whiskers says:

    Just a thought from the original thread. I don’t know if Lydia is lurking here, or whether there are those reading this who will be discussing this set of comments with her.
    One of her early comments was
    If the blogger linked is supposed to be an example of someone who appears to care deeply about marriage and the family, you can keep him. I don’t care if he’s a Christian. I don’t care that he knows feminism is false or that lots of Christians are, unfortunately, feminists. (Whoop-de-doo.) Someone that callous and cynical, who freely thinks and talks in the terms of “Game,” who pretty obviously thinks that all women are prima facie sluts, has had his chivalry and his capacity for wonder permanently damaged if not destroyed. I wouldn’t want him or his followers in the so-called “Christian manosphere” (shudder) coming within a hundred miles of marrying one of my daughters.
    …which struck me as an air of being furiously indignant — most subsequent commenters seemed to attribute it to the Feminine Imperative (FI), but I immediately thought that it looked more like a very high temperature case of NAWALT. If it were on general principles, I would have chalked it up to FI, but when I see from other conversation of hers that she is heavily involved in Home Schooling — in the thread http://zippycatholic.wordpress.com/2012/08/11/rubbernecking-past-the-death-of-masculinity/, in her post August 11, 2012 at 10:10 pm…
    It makes me wonder if her reaction was primarily one of protection of, and being offended for the sake of, her young charges of both sexes, and her efforts to bring them up unstained from the world.

    Comments, thoughts, feedback?

  32. Farm Boy says:

    I thought for the longest time that Zippy was a woman.

    I was shocked to find out it was a man. It talked like a women.

  33. Zippy says:

    Jordan Winters:
    So what you mean is, why oh why didn’t you take the Blue Pill?

    The red pill / blue pill analogy has its limitations. Qua analogy it implies that everything on the “red pill” side – basically anything and everything in the current manosphere consensus – is true, and rules out the possibility of, just for example, (some) of the prevalent cynicism representing a nihilist retreat from reality.

    In other words, be careful that the red pill isn’t immunizing the manosphere from self criticism.

  34. 8oxer says:

    Dalrock:

    I realize that many just see the eristic side of this exchange, but it has been most enlightening nonetheless. The “Feminine Imperative” is something we all accept and can usually identify, but until now it has eluded any sort of rigorous definition in my mind.

    Farm Boy:

    I, too, thought Zippy was a woman. I had never read his blog until this last week, though. Odd.

  35. @grey_whiskers
    It’s entirely possible. Female tradcons are prone to thinking the manosphere is only about learning to be a PUA. Dalrock calls out women’s bad behavior but the notion that he thinks all women are “prima facie sluts” is risible. I sympathize with her desire to protect her daughters from players; hell, if I had daughters I’d probably be the same way. But, as I say repeatedly elsewhere, at the end of the day the claims that guys like Dalrock, Vox, Roissy, et. al., make about human nature are either objectively true or objectively false. If they’re true (and I think much of it is true), refusing to talk about them won’t make those truths go away.

  36. grey_whiskers says:

    @Beefy Levinson — One fear is that an innocent daughter be seduced by a player: so the less widely red pill knowledge is disseminated, the fewer people who know how to misuse it ; even bearing in mind the repeated claims that “only ~10% of men will be able to admit and make use of Game even if they hear of it”. A daughter can only lose her virginity once, and one prefers that it be to a stalwart husband on her wedding night (or afternoon, if they’re in a hurry after a morning wedding, I guess).

  37. Anonymous Reader says:

    ZippyCatholic
    In other words, be careful that the red pill isn’t immunizing the manosphere from self criticism.

    Self-criticism sessions were a tool of the Red Guards in the People’s Republic of China during the Cultural Revolution. Is that what ZippyCatholic has in mind, I wonder? Seems rather, oh, “culturally Marxist”…

    Criticism of ideas, and testing of hypotheses, seems pretty standard in the androsphere. More so than in some other niches of the web, in my opinion, such as all the various feminist and femininist zones.

    (Astute observers may note that of all the questions asked of ZippyCatholic all the way back up to the O.P. he has answered, essentially, none. )

  38. Walking Dude says:

    So-called self-criticism past a certain point, is just navel gazing

  39. 8oxer says:

    Grey Whiskers:

    One fear is that an innocent daughter be seduced by a player: so the less widely red pill knowledge is disseminated, the fewer people who know how to misuse it ; even bearing in mind the repeated claims that “only ~10% of men will be able to admit and make use of Game even if they hear of it”. A daughter can only lose her virginity once, and one prefers that it be to a stalwart husband on her wedding night (or afternoon, if they’re in a hurry after a morning wedding, I guess).

    One of the great misconceptions of game (ironically promoted strongly by PUA types themselves, usually in the hopes of getting new disciples) is that it is a form of mind control or hypnotism, which will enable the player to bed any woman. This, to put it bluntly, is total bullshit.

    The “innocent daughter” can not be gamed unless she is open to the idea of having sex. Game is not a way to rape unwilling women. It is more correctly seen as a series of tactics by which men can quit sabotaging themselves when approaching willing women.

    Many men (myself among them) talk women out of having sex with them during the negotiation stage. Game corrects this.

    There are women who no playa can bed, because these women have taken themselves out of the market. Yes, I know, some of the Roissyites will come along and tell you otherwise, but they’re full of it. The answer, therefore, is to convince these “innocent daughters” to put themselves off the market. There is a difference in being off the market and “waiting for *the one*” or some similar nonsense. Many men can playact their way into the beds of such women. No playa can seduce a woman who has decided that she is unavailable, nor would we want to. Men like myself enjoy playing the game with skilled female players, not unwilling women.

  40. Dalrock says:

    @Zippy

    In other words, be careful that the red pill isn’t immunizing the manosphere from self criticism.

    Criticize away. Just be a man about it. Do as you instruct the commenters on your own blog; quote the text, explain the error of the argument.

    I prefer linear comments because they make it easier to follow a thread over time. I also prefer them because they encourage us to directly quote the part of someone else’s post to which we are responding. This has lots of benefits, not least of which is that it makes it a bit harder (though of course not impossible) to pretend someone said something he didn’t say. Bad paraphrase (“Bob said he wants to pitchfork children!”) is one of my pet peeves, though I know I’m not completely immune myself. I consider it a vicious form of calumny when it is done on purpose; so lets never do it on purpose and try hard not to do it on accident.

    Or if you can’t do this, admit it is so and quit the passive aggressive crap.

  41. grey_whiskers says:

    @8oxer — Do you *have* a daughter of eligible/vulnerable age? If so, do not let her out of the house unless she is picked up by the Mother Superior in person to escort her to the convent, and sew the front yard with land mines.
    This is the natural instinct of the father.

  42. 8oxer says:

    Beefy Levinson:

    I sympathize with her desire to protect her daughters from players; hell, if I had daughters I’d probably be the same way

    No woman needs protecting from PUA tactics. Chaste women can not be gamed, in the same way that honest men can not be conned. I realize there are some harsh implications there, but this is absolutely true in my experience.

  43. Dalrock says:

    @grey_whiskers

    @Beefy Levinson — One fear is that an innocent daughter be seduced by a player: so the less widely red pill knowledge is disseminated, the fewer people who know how to misuse it ; even bearing in mind the repeated claims that “only ~10% of men will be able to admit and make use of Game even if they hear of it”. A daughter can only lose her virginity once, and one prefers that it be to a stalwart husband on her wedding night (or afternoon, if they’re in a hurry after a morning wedding, I guess).

    So you are saying it is Lydia who is calling all women sluts, and that what is needed is a way to coax the men they slut around with into marriage after the fact? Or are you accusing players of pretending to marry or at least get engaged with the women they have sex with?

  44. 8oxer says:

    Hi Grey Whiskers:

    I do not have children, and sympathize with the fathers and mothers in this discussion. I do know quite a few women who are off the market. They’re married and take their wedding vows seriously, or they are chaste for unknown reasons.

    Such women will flirt in a very open and friendly fashion, but they make no bones about telling men who approach them that they’re not interested. I personally respect this. Such women are, in my experience, a minority, but they do exist, and their existence is part of the reason I can’t fully accept the “all women are whores” meme that is so prevalent on other manosphere sites.

    Best, Boxer

  45. Dalrock says:

    @grey_whiskers

    @8oxer — Do you *have* a daughter of eligible/vulnerable age? If so, do not let her out of the house unless she is picked up by the Mother Superior in person to escort her to the convent, and sew the front yard with land mines.
    This is the natural instinct of the father.

    The convent isn’t the only solution to a young woman who burns with passion. The problem is the assumption that women must delay marriage, with the follow on effort to slut proof the whole world so they can make it to their late 20s or early 30s with their chastity in tact. It simply can’t be done. If they are intent on delaying marriage and subject to the type of temptation you fear it only takes one alpha with a few minutes to spare. You won’t sequester every last one.

