Savage Love Oct 20, 2020 at 3:48 pm

Don’t Give Up

JOE NEWTON

Comments

103

username @97: "you surrounded me like a group of hyenas going in for the kill". Actually, nobody has paid you that much attention. Projecting, much?

"BYEEEEEE". This is not an airport. No need to announce your departure.

104

@61. venn. I think I'm a red dog Democrat in the current situation ... because the alternative is Trump and a Trump-led Republican Party. If we had a different political climate, well, then, I'd be voting for the socialist against the centrist responsible Republican. I had the chance to vote in the Weld-Kerry 1996 race in Massachusetts, but passed it up to vote, in a race where the outcome was not in doubt, in my home state, to which I was returning. Cowardly, maybe. I would still have voted for Kerry.

105

Harriet @104: I had to Google 'red dog Democrat', and the result reminded me that Americans have their political colours reversed. By global convention, blue is the colour of the right, and red is the colour of the left. It's very confusing to look at the US electoral map with it being all topsy-turvy.

106

Based on the fact I hold a different opinion to assumptions were made I must be hetero, married, privileged, gaslighting (abusive), a troll, and finally, a Trump supporter.
Then about 30 references as to what ‘being a Trump supporter’ means = Satanic by the time you get to raping women, murder, and locking children in cages!
By disagreeing, I suffer from ‘intellectual dishonesty to the point of denial’. (As if I’m intellectually challenged to the point I can’t cope with the truth).
When other commenter’s explicitly refer to something I said, they use contemptuous turn of phrase like ‘Do you really think’, and ‘don't be ridiculous’.
My view that as a voter, political stance is an opinion formed on facts is derided, I’m “pretending” (naive, childish, simple).
The meaning of what I said, Agree to Disagree, was altered when , and love each other, was added
(- to murmurs of ‘oh, I agree’).
Explicitly calling ‘ some of Dans fans’ , which I earlier admitted to being, as ‘garbage’...
“But never mind me. It's just a political opinion, a different point of view”. (Sarcasm at a point I made, but not discussing the point directly with me).
And you specifically BiDanFan, try to wrap it all up
-hopefully shows the doubters, -We would like to think that we can influence people out of their way of thinking, but sadly, -"otherwise normal+" -have "caused division." Eyeroll emoji.
underhanded to say the least.

107

@67. John Horstman. The British aristocracy? Most of them are poor. They can't afford the upkeep of their country houses. They become wallpaper entrepreneurs; they turn their grounds into wildlife parks. Only a few of them have big property portfolios. Rich Americans, so much more heavily than rich British, have personal servants and households.

You say that right-wing people have right-wing 'values and psychological frameworks'. Partly, yes--but something like a disposition towards the familiar (and not the novel), or for rules (and not creative anarchy), does not make you a bad person. It can translate into selfishness and bigotry, sure. But 'putting myself and my family first' is surely the recourse in almost all circumstances of the poor.

@85. CMD. Well said!

It's not necessarily true that every legacy Republican voter subscribes to Trump's "bigotry, stupidity, vindictiveness, corruption, misogyny, anti-Semitism, sexual abuse, Islamophobia, homophobia, racism, deceitfulness, a contempt for truth, honesty, law, or sense of duty, and willful ignorance". They aren't aware of some of it, and are prepared to tolerate what they know of the rest. OFH should fill her lover in on some of the worst instances to see whether he's still prepared to hold his nose. (And why?).

And his reaction will tell her something about he sees their relationship. 'Your trying to tell me how to vote is an intrusion on my autonomy, and not something I'm prepared to accept from a Saturday fuck'. (Or some such words). Well, that would be good for her to know, if he feels that way.

@82. Sadass. I am very pleased to hear you are trying with all these constructive things. Hang in there!

@89. Chase. Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion, based on the Civil Rights Act, protecting homosexuals from being fired at work--Gorsuch, Trump's first and more conservative appointee. I note this to point out that your left-right schema will not be that of many other people elsewhere on the political spectrum.

108

@105. Fubar. Like a 'red dog' in Texas--'I'd vote for a red dog if it were the e.g. Democratic candidate'. I thought you could equally be a red dog Democrat or a red dog Republican. Trump, of course, is the original red dog on that understanding of the phrase.