  46. bios says:

    Typical. Whenever a man discusses this topic, he is invariably seen as a loser, a psychopath, a loner etc. All the shaming tactics in the book come out to play. I got into an argument online recently about female entitlement, and a few guys supported me, but it was essentially me battling 1 woman and 6 manginas, and one of the manginas tried to dismiss everything i said as ‘reductive’ or ‘bitter’, yet nobody told off the woman that practically said that even if bad things were happening to men as a result of feminism, they deserve it for thousands of years of oppression. Really? That is _not_ an expression of bitterness but a perfectly acceptable worldview? And it’s really amazing because that woman in question who was arguing with me the most was exhibit A. She was exactly the kind of woman i was talking about it.

    I also agree that a good looking alpha can break down even the most outwardly frigid and conservative women. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. Maybe 2-3 out of 10 at the most will resist temptation, and that is being generous.

  47. Twenty says:

    @Zippy
    It is stupid beyond words, dumber than the proverbial bag of hammers. Sorry, but it just is. do any of these people live in actual real life? Know any actual real women? Seriously?

    +5 Internet points for the most devastating barrage of logic I’ve seen today, sir!

    You describe statements with which you disagree as “stupid beyond words” and “dumber than the proverbial bag of hammers”. Lest anyone question this characterization, you quickly back it up with the bon mots “[s]orry, but it just is”, and “[s]eriously?”.

    Who could argue with that?

    You then destroy your opponents’ credibility with the brilliant, insightful question: “do any of these people live in actual real life?”

    Let me tell you, I was taken aback by that one. Why, they probably don’t! And you’ve exposed them as the denizens of non-actual, un-real life that they almost certainly are, as demonstrated by their uncongenial opinions!

    Finally, for the coup de grace, you ask whether they “Know any actual real women?” Devastating, sir! The rhetorical equivalent of that Mortal Kombat move where that one guy rips that other guy’s spine out.

    Of course, some might say that the real test of various mandrosphere theories is whether or not they have predictive power when dealing with “actual real women” in “actual real life”, and not whether some twit on the internet approves of them or not. And some might even say that, if those theories do have value, that it might not be unreasonable to apply them to internet chatterboxes.

    But, obviously, no one would say that after they’ve been exposed to your Aristotelian reasoning.

  48. Apollo says:

    Of course spending time in the manosphere makes one cynical. However, cynicism is the appropriate response to the way our current day society enables the unfettered expression of the feminine imperitive. To a system thats designed to take advantage of those men with trusting natures who follow their “normal” instincts. Cynicism is simply a necessary survival mechanism that allows us to cope in a predatory environment.

    And if the ladies dont want to rationally discuss the problem with an eye to becoming part of the solution, thats just fine. We will deal with the problem ourselves, without being influenced or moderated in any way by feminine points of view. We will deal with the problem our way.

    And honestly, I think the necessity of taking that approach has been inevitable all along.

  49. Hisoj says:

    like any tyrant, feminists become so chaotic that they eventually begin to destroy themselves.

  50. JHJ says:

    I think we have here, in a nutshell, a splendid illustration of how Christianity has gone off the rails. Even those who take their official faith seriously enough to make themselves public proponents for it on the interwebs, even when they can occasionally see the darkness that has gathered among the females of the flock, are unable to abandon with their white knighting feminist-in-cloth ideologies on any systematic basis, backsliding into essentially “man up!” rants all the time, only in a slightly less – dare I say it? – manly, straightforward way than that Driscoll fella.

    Here’s a free clue, Zippy: I don’t care that you disapprove of shaming sluts. If knowledge of what you and the rest of the enablers have allowed Christianity to become can save a single naive young Christian man from marriage, then it is worth all the pain and discomfort that you and the little damsels in emotional distress you fondly imagine you have to protect experience.

  51. frenchy says:

    Dalrock,

    even before i finished reading this, it occurred to me that Zippy is doing EXACTLY what he accuses you of doing.

  52. Opus says:

    …and all this at the season of goodwill.

    If my memory serves me correctly, the last time Dalrock fell out with fellow bloggers was the set-too with the Darwins, and curiously both The Darwins and Zippy are of the Catholic persuasion; yet it does not appear to me that this is obviously a Protestant/Catholic smash-up.

    I would be tempted to think that Anonymous Reader comes closest when he observes that it looks like a case of ‘lets you and him fight over me’ – except that does not really seem to be it either.

    I’m lost. Bring on the hamsters, I say. They always amuse me.

  53. 8oxer says:

    bios:

    I also agree that a good looking alpha can break down even the most outwardly frigid and conservative women. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. Maybe 2-3 out of 10 at the most will resist temptation, and that is being generous.

    You’re actually agreeing with me. 30% of the female population being out of the market is almost precisely commensurate with my experience, too.

    Lest there be any misunderstanding, I’m not describing my personal success rate as 70% (LOL!) nor anything close to that. All the same, the market has about a 70% female saturation rate. I won’t speculate on the male numbers, because I don’t know male tells (I’m not in the market for other dudes, after all, and have never tried to pick up a man).

    Take all the non-disabled, reproductively viable women (age 18-45, say) in the North American population, and 3/10 of those women will not be receptive to sexual overtures regardless of who makes them or what hoops he jumps through. Sure, some dude could force the issue physically or use some other form of coercion, but then it wouldn’t be game, but sexual assault.

    What’s interesting about this topic is the fact that I’ve never thought deeply about the motivations of those women. Marriage is certainly not a catch-all. I’ve seen married women discreetly offer no-strings sex to available men more times than I can count. At the same time, many non-married girls are in this category too. I was casually seeing one, and it has been fun, though it’s going to wind down over the holidays. She’s clearly quite attracted to me, and has made it plain that she’s very interested (she texts me at least once per day), but the only way I’m going to “game” her into bed is by signing a marriage certificate in front of her pastor and congregation.

    Dalrock or Heartiste ought to explore the issue sometime.

  54. grey_whiskers says:

    @8oxer Dec. 30 at 12:22 AM —

    No woman needs protecting from PUA tactics. Chaste women can not be gamed, in the same way that honest men can not be conned. I realize there are some harsh implications there, but this is absolutely true in my experience.

    NACWALT. There is such a thing as “isolate and escalate” even within the context of a relationship, as Athol Kay knows; there is such a thing as “one thing led to another” in a literal sense (people intending to be chaste succumbing to temptation), else sluts would not use that line as an excuse, much as LJBF is used in other contexts (*); there is such as thing as roofies and date rape (if overstated by feminists and used as excuses by bad girls).
    All of these actions exist, e’en though they be statistical outliers, and not *nearly* as prevalent among good girls, but as Game Theory (Nash, not Roissy) teaches us, if one of your moves results in losing completely (virginity), it is best to avoid such moves.

    Please note carefully — I am not buying into these as “excuses” after the fact to shield an unchaste woman from blame; I am not saying “all men are like that”; I am saying that a young inexperienced girl might not have the life experience to avoid them on her own, and so prudence is necessary. There are Marriage 1.0 rules for courtship / chaperoning as well as for marriage itself…

    (*) more valid if the woman is *hoping* to attract another man’s attention, execrable if she is actually having sex with 1 or more other men while stringing along the LJBF-ee.

  55. grey_whiskers says:

    @Dalrock Dec.30 at 12:22 AM:

    So you are saying it is Lydia who is calling all women sluts, and that what is needed is a way to coax the men they slut around with into marriage after the fact? Or are you accusing players of pretending to marry or at least get engaged with the women they have sex with?

    I fear I have miscommunicated. My sentiment/suspicion towards Lydia is based on the advice Gandalf gave to Frodo in The Fellowship of the Ring:

    The wide world is all about you: you can fence yourselves in, but you cannot for ever fence it out.

    Now I know that sounds particularly ironic in light of my comment about land mines, but there is a difference — assuming for the sake of argument that I have correctly characterized Lydia’s motivation for her actions regarding her protégés and her *re*-action to the other threads.
    She is relying on innocence and conviction being the best protection against defilement; which is usually pretty good against “mistakes on purpose” in the absence of “creeping seduction / corruption” as someone may have creeping misgivings which they are not allowed to verbalize and resolve. But it does not protect against other types of men, who are more (literally) predatory.(*)

    I don’t know Lydia — I do maintain, given a quick perusal of her blog “What’s Wrong With the World” that she is of an unusually serious intellectual bent compared to most female bloggers — more Leah Libresco than Jezebel, if you will, leaving out Leah’s lesbianism. But it looks to me that she is offended either at the suggestion that “innocence might not be enough” OR at the fear that imbuing her flock with knowledge of game will unravel much of the hedge she has grown up to protect them.

    (*) NOMALT, in fact, MMANLT, given that several manosphere commenters predict that only 10% or so of men would be able to internalize game even were it propagated universally. But, like laws against murder, taxes, and speed limit signs, these things work at the margins, by persuading the masses of people. There are some hard-core people for whom the breaking of the rules / defilement itself is *part* of the thrill, not a mere by-product of the chase.

  56. grey_whiskers says:

    @8oxer Dec. 30 at 12:26 AM.
    I do not have children, and sympathize with the fathers and mothers in this discussion. I do know quite a few women who are off the market. They’re married and take their wedding vows seriously, or they are chaste for unknown reasons.

    You are completely correct on all counts.

    Such women will flirt in a very open and friendly fashion, but they make no bones about telling men who approach them that they’re not interested. I personally respect this. Such women are, in my experience, a minority, but they do exist, and their existence is part of the reason I can’t fully accept the “all women are whores” meme that is so prevalent on other manosphere sites.

    It all depends…on where you look. There are practicing whores in church, as well as legitimate good women, and married women determinedly faithful; but, do you know, I’m willing to lay money that (among the disjoint portions of the Venn diagram between bar-hoppers and churchgoers), more of the bar-hoppers are open to promiscuity than church-goers. Peer pressure makes a difference: but peer pressure is composed both of prevailing public opinion as well as the members of a woman’s immediate social circle *whom she values*.

    NAWALT, and NAWANLT too.

  57. an437737 says:

    Zippy, I read the thread and you’re Lydia’s bitch.

    Don’t bark at us when your collar chafes.

  58. grey_whiskers says:

    @Dalrock Dec.30 at 12:30 AM
    The convent isn’t the only solution to a young woman who burns with passion. The problem is the assumption that women must delay marriage, with the follow on effort to slut proof the whole world so they can make it to their late 20s or early 30s with their chastity in tact. It simply can’t be done. If they are intent on delaying marriage and subject to the type of temptation you fear it only takes one alpha with a few minutes to spare. You won’t sequester every last one.

    Agreed completely. This an off-the-wall suggestion, but one notes that in ancient Jewish culture (as well as in many agrarian societies), women got married *much* younger; and men were expected to work and contribute economically practically from puberty — which of course is possible where there is no extended adolescence.

    But this is significant on a number of levels: first, in our society, someone without a high school education is generally not employable at a salary which would enable him to support a family.
    But making the matter worse is the “government-education” complex (which arose from the confluence of industrialization, the G.I. Bill, the Griggs decision, and got worse with the usurpation of academia by the left, then gender feminists, resulting in a surfeit of useless diplomas plus a societal bent on credentialism as opposed to meritocracy, coupled with the “You Go G’RLL” male bashing, see also Larry Summers of Harvard[*], AND the astronomical cost of college), which has the result that most people are FORCED to delay marriage, or to delay fertility within marriage, for they cannot afford children.

    The current fashionable way to solve this is to encourage single motherhood and to support the familial fragments using taxpayer funds, but for a number of reasons, this isn’t sustainable, as most in the manosphere have agreed.

    Is there any meaningful way to modify our society so that young marriage becomes feasible again?
    No, not as much fun, but more stable, more enduring, and less prone to disintegration from within, and more united against attack from without.

    My greatest fear is not that we end up with societal decay followed by Mad Max or a dictatorship, but war. (Note the increasing number of “surplus males” for example in China.) As Professor Frost lectured Mark Studdock in C.S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength:

    “For the moment, I would merely remark that your view of war and your reference to the preservation of the species suggest a profound misconception. They are mere generalizations from affectional feelings,” said Frost.

    “Surely,” said Mark, “one requires a pretty large population for the full exploitation of Nature, if for nothing else? And surely war is dysgenic and reduces efficiency? Even if population needs thinning, is not war the worst possible method of thinning it?”

    “That idea is a survival from conditions which are rapidly being altered. A few centuries ago, war did not operate in the way you describe. A large agricultural population was essential; and war destroyed types which were then still useful. But every advance in industry and agriculture reduces the number of work-people who are required. A large, unintelligent population is now becoming a deadweight. The real importance of scientific war is that scientists have to be reserved. It was not the great technocrats of Koenigsberg or Moscow who supplied the casualties in the siege of Stalingrad: it was the superstitious Bavarian peasants and low-grade Russian agricultural workers. The effect of modern war is to eliminate retrogressive types, while sparing the technocracy and increasing its hold upon public affairs.”

    Oops, I’m *beginning* to wander off topic. I’ll bail out now…

    [*] his academic credentials are (according to those rules) impeccable, I once read that at the time he graduated, he was the youngest person ever to receive a PhD from Harvard: but even he got dumped under the bus the moment he didn’t toe the party line.

  59. Thornstruck says:

    @ Dropit
    This feels wrong. I’m a frequent reader of this blog, and gained plenty of insight without its sudden intra-Sphere defensive bent. Beware the Streisand Effect. Better to ignore slander and push forward with a strong case (and at some point, action), than to become embroiled in a pointless he-said she-said that feeds a need for drama but fails to enlighten.

    I don’t think it’s wrong at all, in moderation. From what I can surmise Dalrock is bringing the discussion to the reading community and offering confirmation or refutation of Lydia and Zippy’s assertions. In the process he provides examples of passive aggressive response and emotional reaction to observations and empirical evidence sans logical counter arguments.

    It provides a situation report (sit-rep) to the uninitiated or those just reading about socio-sexual interactions. I did not follow the entire exchange in the various blog’s mentioned but this post, and future posts of it’s kind, are instructive when done in moderation.

  60. Farm Boy says:

    even before i finished reading this, it occurred to me that Zippy is doing EXACTLY what he accuses you of doing.

    I wonder if she is my ex-wife….

  61. freebird says:

    We’re getting closer to what Lydia does not want discussed,and that is the female desire for sex and the fact that feminism (whoop-de-dah!)
    Has freed them up to purse it and set the terms they get it by.
    Take for instance the “Girls Gone Wild” phenomena.

    Where these girls coerced against their will to show their perky young titties?

    No, they enjoy doing that because *they* are in the position of power and not the men,and that challenges the
    Narrative of the feminine ‘mystique.’

    For women it is verboten to discuss what motivates their sexuality because it is more powerful than than mans and often comes from lack of self regulation as defined by Christianity,more of a 50 shades of grey type motivation.
    Lydia would not have us believe her daughters have full agency in their decisions to desire alpha penis (in the future) like all women do.

    This is the job of the father,to teach girls what men are best for her and which ones are not.
    Modern churchianity and feminism combined set free those destructive choices made by women and they *refuse* to be held to account,or to engage in discussion which might lead to the concept of female agency,when in fact it is the driving force behind the SMP.

    This article about the ratio of women to men in the various denominations is worth reading as it suggests the underlying factors of male feminization in the churches:
    http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/Evils%20in%20America/Feminism/church_impotent.htm

    “Neither has the absence of men left women untouched. Unfortunately, women have been forced into the unnatural mold by Christians’ misunderstandings of the feminine. Much of current feminism is an understandable reaction against the caricature of feminine roles. The breakdown of the proper relationship of masculinity and femininity, male and female, Adam and Eve, is at the root of many of the churches failures in the modern world, but this situation would not surprise the author of Genesis.”

  62. freebird says:

    This quote here illustrates the point that the free sex movement of the feminists is in direct contradiction to the Christian teaching of sex only inside marriage,and that young girls who ‘liberate’ themselves by choosing sex before marriage are going directly against biblical teachings.

    “Our pagan (a.k.a. “modern”) Masonic culture programs us to worship sex in the form of the fertile young female.

    Romantic love is our ersatz religion. Sexual intercourse is the holy sacrament.
    Sex is considered the most pleasurable and profound experience life has to offer. ”

    This is another subject Lydia would not have us speak upon,because it would question
    (whoop-de-dah)
    the feminist satanic influence she minimizes as less than nothing but that is greater than all in the churches.

  63. grey_whiskers says:

    @8oxer Dec. 30 at 12:07 AM

    Sorry, I missed your comment earlier, and it is important.
    I partially replied inadvertently in my responses to your 12:22 AM post, but there is more to be said explicitly.

    One of the great misconceptions of game (ironically promoted strongly by PUA types themselves, usually in the hopes of getting new disciples) is that it is a form of mind control or hypnotism, which will enable the player to bed any woman. This, to put it bluntly, is total bullshit.

    Let’s break this down. One way to be immune is to be immune from gamers: “I want a committed relationship and I will NOT put out outside of one.” This used to be more viable, before generalized sluttery took over; many young women find they cannot *retain* male attention for long if they retain chastity, because in many locales — college settings, nightclub venues, what have you — men are so used to getting sex that they disappear quickly when it is not forthcoming.