(I could well have misunderstood the phrase; I grew up in my earliest years in France, went to a middle school in Cal., and English boarding public school).

@106. username. About four people have said 'ditch any Trump supporter', and one of these has said (along the lines of), 'try to explain why politics is so important to you'. More than four suggested that OFH shouldn't let politics come between them, provided he's able to be sensitive, in some way, to her values. No one had come out strongly in support of ditching before you came along. It's as if you're trying to paint the commentariat as being of one mind (being subject to groupthink) when we are, in fact, collectively able to sustain a discussion.

109

@101 'You're not seeing when people are agreeing with you.'

I haven't had the time to give credit to opinions I agree with.
As you can see, the personal stuff just keeps coming.. "Another eyeroll emoji", "Projecting, much?"

But I have read your comments and found them to be thoughtful, incorporating a wider field of view.
I would also include @57 ..country would benefit..from you staying .. We need more cross-pollination between the two media bubbles, and more separation between the political and the personal. and @85 It’s possible the wonderful, smart man wasn’t fully aware of what many of the actions and rhetoric may mean for others, and he definitely needs to hear them. FOH should reassess their relationship after that conversation and take action accordingly, but to tell her to dump him on the spot is not the right advice.* (that's my point, particularly taking into account OPs account of the events, man, and relationship)

Other comments like, talk first but it will be pointless, or to change an opinion would require a MIRACLE etc. that's not my point of view.

And my wider viewpoint as to the repercussions of Dans instant dumping philosophy, I find in your own comment above ""And are these people going to go away when Biden wins?""
That's why you don't cut people off, that's why you don't end dialogue. There's always more to come. You must agree to disagree and move forwards. Not trash people like there's no tomorrow, no consequences.

But - "not one single person said (what I would take to be Dan Savage's view), 'peremptorily dump any 2016 Trump voter'.".
Dans words "Yes you do, OFH, and you tell him why: elections have consequences. Better a trusty vibrator than an unworthy Trump voter."
My opinion "You shouldn't cut people out of your life because they hold a different opinion to you (*she said "smart and funny" and "not crazy" *).
As a voter, your job is to interpret facts, form an opinion, and vote. Two people with different opinions can still form relationships to varying degrees. Cutting each other off is harmful to society".

(What I thought was obvious when I said "If the love is true, the truth will win (I hope),", was that if all the negative things attributed to Trump are true, and this guy is all the things she says he is, he would come around.
But even if their relationship is more casual, if they just banter but what she's saying is true, he'll know it. You should be able to have casual relationships with people with different opinions.)

Sorry, I'm being accused of not listening but I'm the one that has to correct people misquoting me and repeating what I've already said to counter arguments attributed to me that I didn't make?

110

@108
ok Harriet, if this is not getting personal, why are you saying "No one had come out strongly in support of ditching before you came along"
when you can see Dans word for word answer to "Do I end it?!?" quoted above me?
And his advice is blatantly "strongly in support of ditching",...before I came along...

You go on "It's as if you're trying to paint the commentariat as being of one mind (being subject to groupthink) when we are, in fact, collectively able to sustain a discussion."
I'm not painting anyone.

But in that statement you just accused me of something which is wholly untrue.
And can be proven in the lag between typing, because before you finished typing it I had already explained above, that I agree with some (even yourself in places), but that I haven't had the time to acknowledge that, because, as you have just proven, you want to engage with me in a personal way rather than the viewpoint I hold, which I came here to discuss.

111

slightly confusing point, which you may no doubt want to nit pick,
but by the time I had finished typing my post at 09:14 to your earlier point,
I posted and it refreshed to see you saying "I accuse you all.." speech at 08:37.

look, just calm down people. if you want to talk, fine. Stop with all this "I tar you all with the same brush!!" accusations, and whatever else you've got up your sleeves.

If you don't want to talk about the point I made, way back when, @16, fine, ssshhhh

112

I would just like to point out that "he voted for Trump," past tense, could indeed refer to the current election. Many have already cast their ballots by post or even by e-mail. Dan could have made this interpretation -- or he may have access to information we don't that reveals she means the 2020 election -- when he wrote his response.