    Recall that Game proponents key off of IOIs, — if a woman is not reciprocating kino, or giggling, or touching her hair, or whatever, within a period of (say) 120 – 180 seconds after opening, the savvy, successful gamer will move on, in order to preserve frame (“I’m interesting, witty, charming, sexy as hell, and all the ladies know it”) in front of the other women who may be watching.

    In other words, one way to be immune is to be immune from that particular man; he’s not your type.

    But the danger is, sex and the urge to form relationships, is deeply embedded within people: and while a woman may be proof against cheap pickup lines, she is not immune to *loneliness*. And over the long term, many women may end up succumbing against their better judgment, not because they start out intending to be sluts, but because they see no other way of securing anything which even seems like male commitment. (See also “serial monogamy”) Women will be more vulnerable to this if one or more of the following apply:

    a) a poor relationship with their father (divorce, “Daddy issues”)
    b) no familial role model of commitment (Mom has had numerous men in her life)
    c) no strong social circle — either to provide affirmation of her as a person, or to dissuade her from promiscuity (a strong social circle of sluts, as a strong social circle of divorcees or unhappily married women, is toxic to good women).

    The “innocent daughter” can not be gamed unless she is open to the idea of having sex. Game is not a way to rape unwilling women. It is more correctly seen as a series of tactics by which men can quit sabotaging themselves when approaching willing women.

    This sounds like the “no true Scotsman” fallacy (or “phallacy”, in this case?) It is true that conventional “gamers” do not resort to this; but there are others, who wish for the promised, exaggerated success from game, who are not so scrupulous; there is also the possibility of a woman having a social network of less-chaste women (classmates in college, room-mates, some co-workers) who either drag down her reputation (“guilty by association”), or introduce her to a man whom she mistakenly trusts based on the recommendation of the room-mate; and finally, there are “high pressure” guys who resort to bullying to get sex. True story from an extended family member (cousin / in-law level) — the girl goes out on a first or second date with a guy and they go back to his place to chill for awhile. She goes to use the restroom, and when she comes out, he is in his underwear, and says point blank:
    “Either you do me or you walk home.”
    (This being in mid-winter in one the Upper Midwest.)
    She said “Fine” and grabbed her coat and marched out the door.
    Bully for her, but some women — particularly younger, more inexperienced ones — might try to placate the man by “just kissing” or somesuch, not realizing that the man has determined in advance that he will escalate until get gets to ejaculate.
    The woman is not a slut, nor did she intend to be, but she did get used and her innocence / partner count sullied — the guy used the tactics of a sleazy, high-pressure car salesman or telephone bill collector, coupled with the implicit, or sometimes explicit — threat or use of mild force.
    Not “rape-rape” as Whoopi Goldberg might say; but neither was the woman a total slut who “just wanted it, I *know*” (high-fives by the men).
    And it is to avoid *those* kind of situations that daughters should be Convented- and Land-mined up. (Guard their social circles and friends, women are unusually susceptible to peer pressure.)

  64. freebird says:

    Which leads me to believe that when Lydia says “I’m trying to restore culture” she means restoring the *new* feminist sexual freedom culture by not discussing women’s acts of sin by seeking sex outside of marriage.

    In other words,to maintain her feminist privileged to sin,whilst seemingly espousing Christian ethics.

    That is hypocrisy,and that is why it’s verboten to look at it.

  65. freebird says:

    It’s the typical defense of the guilty,to deny,obfuscate,and counter-accuse.

    That’s why you will never get a logical response.
    To keep men on the back-foot by discussing male sexuality all the live-long day but to never say a word about the incredible power of female sexual choice and how that compares and contrasts with Christian teachings.

  66. freebird says:

    It seems the conversation about “game” got too close to the real issue of the patriarchal standards of biblical faith being in direct contradiction with feminist sexual freedom,and would lead of thoughts of heretical teachings in the church.
    Take close note how the modern Christian woman rebels against the concept of ‘submission.’
    The other,unspoken rebellion is against virginal purity going into marriage.
    The high priestesses of ghia
    demand the ‘right’ to their bodies and anything they do with them,including abortion,sex before marriage,refusal to submit to husbands,and adhering to biblical doctrine in general.
    The new ‘worship’ is to the false image of the innocent feminine who can never be sinful,only sinned against by evil men.
    An inversion of logic in at least half the cases.

    It is this FI mindset that allows displaced dads to be labeled “deadbeat dads” and ‘bad men’ when in fact it was the woman’s choice to toss him out.

    Feminism freed up women to realize sex was something a woman DOES not something that is DONE to her,yet feminists today maintain that men should not see that,that they,and they alone are responsible for the sex act.

    It’s business as usual,propping up responsibilities for men and rights for women,and never the twain shall meet,because “that’s different.”

    It all ties into together in one big tapestry,once you start pulling at the string of feminine and feminist imperative the entire Narrative falls apart and threatens the feminist (anti-family) Agenda.

    Satan,the mother of all lies.

  67. TMG says:

    Sounds like Lydia is just another religious believer in Team Woman.

  68. freebird says:

    The largest example of these double standards is manifested in the way single mothers with bastard children from different fathers are supported financially by church donations as helpless victims whilst caring fathers who have been robbed and pushed from home and family are demonized as bad men and/or abusers.

    It is in this way the churches enable and promote sin,an anti-Christian value.

    When you question them upon the subject you get the same shut-down.

    Because the FI rules all,and has overtaken the churches as the primary RELIGION.

  69. freebird says:

    To look at these issues is to be a realist,not a nihilist,to deny these issue is delusion at best,facilitation of predatory herd narcissistic at worst.

    Another case in point,woman gets preggers after one night stand:
    It is the bad man with the bad penis that caused the pregnancy and DON’T YOU DARE SAY SHE SHOULD HAVE KEPT HER LEGS CLOSED.

    It’s the equivalent of a child sticking fingers in ear and yelling la la la
    I’m not hearing you.

    As an adult with a mind I find this refusal+slander quite offensive.

    If thought is bad,quit thinking,why are you reading this,you could be masturbating right now.(get to it)

  70. TMG says:

    The Newfangled Bible of Feminized Churchianity

    Commandment 1: “Thou shalt not deny a woman’s sacred quest for always seeking a bigger better deal.”

    Commandment 2: “Better that 1,000 men be led down the primrose path to matrimonial disaster than 1 woman get her feelings hurt.”

    Commandment 3: “It is the mark of man’s original sin that he cannot fulfill woman’s desire for toasted ice.”

    Commandment 4: “So it shall be written that the foundations of the church, family, and society shall always play second fiddle to a woman’s search for tingles.”

    Commandment 5: “Should a woman indulge her ineffable vagina in a way that leads man to sin, he shall be cast from the flock while we speak comforting words to her.”

    Commandment 6: “Lo, and I saw my son and my daughter standing at the foot of a cliff. My daughter expressed a desire to stretch out and get comfortable, so I pushed my son off. As she desires, so shall it be.”

    Commandment 7: “Mothers are holy, children are a blessing, fathers are useful as long as they don’t ask questions.”

    Commandment 8: “May it be so that 2,000 years of religious doctrine be rent asunder if it furthers the betterment of the sacred vajay.”

  71. He argues like a woman, all the really needs to be said.

  72. FuriousFerret says:

    @grey_whiskers

    There are two ways for women to stay chaste in today’s society from a practical standpoint:

    1) Be hideous so no one offers the temptation
    2) Stay exclusively in evangelical Christian circles and date the men there.

    The problem arises when most of the evangelical Christian are totally unattractive to most women because they have to been raised to be in effect masculine females. So they whine and cry about the dearth of ineligable men and when a truly attractive man comes around they will go with the player because the alternative is too terrible to consider.

    The thing is that Christian men have the same problem if they want to evangelicals as well. How many truly non-overweight attractive women are there in religious circles. You have a much better change of getting hot women by widening your pool. It’s just that the women have the option to go get sex while the men don’t because again they are in effect masculine females.

  73. It is curious to me this is a problem, is there really a large feminist contingent in the church? I thought it was the last bastion of ‘feminine’ women.

  74. “Lydia made a perfectly valid point: that the manosphere tends to produce an unreal cynicism in many of its participants.”

    More likely, men participate in men’s rights sites because they have already become cynical thanks to their experiences.

    Which is more likely to make a man cynical: reading Dalrock’s thoughts, or being rejected by the last dozen women he asked out even though he behaves as women have told him he should?

  75. grey_whiskers says:

    @Furious Ferret Dec. 30 at 9:44 AM
    “1) Be hideous so no one offers the temptation
    2) Stay exclusively in evangelical Christian circles and date the men there.”

    A couple of other choices, see also Catholic / Eastern Orthodox for example.

    Another (fearsome) choice is chastity; an even better choice (as enjoined throughout the manosphere) is true femininity : escalating emotionally, with light kino, over time, rather than sexually: if there are any lingering embers of masculinity, this will re-kindle them.

    But you are right: “The problem arises when most of the evangelical Christian are totally unattractive to most women because they have to been raised to be in effect masculine females. ”

    I suspect, though it is terrible to say so, based on the last 20 years of high-profile church scandals, is that a disproportionate share of church leaders are not sexually pure or chaste, and cloak their alphaness in “leadership over the flock” while their suppression of masculinity within their flock by enforcing the FI by word and deed over the congregation serves two purposes:

    a) it keeps the womyn happy and donating
    b) it eliminates almost all of the rivals for feminine attention within the church

    The other issue with Church womyn is a bit more subtle. It is often cast within the manosphere that church women get jackhammered by alphas on Saturday night and demurely pretend to virginity on Sunday morning, rejecting and lamenting the betaness which infests the pews around them; but in my experience (as a brother, husband, father, and observer) is that women develop extreme *oneitis* (for whatever reason, and tingles are not exclusively gained on account of alphaness) — and so there are many chaste and virginal Church women who rebuff all male comers because they are not the *individual* man she has set her eyes upon. (Compare and contrast the surveys about “what I want in a man” which mean “what I want in a man I am already attracted to”.

    This does not have to mean “alpha men get all the women” — too often (by the law of averages, and the “one true spouse / soul-mate” teachings so derided by Athol Kay, it means “EVERYBODY goes home lonely, starving amidst abundance.”

    That being said, a good dose of the MAP introduced into the congregations might really shake things up: and judging by the recent thread (http://thewomanandthedragon.wordpress.com/2012/12/16/if-you-challenge-femdom-churchianity-the-white-knights-will-attack-an-update-on-joseph-of-jackson/) on Sunshinemary’s blog “The Woman and the Dragon”, the reaction of the church elders is, alas! congruent with the supposition that the leaders of the church are not keen on the competition, or are hopelessly whipped into the FI.

  76. greyghost says:

    grey_whiskers

    your response to this statement is wrong big time and shows a complete lack of real leadership but is a very PC type of stance that displays thoughtfulness. There is such a thing as the feminine imperative just as there is the black thing. When I was growing up I could always recall a black preacher or some leader talking about how “we’ don’t make guns or drugs and those things are brought into our communities causing all of this and that evil. Now I was one of those uppity weird niggas of sort. What I heard and understood was”black people are ignorant monkeys swinging in the trees until some bad white men layed some guns and drugs on the ground under the trees. The monkeys then began using and selling the drugs and later started shooting each other with the guns. The smart monkeys said it was not their fault they were suffering because someone other than a monkey brought that into their community.” I’ve been to funerals of a couson I grew up with over this dumb shit
    I hope you don’t have a daughter and teach her this crap. Just because it’s popular and you won’t be seen as wrong for it doesn’t mean you are not being a servant for evil.

    This next series is the classic “yeah but game from high school psych class.

    This is something all girls at a “I think he’s cute” age should be taught.

    Rather than look for feminine PC reason that relieve women of social responsibility and consequences a father teachers his daughter how to live and act by the statement. If you may have noticed the romance of fucking the alpha goes away with leadership. red pill will help your daughter see what a blue pill slut cannot see. Romance and herd think depends on blindness. Never allow yourself to be under the delusion your daughter is not a woman she is and will be all of the things the manosphere has discribed. It is normal and cannot be changed but the behavior motivated by the female nature can be directed and influenced. the childishness solipsism,hypergamy,gina tingle is love, herd status, aversion to responsibility, hamsterism, etc etc will be ever present robbing her of inner peace. Give her a normal place to go for peace rather than the feral nature of being true to herself.

    A father teaches his daughter about those emotions and how to handle them. he tells her where to go and gives her a solid foundation to stand on so she doesn’t have to rely on how she feels. Leadership not friendship goes a long way. The goal pop is not for her to be “happy” while she has that cute face and perky titties supported by an ass that is hard to pinch but to make sure she is at peace in her hysterical mind when she is 55 and nobody wants to fuck any more. But they want to love her because she was such a good person when she didn’t have to be.

  77. FuriousFerret says:

    “disproportionate share of church leaders”

    Contextual alphas. In the real world , they are beta chumps.

    “that women develop extreme *oneitis*”

    As I said, most men in church are totally unattractive, the very few that shine through despite the beta teaching will have their pick. Most often this is from extreme talent such as music or pure althleticism, or great physical looks. However most still have the heart of the beta. Tim Tebow is the ultimate example of this.

    This also why if you ever read these sad sad stories of women in their 30s that are single despite being good and chaste is that they are waiting for God to deliver an alpha. If you ever tell such women that maybe they should settle for the countless number of church betas, well ‘hell hath no fury’.

  78. Not sure where the real conflict is here. On the one hand, and NOT regarding any specific poster or blogger, Zippy has a point.
    When he wrote This latest “feminine imperative” fad, especially as it played out at SSM’s and Rollo’s, is basically a manosphere version of cultural Marxism. it illustrated his point perfectly. It needn’t even be about the particulars of the FI validity or not to see what he is saying, and to make it about the minutia is to be sucked too deeply into it to be able to see what he means.

    On AVFM I used to refer to it as intellectual peacocking that dragged the conversation down, and I stand by that. We all do that….period. And its not necessarily a bad thing. But it gets tedious, and the Matt King vs…..whoever dynamic unfolds, who can drop the coolest historical reference or quote the more obscure philosopher…..I digress.

    To Zippy I would say, however, that the cynicism he sees is not undue. I do not know Zippy or his life experience but it seems most of us are motivated by an experience, and that experience opened our eyes to a world we only wish we could have seen in advance. If conveying that requires peacocking and hyperbole, so be it, its worth it. There is no common ground ideologically so we cannot do a Rodney King with the Lydia’s and her color of peacock. Zippy reaches that revelation as illustrated in the chronology Dalrock sets forth here.

    I agree that describing the exact motive of a singular women is specious. BUT, it serves a greater and bigger overall purpose in that it assigns some analysis from which we can attempt to extrapolate cause and effect and pro-act or react accordingly. But man it does get painfully tedious to read over and again…..so what? We are not compelled to read.

    Perhaps it is a confusion of purpose that is making the noise between these two bloggers. But I fail to see either the overly cynical or the passive aggressive aspects of them respectively.

    But…..I guess pick your favorite guy and escalate the drama!

  79. Farm Boy says:

    Lydia made a perfectly valid point: that the manosphere tends to produce an unreal cynicism in many of its participants.

    If developing an effective model of how the world really works is cynical, then I am cynical.

  80. Farm Boy says:

    He argues like a woman, all the really needs to be said.

    I wonder if he throws like a girl.

  81. grey_whiskers says:

    @greyghost on Dec.30, 2012 at 10:18 AM

    your response to this statement is wrong big time and shows a complete lack of real leadership but is a very PC type of stance that displays thoughtfulness. There is such a thing as the feminine imperative just as there is the black thing.
    You apparently misunderstood my post. I was not denying the existence of the female imperative, but questioning whether Lydia’s responses were ONLY due to her allegiance to it, or due to some other motives as well.
    I hope you don’t have a daughter and teach her this crap. Just because it’s popular and you won’t be seen as wrong for it doesn’t mean you are not being a servant for evil.
    What *specifically* are you calling crap? You’re using too many indefinite pronouns while failing to refer either to a time-stamp post, or to cut-and-paste the quote you’re replying to.
    If you mean “be careful, because men may seduce or violate you” that is NOT crap; it would only be crap if you tacked onto it (implicitly or explicitly) the idea that “all illicit sexual activity is solely the man’s fault.” The reason to warn a woman about men is that she already knows *her own* motivations, and doesn’t need to be told about them; and the fact that women thrive on men’s attention and might not distinguish between men’s motives on anything other than tingles. (Aren’t all the manosphere posters complaining that women *ignore* the good men due to lack of tingles? Haven’t they lamented the lack of grandmotherly wisdom which counseled young girls to ignore tingles and marry a good provider while young, and start screwing like bunnies to have kids together?)
    The reason that even *that* advice is suspect is that the whole cultural milieu has changed from Marriage 1.0, so that women do not have slut-shaming surrounding them on all sides; chastity needs extra defenses and bolstering when it is under assault from (almost) all sides.
    Which, when I read over the remainder of your post, seems to be exactly what you are saying in different words.
    I conclude we are on the same side: hold your fire.

  82. grey_whiskers says:

    @FuriousFerret on Dec.30, 2012 10:19 AM:
    “disproportionate share of church leaders”

    Contextual alphas. In the real world , they are beta chumps.
    I’m working on a long involved piece on that…don’t know when I’ll finish — but there is a lot of inconsistent usage of alpha and beta in the manosphere (even aside from the Roissyan vs. VoxDay-ian nomenclature), and you are right, it depends on *context*.