Harriet @100: "The white suburbanites who don't want Black demonstrations in their neighborhood care more about their own families, their children's wellbeing, their livelihoods, even their peace of mind, than they do about Black folk's just being alive. Sure."

Thank you. That's what I meant.

"But is this necessarily racist? Doesn't everyone care about what is close to them, and less about what's further away?"

Did I say it was racist? No. It's, as you yourself described, self-centred, self-serving, and shows an appalling lack of empathy. Prioritising one's own (perceived) safety over the lives of other human beings. Don't you think this is a character defect that would merit dumping someone over? I do, and it seems OFH does as well. What factor should be given more weight in determining compatibility than sharing a world view? If Mr OFH supports Trump, he's revealed that his world view is incompatible with OFH's. I can't understand why anyone would argue against such a fundamental incompatibility deeming this relationship untenable.

Fubar @102, @103, I grow to admire you more with every passing week. :)

User @106, none of those are personal attacks. I think we both know what a personal attack looks like, and what you are quoting is criticism of your position, not attacks on you personally. You really find "hetero" and "married" insults? I see far, far worse on the internet every day before I even finish my coffee. Even a roll of the eyes is not an attack. If it is, surely likening people to a pack of hyenas is no less a "personal attack"? You came into this comments section knowing, even telling us in advance, that you knew your viewpoint was unlikely to be well received. You can't claim personal injury when you turn out to be right.

113

I have a new puppy, and when she feels she's not the centre of attention, she goes online and posts things like @106, 109, 110, 111. The trainer says to ignore her, rather than rewarding the attention-seeking behaviour.

114

LW3, being old/ er and therefore the lover option cupboard is almost bare, is no excuse for touching a fascist. If you lie down with dogs you get up with fleas.

115

@113

Google “ libertarian bears new hampshire” when you get a chance.

To summarize, a group of libertarians took over a small town in New Hampshire and afterwards the town went to hell and was invaded by bears. Look it up. I can’t make this stuff up.

I don’t think I will ever be able to take libertarians seriously now.

116

@ 112 "You really find "hetero" and "married" insults?"
I said - assumptions were made.
That particular assumption was in reference to my the assumed position of privilege.
Which is personal.

I've written it all above. Continue nit picking if you must

The reference to a pack of hyenas, you can take as an insult if you wish.
But I am able to reinforce that statement with the examples given above.

Another twist of words - I'm not "claiming personal injury."
I said I don't know why I expected more...

I came here to discuss a point of view, and some of you want to play little games with words and make it personal.

Once more...
If you wish to discuss my point of view @16 and why you think it's wrong without making it about me, my character, whatever, then fine. I look forward to it.
Well no, that's a lie. I can't be bothered giving you any more of my time.
And that was the whole point wasn't it.
To squash the discussion we could have had.
Well done

117

@113 I enjoy you trying to belittle me Fubar, for it does not reflect on my character, but it does expose yours

118

So the first two letters are about the very real struggles with being isolated. Then we finish with advice to severe a connection over politics. A little self awareness maybe. One of the biggest tells of being in a cult is being pressured to cut off communication to those who think differently. Wouldn’t it be so much better to use our disagreements to learn different perspectives

119

@111

Quick point, it isn’t disagreement that isn’t tolerated. I disagree with people here all the time.

LavaGirl and I disagree because I’m roughly 6000x more bitter and cynical than she is.

BiDanFan and I don’t see eye to eye because I think polyamory is a dumb idea for the vast majority of people and it’s fine.

But Trump is very different as several people have discussed at great length. The one thing I would add is this. The vast, vast majority of Trump supporters will only talk to waste people’s energy as they are extremely hardened in their views.

120

It’s a mugs’ game, username, hanging in here, sometimes. I haven’t followed the discussion, SADASS took up my head. Where does one draw the line saying no to inhumanity and anyone who supports it? None of us care if she keeps fucking him or not, and I see her point. A willing and working cock is harder to find the older one gets. One must still have standards.
Really. She needs to ask? Kick that trump voting person to the kerb.