    “that women develop extreme *oneitis*”

    As I said, most men in church are totally unattractive, the very few that shine through despite the beta teaching will have their pick. Most often this is from extreme talent such as music or pure althleticism, or great physical looks. However most still have the heart of the beta. Tim Tebow is the ultimate example of this.
    That’s often true, but not universal. Going into those corners of the manosphere who talk about olfactory cues to genetic diversity, and those being blunted by oral contraceptives, one can pick up the suggestion that sometimes a woman gets fixated on one particular man (regardless of his “true” alpha status) and rejects all other comers in the hope of landing him. I’ve seen this with family members and co-workers as well as church; but I presume it happens far *less* often in bars / nightclubs or other venues where the explicit purpose is to meet the opposite sex…which may be why the manosphere does not comment on it as much.

  83. gregariouswolf says:

    “In other words, be careful that the red pill isn’t immunizing the manosphere from self criticism.”

    Self-criticism is an important feature of Maoism. I kind of find it ironic someone accusing the Manosphere of complaining about cultural hegemony and the power of feminism would suggest we engage in it.

  84. Looking Glass says:

    @8oxer & grey_whiskers, Re: Chaste Women.

    You both sort of touched on it, but I wanted to point something out when talking about a specific dynamic. There’s the biological and the intellectual aspects with self-control. So, from a strictly theoretical point of view, you can say: “All Women can be Gamed into bed by A Man”. It’s just in the realistic, practical point of view, that’s only true for a specific set. That set has gotten pretty large, however.

    While I don’t normally reference James Dobson, I did come across a piece where he talked about “Anger” vs “Rage”. “Anger” is an emotional response to stimuli; “Rage” is when that response becomes a physiological response. A person is capable of handling Anger, but once they reach Rage, the strictly physiological is in control. I found this to be a fairly valuable tool for realizing where “Anger” needs to end, before it becomes “Rage”. Further, I also have found it to be a good model for splitting up the Mental and the Physiological side to many reactions humans have, especially when it comes to attraction.

    In the case of Chaste women (this also applies to “Honest Man” actions), the “trick” is to prevent yourself from escalating temptation. It’s not to “avoid temptation”, it’s to avoid “increasing temptation”. This allows the person, in this case a woman, to head off both the Hamster and the biological impulses. The self-aware, full conscious actions are still in control when this happens, thus allowing the woman to avoid what she has, nominally, said she wants to. This is the reason why blind ignorance of our own natures is terribly destructive on young women. They like to “play the Game”, which is really just giving the Hamster time to work its wheel.

    The same tricks also applies if you’re on a strict diet. 🙂 (Seriously, just throw out the chips & cookies, it works so much better)

  85. Bee says:

    @Matthew,

    You make a good point about the excessive nuance clouding things.

    Zippy responds to some questions from The One in his Cynicism post of December 27.

    “Zippy
    December 29, 2012 at 1:26 pm

    The One:
    Do you agree it’s biblical that men should view women as a gift?

    That isn’t a question I know much of anything about, since as a Catholic “biblical” isn’t a category I use to judge truths of the natural law. I do agree with Lydia’s general point that too much cynicism about women can ruin a man and make him unsuitable for marriage, much like promiscuity, etc. (This is also true for women, in both cases).

    Zippy
    December 29, 2012 at 2:23 pm

    The One:
    Perhaps you could explain or point me in the direction of a good primer that explains how Catholics evaluate the truth of someone’s statement.

    You are asking for a primer that does not exist. Contrary to popular mythology, the Catholic Church does not tell people how to think and how to evaluate truth in general. She does claim authority on particular kinds of truth claims involving faith and morals, of course (as well as other powers and authorities, sacramental and juridical); but mostly we are on our own if we want to understand epistemology, ontology, etc.
    You might try the encyclical Fides et Ratio by Pope John Paul II, depending on where you are yourself in terms of understanding philosophy, epistemology, natural law, theology, etc. But understand that you are asking a rather flippant question about a very large subject. People study these things for decades without doing more than scratching the surface.
    How would a Catholic begin to evaluate the truth of the statement “men should view women as gifts”
    I can’t speak for “a Catholic” as a general thing, but my own reaction to the question is that out of context it is hopelessly vague. Women, like all people, are sometimes a gift, sometimes a burden, and sometimes all sorts of other things. Read in context it seems obvious to me that Lydia was suggesting that man and wife ought to see each other in some sense as a gift, and that salting the ground with too much cynicism can interfere with that. Seems perfectly obvious and reasonable to me.”

    Zippy says he believes in natural law and some Catholic doctrines. He doe not believe in Biblical authority.

    Most people that believe in natural law do not have a complete written statement of what that means for them. Instead they pick and choose laws like visiting a salad bar. It is not clear to me that Zippy believes in absolute truth. If he does not, then that explains why it is difficult to debate his writings.

  86. Opus says:

    I have just had a look at the latest thread at Zippy’s – a first (and probably a last) for me – and I must say I am quite lost: to accuse the manosphere of cultural marxism is something I cannot get my head around – I thought cultural marxism was reducing everyone and everthing to the same level, thus men and women are identical, black and white, Heterosexual and Homosexual – surely Dalrock was doing just the opposite? He is not by any means the first to note that there is a female imperative and that men fall over backwards to excuse female behaviour. I recall seeing it in Herodotus (and what was that Trojan War?) and it continues from there. Surely everyone has come across instances of men white-knighting the most appalling behaviour by females – well I have. To describe Dalrock’s post as cultural-marxism is thus in my view incoherent – and presumably nothing other than an ad-hominem attack, but as they say: when you are getting flak you know you are closing in on the target.

    Perhaps I am missing something.

  87. Pingback: My comment to Zippy | Dalrock

  88. Opus says:

    … but it does occur to me that possibly Roman Catholics are more likely to pedestalise women given their especial devotion to The Virgin Mary – I seem to recall that the last Pontiff was especially devoted and not just to her – did he not attribute the miracle of his recovery from the assassin’s bullet to the intercession of a female saint (I forget which one)? Is this (as I indicated sometime early this morning up-above) what really lies behind this – that it does indeed come down to a Protesant/Catholic stand-off or at least difference of emphasis?

  89. grey_whiskers says:

    @Looking Glass on Dec.30, 2012 at 11:53 AM:
    In the case of Chaste women (this also applies to “Honest Man” actions), the “trick” is to prevent yourself from escalating temptation. It’s not to “avoid temptation”, it’s to avoid “increasing temptation”.
    True for both men and women, and not only in the context of seduction, but also in the context of preserving chastity within a relationship before marriage.
    There’s a reason “isolate and escalate works” — and a reason that staying in groups in public away from alcohol helps preserve virginity.
    One of the surest ways to get burned is to convince yourself “I’m strong enough to resist temptation, I know when to quit.”
    Set limits on both behaviour and activities/location *beforehand*, and stick to it.

  90. grey_whiskers says:

    @Gregariouswolf on Dec. 30, 2012 at 11:41 AM —

    Self-criticism is an important feature of Maoism. I kind of find it ironic someone accusing the Manosphere of complaining about cultural hegemony and the power of feminism would suggest we engage in it.

    That’s true in *two* senses — first the practices of the Red Guards, and secondly, the Marxist *theory* that classifies people first and foremost as members of a group or class, to be assigned the same rubber-stamp motivations, attitudes, and guilt or innocence as all other members of that group. Feminism takes on a whole new aspect as a mere Communist front / battering ram on Western Society when evaluated like that — not to mention the obvious dishonesty of the plaintive cries “NAWALT.”
    “Heads I win, tails you lose.”

  91. gregariouswolf says:

    Of course, accusing the Manosphere of “cultural Marxism” is an attack. Consider the negative connotations associated with the word Marxism, and the insinuation that Androsphere bloggers are making themselves immune to self-criticism (as if they need to be politically rehabilitated).

    Does this analogy really hold beyond discussions of power politics in the sexual market? What would be Men’s Rights/MGTOW/PUA community have to be advocating? Some kind of sexual communism? What are the means of production and what is to be publicly owned?

    I think it’s just a smear. You can discuss feminism, power politics, and the Battle of the Sexes without being culturally Marxist.

  92. greyghost says:

    “If you mean “be careful, because men may seduce or violate you”

    This IS the wrong thing to tell your daughter. It tells her she is not responsible for herself. You then tried to play grown up with the It would be crap if I added this “all illicit sexual activity is solely the man’s fault” You don’t need to add that you have already acknowledge that she was violated. So some guy with game fucks your girl she already knows if it doesn’t come out socially to her liking she was raped daddy said so. (don’t worry the church and evabody else thinks that too)
    The tingle is what is present and what is the finale decision maker for the independant women. The tingle is not a fixed thing. Mens idea on beauti is more fixed and universal over time with some differences on the margins for social reasons. The tingle is attached to social markers and herd approval and personal bio to each individual.
    Try to understand this.
    At one time society respected a “good” man that worked hard and was a stable provider type (beta) A good women understand that and married him. A woman that was “taken advantage of” by the PUA type following her tingles was a slut and is a slut and will be a slut tomorrow yours and my daughter included.
    Now think of all of the social customs and laws of misandry put in place including a father not telling his daughter the truth put in place to expand hypergamy and the tingle. All just so little pumpkin can feel romantic love with out consequence.
    I can see you give a damn. Really think about what the manosphere has to offer. When the time comes as an MRA I will speak has you have with the goal of punishing females for generations for feminism. One of the cruelest things a man as my self can say to a single mother “You should follow your heart and be happy. You and your daughters should not let society hold you down and keep you from being true to yourself. Experience life and find love and romance and happiness. Don’t limit yourself and you will know when you find it. Just be careful and know you are worth it.”
    Most jackasses today will think that is empowering. Infact anybody here should post that up on some worthless damaged cunt blog and get praise.

  93. Farm Boy says:

    Cultural Marxism tries to obfuscate reality, the Manosphere tries show reality as it truly is.

  94. gregariouswolf says:

    @grey_whiskers

    “Marxist *theory* that classifies people first and foremost as members of a group or class, to be assigned the same rubber-stamp motivations, attitudes, and guilt or innocence as all other members of that group.”

    Somewhere in that long thread this issue came up. I’d have to spend some time looking for the post in question, but I do recall someone saying Mansphere bloggers are classist against women (i.e. sexist) and paint all women as guilty.

  95. greyghost says:

    This Maxist stuff is the kind of thing a feminised man will use as an arguement. Zippy has a blog and a following this whole spat is a guy trying to keep his flock in tact along with his essence of being in the beliefs he holds. He is a man that has found a way to survive in the feminist world and the feminist world is under attack in was never before seen.

  96. gregariouswolf says:

    The more I think about it, Zippy may have stumbled on an important truth. In his attempt to paint the Manosphere as pseudo-intellectual may have demonstrated the opposite. It’s been a long time since I’ve read anything philosophical and I am far from an expert on Hegelian dialectics, but analyzing the Battle of the Sexes in this way is a good thing. Viewing it as power politics, two forces competing, where there is tension that leads to a resolution, and that resolution leads to a new conflict, is looking at the Battle of the Sexes through the lens of dialectics. It’s just a philosophical tool that dates back to Socrates. Emphasizing “cultural Marxism” really is just an ad hom. I’m assuming Zippy is anti-Socialist. I know nothing about his politics, but his use of Marxism in this context is clearly meant to be an insult. It distracts from the fact that people are looking critically at feminist power in society.

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  98. Farm Boy says:

    You make a good point about the excessive nuance clouding things.

    but his use of Marxism in this context is clearly meant to be an insult. It distracts from the fact that people are looking critically at feminist power in society.

    Obfuscation is the goal

  99. sunshinemary says:

    Farm Boy wrote:

    the Manosphere tries show reality as it truly is.

    Lulz. You mean like this?

  100. Farm Boy says:

    @SSM

    Yes, pretty much. Just substitute “civilization” for “bodily fluids”.

  101. 8oxer says:

    OK, Bonus points to sunshinemary for the hilarious Dr. Strangelove meme.

    Now, Gentlemen! You can’t fight in here! This is the war room!

  102. 8oxer says:

    Hi Gregarious Wolf:

    Emphasizing “cultural Marxism” really is just an ad hom. I’m assuming Zippy is anti-Socialist. I know nothing about his politics, but his use of Marxism in this context is clearly meant to be an insult. It distracts from the fact that people are looking critically at feminist power in society.

    I started a several-month long flame fest on another site simply by asking “what is ‘cultural Marxism'”. The term in itself is utterly meaningless, and without definition, which is why so many people like to bandy it about to smear their ideological opponents. At the end of that fracas, all the people who were upset (when I illustrated that they didn’t know what they were talking about) decided that I was a Marxist myself, simply for asking the question.

    Marxism in itself can mean almost anything. Stalin called himself a Marxist, as did Gregor Strasser (second in command of the Nazi Party in Germany) as did Marcuse and Leo Lowenthal (who worked for the OSS and Voice of America). Marx was a prolific writer and much of his later material contradicted the stuff he wrote in his youth (and he acknowledged this himself). In the end, it’s just a meaningless ad hom.

    I don’t want to attack Zippy, but I’d hope that if he were to criticise people, he’d do it in a more open fashion. Criticism is good. It illuminates weaknesses in our philosophical edifice and allows us to make more salient points in the future. Using weasel words like “cultural Marxism” is not criticism. It’s just sloppy sophistry.

    Best, Boxer

  103. grey_whiskers says:

    @greyghost on Dec. 30, 2012 at 12:52 PM —
    (Long quote broken into pieces for convenience):
    This IS the wrong thing to tell your daughter. It tells her she is not responsible for herself. You then tried to play grown up with the It would be crap if I added this “all illicit sexual activity is solely the man’s fault” You don’t need to add that you have already acknowledge that she was violated. So some guy with game fucks your girl she already knows if it doesn’t come out socially to her liking she was raped daddy said so. (don’t worry the church and evabody else thinks that too)

    You are correct — so correct, in fact, that you are wrong. (A little Chestertonian paradox, in the vein of Mr. Pond.)

    The manosphere complains that women are as little children: led by their emotions, short-sighted, and naive; and that they tend to hide behind these characteristics when in other ways they are solipsistic and self-seeking, and to assign blame to other people for things that the women *ought* to have resumed responsibility for.

    My advice to the daughter is, “Don’t trust your tingle, men may take advantage of you if you listen to the tingle *INSTEAD OF* keeping your eyes open. (This goes back to Looking Glass’s post at 11:53 AM) — there are men who will seek to dazzle you “in the moment” so they can have their release: be on your guard so you don’t end up in those types of circumstances in the first place.
    Note that this is *in advance* and not a hasty excuse after the fact — I have seen women been seduced or used, just as I have seen other women seducing and using men.

    The point is, if the girl *is* inexperienced, she needs to be warned that not every man who shows up intending to pump and dump is going to walk up and say, “Hi, I’m Sleaze Ball. I’d like to take you on a date and then trick or pressure you into oral sex or intercourse even though you’d rather not.”

    There is another level, say a boy and girl already dating (“going steady” in the parlance of yesteryear, “exclusive” for now) who end up getting carried away — I once gave a friend a humorous greeting card upon hearing of their pregnancy: the card had a cartoon watercolor of an expectant mother sitting on a park bench on the front, and a caption on the inside reading “See what kissing can lead to?”

    Still another level is a couple who have been close for awhile, mutually agreeing to take the next step of sexual intimacy. Morally wrong (as Christians agree), and the woman bears more responsibility.

    And if the girl herself intends to engage in illicit activity, then she will receive no moral support after the fact from me.

    One can make some analogy to assault and battery, and 3rd, 2nd, and 1st degree murder respectively, depending on how much intent, planning, and forethought went into the act.
    And that goes for *all* the participants (it takes two to tango). If women *are* sexually inexperienced, or if they have not run into hard game, they might not know they are being taken for a ride: and so I cannot fathom why you are claiming that warning a girl “not to be taken for a ride” is taken as morally absolving her, as it is the voice of experience telling her not to trust and follow the tingle blindly.

    Feminism declares “all womynz are precious snowflakes defiled by men” ; and I don’t agree with that. But on the other hand, reacting against that by assigning ALL culpability to a girl is wrong, too.

  104. the manosphere tends to produce an unreal cynicism in many of its participants

    I was cynical loooonnnng before I ever tripped across the manosphere. i’m sure I’m not the only one like that. If anything, I would say a fair number were cynical first, and the manosphere gave them a framework to understand the things that made them cynical in the first place.

    Not to say learning about these things cheered them up any…

  105. Art Deco says:

    The term in itself is utterly meaningless, and without definition,

    Characteristic of Marxism at its inception (though perhaps not of contemporary Marxist discourse) was the notion that culture is a function of social relations derived from ‘modes of production’. ‘Cultural Marxism’ is a nonsense term.

  106. Retrenched says:

    @ nightskyradio

    “i’m sure I’m not the only one like that. If anything, I would say a fair number were cynical first, and the manosphere gave them a framework to understand the things that made them cynical in the first place.”

    Yup.

    http://no-maam.blogspot.com/2010/07/zenpriest-10-when-mens-trust-is-gone.html

  107. infowarrior1 says:

    @opus

    john paul the ii attributed his salvation to the virgin mary. When he was shot he was reported to say maria oh maria. I think a search on the internet will substantiate this historical event

  108. Alshia says:

    Saying that a woman is a gift is like saying that a female bonobo is a gift to male bonobos; it’s a ridiculous claim.