121

@118

Which “different perspective” should we discuss? How Covid isn’t a big deal and over 200,000 Americans just vanished? Or maybe how Q is a great prophet and Trump will put the sex offending cannibals in jail any day now? Perhaps we should chat about the 20 Republicans who would rather watch the country burn than spend another dime?

Btw, no whataboutisms please.

122

I don’t know, is this guy Catholic, LW3? Does he regret his decision? Will he be voting Biden in X days time? He could do confession and be forgiven.
You could dump him LW3, and tell him why, and see if he shifts see if he does vote Biden, see if he has the goods for you to spend time with him. Let him go think about his choices. Yes it’s a sacrifice, for you, nothing to that of children at the border, many of whom they can’t find the parents of.
I can do bitter GhostDog, raises the blood pressure so I try to skip it. Sounds like you need a hug? Hugs to you.

123

BiDanFan @112: Thanks! I'm flattered (Blush!)

GhostDog @121: The only "different perspective" one could discuss is whether to not the deaths are a bad thing. Turmp has openly rejoiced the deaths in Democratic states, and we have people insisting it's just politics. Were we to accept that, they'd have won and we'd have lost a chunk of our humanity. Just my opinion, of course.

124

GhostDog @115: Oh my gerd! Honestly, it's too bad the Grafton project imploded. It would be great to have a place where libertarians can go and fight amongst themselves, leaving everyone else to get on with it.

125

During the last US Presidential Election, a lovely woman from Middle America asked to be my friend. We bonded over Hillary, though I don’t know if she was/ is a true Democrat. She hates Trump though, big time. Love having a window into her life. Masses of fb friends from around her etc, and many of them are trump supporters. They have this constant battle going on between them, and yet she never unfriends them, on they go.

126

@69 transfixed: WA-HOOOOOOO!!!! Congraulations on scoring this week's Lucky @69 Award! Savor the luscious honors and bask in the glory. :)

@92 BiDanFan: I know, right? The sooner DJT is finally removed from the White Trash House, the better.

@100 Harriet_by_the_Bulrushes: WA-HOOOOOOO!!!!!! Congratulations on scoring this week's Big Hunsky Award honors! Savor your much envied riches found only here in Savage Love Land.:)

127

I don't really comment here and I don't know if you're still reading, SADASS, but I work for an organization that specifically helps individuals with mental health concerns/disabilities who are out of work. I have worked with the same group in Washington state if you are there and if you aren't I know that they exist in 23 states in the US and could help you find connections. Vocational Rehabilitation can work with both physical and psychiatric conditions and help with job placement and accommodations needed and that is a federal program that is in all 50 states. I'm not sure if there's a way that I can get information to Dan or if it would be helpful/appropriate to drop it in a comment later.

I'm so sorry you're going through this and I can't even begin to touch on the loneliness aspect. As someone who has stayed in abusive relationships just because that felt less painful than being alone I can empathize to a point and I hope that you're able to find some measure of peace either with the non-relationship aspects of your life or finding the love that you desire. I can, however, speak a little bit to the employment aspect so that's what I addressed above. If it would be helpful I can respond again later with more details or find a way to get information to you.

128

Thanks for your kind words, Trella (@127). I am, however, in Canada. British Columbia, to be more specific.

I believe someone also asked above if I have a pet. I'm living in a rented room at the moment and have been moving house (on average) about every six months. So as it is, I don't think a pet is in the cards.

Pan Sapien (@93) --> Oh, man. I really hear you. The struggle is real. (((hugs)))

I wanted to thank you all for helping me to consider new things over the past few days. Your words have been invaluable. Whenever I need to move my thoughts along, I'll come back here and re-read what you all have said to me. Thanks again! :-)

129

As with Dan Savage, I draw hard lines on both sex with Trump voters and with shit-play. A definite "NO."

I mean -- both activities are practically the same thing.

130

M?? Harriet - I've heard "yellow dog" with regard to that for which one would vote if it were from the right party. I've also heard "blue dog" in a different context, usually to indicate a person whose economics and perhaps foreign policy tend to the D over the R but who could pass for Republican on social issues.

I'm surprised you use Weld-Kerry (who, after all, voted against DOMA) as the example. The far more pertinent one would be the Weld-Silber election for governor in 1990, Mr Silber possibly meeting my high standard for the title of homophobe. Or there was the Weicker-Lieberman Senate election in 1988, in which both candidates won a majority of voters from the other party.

I can think of at least two Republicans would would be clearly a better choice than Mr B, one by a substantial margin and one by slightly more than the margin by which Mr B is marginally less terrible than Mr T. Now, I can allow for nuance. I can forgive anyone who frames it as, "I am voting for the major party candidate who is not Mr T," but being an actual supporter of Mr B I would find a serious problem.

You may be able to help me with something about the socialists these days. I find it particularly tiresome the way the ones who strenuously don't want to be considered class reductionists will insist on pretending that their precious working class isn't strongly anti-gay in what comes across as quite a smirking manner that seems designed to convince the G that we are Charlie Brown and Lucy is finally going to let us kick the football. I did recently encounter one member of the team who made a great effort to convince me the working class is the most pro-gay of all, but he was doing such things as moving almost all Mr T's evangelical supporters into the middle class while keeping their less anti-gay economic peers in the WC column.

131

SADASS

1) PSA - "you have to love yourself before someone else can love you" is unconscionably cruel, would those who out of ignorance spout that nonsense please at least come up with something else soul destroying to tell the chronically depressed? It's a bit played out. Also demonstratably obviously false.

2) I'm going to assume you know that being single even if hopelessly so is obviously not a reason to be suicidal because you've been in enough high quality therapy to know that. Also going to assume you've exhausted all med and non med options - minimum 2 years preferably 5 testing meds w/ an at least competent med shrink, screened for and either done or rejected for trans cranial magnetic and/or electroshock (80% efficacy vs. best for a single antidepressant 7% response rate, electroshock is the third treatment recommended after failing on two antidepressants but as I'm sure you've encountered, most drs will put you on years of meds first because it does typically take years to figure out a decent combo and who isn't scared of voltage. Transcranial far milder but not ok'd for more severe diagnosis in some cases, always get fMRI first - basically it's epilepsy in the mood center of the brain and this is the reset button). I'm also going to assume you've tried the usual bevy of antipsychotics and extraneous meds (sleep, anxiety, muscle relaxants, off label randomness, thyroid) and have been screened for personality disorders and stuff like autism, trained in CBT and/or DBT and had what you would consider highly competent psychiatric care over a lengthy period of time (if trauma, years, if just biological depression - i.e. genetic/heritable/brain damage then a year or so as an adult for the pre-mentioned training). So I'm not going to question your dedication to eliminating that as a factor and assume like the unlucky of us your chronic depression is treatment resistant, you are unwilling to undergo experimental brain surgery at this time for the very legitimate reason that it is experimental and having an electrode the size of a pencil in your head does not appeal, med trials do not exist near you and/or you are so thoroughly unresponsive to meds it's not worth your time according to a med doc, training type trials don't exist near you and/or you can't get to them, and so you are stuck with it.

3) I am also going to assume that you've done all the work you are able to do given your illness to build a life with good friendships, hobbies, are managing your self care, etc. and if you aren't able to do that at any time you return to treatment until you are built up enough to do so. I am assuming relationship building and maintenance aren't the problem here, because if they are you work on that on an easier difficulty level than "dream relationship or nothing" first.

This is where the Epic of Gilgamesh comes in handy as a life lesson - you only really need one friend, if they're a good 'un.

3) No one is giving you credit for making the decision every day up to this point to stay alive which we all know is a hell of a lot of work and effort under the circumstances you are facing with this illness and you should get credit for that too. Good job. It's way more of an accomplishment than most things the regular people do and requires far more effort and strength of will.

4) Given all that, the fact that you have had any relationships that tick off any boxes at all is honestly impressive and I think you aren't giving yourself credit for that either. You are a bit of a tall order, true. There is nothing at all wrong with you. Using the words "broken toy" to describe yourself is your depression talking, brush up on your CBT training or get Allison to do it for you, she's apparently got chops.