    More on the point, if males didn’t exist, females wouldn’t be able to mate. Simply because there are more males on Earth does not make females a gift. The existence of the female sex is a necessity, not a gift.

  109. 8oxer says:

    Grey Whiskers:

    First of all, thanks for being so detailed in your responses. I’ve learned a lot. I have to quote your reply for context:

    This sounds like the “no true Scotsman” fallacy (or “phallacy”, in this case?) It is true that conventional “gamers” do not resort to this; but there are others, who wish for the promised, exaggerated success from game, who are not so scrupulous; there is also the possibility of a woman having a social network of less-chaste women (classmates in college, room-mates, some co-workers) who either drag down her reputation (“guilty by association”), or introduce her to a man whom she mistakenly trusts based on the recommendation of the room-mate; and finally, there are “high pressure” guys who resort to bullying to get sex. True story from an extended family member (cousin / in-law level) — the girl goes out on a first or second date with a guy and they go back to his place to chill for awhile. She goes to use the restroom, and when she comes out, he is in his underwear, and says point blank:
    “Either you do me or you walk home.”
    (This being in mid-winter in one the Upper Midwest.)
    She said “Fine” and grabbed her coat and marched out the door.
    Bully for her, but some women — particularly younger, more inexperienced ones — might try to placate the man by “just kissing” or somesuch, not realizing that the man has determined in advance that he will escalate until get gets to ejaculate.

    With respect, this is not game. Heartiste has no articles on “fuck me or walk home in the freezing cold” seduction, for example.

    Aside from the obvious criminal aspect of like scenarios (you mention ‘roofies’ among other things), those of us who have practiced seduction look upon this sort of thing as sophomoric. It has the air of the frat house, rather than the sophistication of an urbane and worldly playa. It’s bad manners and ineffective. Why? Because the goal is not to “ejaculate”, but to ideally meet someone with whom one can have a series of encounters.

    I don’t know if you realize this, but keeping up a wardrobe and going out to venues costs a lot of time, energy and money. The ideal is, for guys like me, a semi-monogamous short or medium term fling. For others it is a soft harem composed of two or three women (tried it, don’t have time to keep track of them all, but it’s the stated ideal at heartiste). Either way: One simply can not maximize his resources if he is alienating women right and left with sleazy demands, high-pressure tactics, sexual assault, and ultimata. Not only will these women complain to police when treated this way, but they complain to each other, and while women might be excited by the appearance of roguish charm, I am fairly certain that the character who pulled that stunt in the midwest did not get much quality female time after he made his demand. There is such a thing as going too far, and he went there.

    One thing game teaches its adherents is that desperation is unmanly. There are thousands of women who would have had sex with the man in your narrative above, the very same night that his date rejected him. If one woman declines his advances there is no reason to get upset or coercive. It serves no purpose, other than to prove the female’s judgement that he is unfit to spend time with.

    Best, Boxer

  110. Samson J. says:

    @Jordan Winters:

    So what you mean is, why oh why didn’t you take the Blue Pill?

    Pretty much. Of course, it’s easy for me to say, now that I’m happily married, that I wish I could “forget” how I got here.

  111. TMG says:

    My interpretation of the Manosphere = cultural marxism accusation, is that the accuser regards men unwilling to take on the selfless provider role as helping bring about societal destruction “just like the Feminist cultural marxists.”

    It’s a variation on the “Man Up” shaming tactic.

  112. It is curious to me this is a problem, is there really a large feminist contingent in the church? I thought it was the last bastion of ‘feminine’ women.

    Oh, is there ever. In the Catholic Church, feminists took over most of the women’s religious orders in the 60s and 70s, which means they taught it to the school kids (until they quit teaching to be anti-nuke protesters). They were also very involved in vocations, which means they controlled who got into the seminaries and who didn’t, which led to an effeminate priesthood and the homosexual abuse scandals. All our hymns got reworded to replace ‘men’ with ‘people’ and so on. The Church held firm on abortion, birth control, and the celibate male priesthood, but the modernists/feminists took over on everything else.

    It’s true that you’ll find more feminine women among Catholics, especially traditional ones. But that doesn’t mean they’re free of feminist thinking — that’s probably impossible for any woman living in this world. So they kind of pick and choose the parts of feminism that they reject, feel righteous about rejecting those (as they should), but never question the others. They might be very pro-marriage, for instance, and think mothers should stay home with their children, yet push their daughters to delay marriage long enough to get a degree. Or they’ll talk about how women need men to lead them and be in charge of things, but then they’ll start a bible study group that just happens to be all women and wonder why it devolves into petty conflict. Or you get the kind of logic twisting that we’ve discussed recently where a woman says the best way to submit to a man is to give him a list of chores he can do to prove his love.

    One problem with the red pill image is that it implies there’s a single red pill — you swallow it, and you’re free; you can see everything now. But it’s not that way at all. It’s more like there’s a whole handful of red pills, and they keep getting bigger and harder to swallow as you go along. It’s one thing to accept that women aren’t perfect princesses and that game works on the kind of women you’ll meet in bars and at online dating sites. It’s quite another thing to look around your church at a bunch of women who really do seem to have it together — they dress and act feminine, they submit to their husbands, they raise their children right, they show a strong and humbling devotion to their faith — and realize that yes, even these wonderful women are part of Team Woman to some extent. They may be right on almost everything, but make a suggestion that’s a little too red pill for them — women shouldn’t be allowed to vote, maybe — and you’ll see them draw up that battle line as fast as any Womyn’s Studies grads. You can’t ever assume that they’re completely on the same side as you.

    That’s a harder pill to swallow than the one that just says, “Woman aren’t as sweet and innocent as you thought.” Interestingly, the ‘Christian game’ blogs may be becoming more offensive to conventional thinking than the Roissy-type blogs, because the latter mostly focus on biology as the driving force, which people can shrug off because biology isn’t the whole story. But on blogs like this one, we’re talking about the biology plus sin, tradition, culture, God’s plan for us, and so on. We’re going a lot deeper, so the truths we’re rediscovering are even more fundamental.

  113. Anonymous Reader says:

    Cail, I have a field report, courtesy of a friend in another state.
    His church has screens and projectors, as all the Cool Churches do now. So last week, one song was “Good Christian Men Rejoice”. Except there was a single word substituted, thus:
    “Good Christian Folk Rejoice”. He sang the original lyric anyway. But what amazed him was all the men he could hear were singing the PC lyric off of the screen. Perhaps that’s why those screens are so popular in the Cool Churches?

    It may not be a coincidence that the Audio Visual team of the week was all women…

  114. Anonymous age 70 says:

    Zippy’s problem is he confuses his intellectual black hole with intellectual genius.

  115. grey_whiskers says:

    @8oxer on December 30, 2012 at 9:11 pm:

    (long, courteous discussion and explanation of the performance of Game deleted).
    I seem to suck at communicating. You are exactly right, none of the things I described, and which you quoted, were Game at all.

    But they *are* things which an inexperienced (virginal) daughter, or sister, needs to guard against; even though a chaste woman who intends chastity may be strongly resistant to Game — and yes, I know, there are brazen hussies, floozies, temptresses, vixens, hypcritical Carousel riders who go to church and *act* pure, whores, sluts, sorority girls, and the like, and only a sexual n00b would ever believe the “all women are pure” — still, *all* women are born factory-sealed, and as even a number of manosphere commenters reluctantly admit, if they had a chance at an LTR intending marriage and/or children (i.e. in the absence of current divorce law), they would want it to be with a low-partner-count mate.

    Happy New Year, btw.

  116. Anonymous Reader says:

    I’m not 8oxer but I can point a few things out. Consider the technique of “isolate and escalate”, where a PUA gets a woman away from her Grils Nite Out pals and skips to a different bar. Now he’s free to escalate with verbal and kino techniques without the risk of interruption. So let’s think about what your hypothetical 15 year old daughter should not do – she should not go on “dates” where she and some 17 year old are alone in a motor vehicle for a long time. She’s automatically isolated, and if he’s read any Game he may be able to escalate faster than she realizes or expects. And she obviously shouldn’t be out with any man who is over 18. Group activities, where a mixed group of young men and young women go to the bowling alley or some such would be safer for her.

    The same is true for college students. There is still a stigma attached to female virginity in many if not most college dorms. “Just get it over with” is the advice that your hypothetical 18 year old daughter will receive from her roomies. Note that advice from the female herd is not the fault of men, nor is it part of Game, yet it is a factor in careless or bad behavior by women. How do you choose your hypothetical college daughter’s friends for her? That’s more of a challenge.

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