5) Dating men in any fashion decreases your mental health. Statistically. Scientifically. Shortens your lifespan. Increases physical and mental illness. Not just cause more likely to be murdered. So. It's not just you. Also not going to solve things.

6) If you were mentally well being forever alone would not make you suicidal. You are focused on the wrong problem. Add to that it's dangerous to pin one's mental health on another person, as you (and we all, truly) have learned the hard way. Let's say the depression is chronic, severe, intractable, untreatable (at the moment. There are people working on new non-med treatments (various kinds of zapping, hopefully less terrifying), new med treatments, old med treatments (ketamine, LSD, ecstasy), and general understanding of the brain is proceeding by leaps and bounds). What to do? You gotta find some kind of balance in your life where lack of a partner isn't life threatening. This is hard. It will take time. Likely you've achieved it in the past though and if you haven't, just know it's possible. It's better than where you are at right now. It's not necessarily fun if you are too sick to do anything else but it is not agonizing, it does not hurt, it is not hard, you can do it. You can get there. I can't promise you the unicorn you are looking for (although he does likely exist and probably feels just like you do - I agree w/ previous posters saying look for the asexual romance first, the dom thing is nichier but it sounds a hell of a lot easier to have a partner flex into that than flex into asexuality, ymmv) but I can promise you you can do that. You can live without it hurting all the time. You can. It is possible to be severely depressed and be ok. Yes, severely depressed. But not agonized. Not distressed in the way you are right now. Channel your inner Russian. Lean into the existential despair. It can be charming.

Pinning your sanity and continued existence on earth on finding the unicorn is not helping you. Yes, hunt the unicorn. By all means. We all need hobbies. But at least Don Quixote it, ok? The guy had a good idea going. Take what you've got and make it what you need, even if you have to pretend a bit. Find the joy in constant doomed failure. That's doable. That's worthwhile. Patchwork that shit.

132

@130 Mr Venn - On the topic of the working class being anti-gay, I'll offer a couple of opinions - firstly, I will note the the approx. 10% of the proletariat who are also members of the QuILTBAG community probably aren't particularly anti-gay - it's worth remembering that, because of the way class privilege co-opts race, gender and sexuality based hierarchies, the working class is substantially more diverse than the bourgeoisie. It's also worth remembering that, despite the media's conflating of the working class with white, male workers in industrial manufacturing, the working class also includes service jobs, the iProletriat (low paid data entry and call centre jobs, for example) and a lot of female-dominated caring jobs as well. A broader, more Marxist view of the working class would probably reveal less anti-gay animus than would be found using the narrower view that is too often considered the 'working class' in contemporary discourse.

The second point I will make is that anti-gay sentiment in the working class is often the result of what Marx would call 'false-consciousness'. It is in the interest of the bourgeoisie to keep the working class divided amongst itself, so that it can be persuaded to vote against its own interests - if social struggle is recast in terms of gay vs straight, men vs women, Black vs white, voters can persuaded to vote for parties that promise to advance their perceived interests in those areas while ignoring the fact that both parties consistently advance the interests of the 1% against the 99%. The culture wars, in short, are used to distract from the ongoing class war.

133

@132: Bravo, Pan Sapien, for a really cogent analysis.

@fubar and BiDanFan all throughout this thread: I am in love with both of you. You've both been so fabulous, consistently, that I can't even single out any particular comment. I'm grateful for you.

@Mr. Ven @79: Well, yes, I'm pretty sure that there's not a candidate or elected official out there who doesn't privately have at least 2 of the items on my laundry list. But I doubt that many people have all of them, and no one else has ever been so unapologetic about Trumpeting them--and thereby endorsing acting on those attitudes.

The Love of My Life (as an homage to you and your PLB, henceforth to be referred to as TLOML) once said that I differed so much in degree from all other women as to be able to count as a difference in kind, and similarly, Trump is so many orders of magnitude more hateful and horrible than all other odious humans, let alone politicians (which, strictly speaking, he is not), that it constitutes a difference in kind, not merely in degree.

@LavaGirl: I like the way you blend and balance sympathy/empathy with practical advice and words of encouragement.

134

@101. The components of the Republican coalition you mention aren’t necessarily all terrible people. Only the ones who support T this year, disregarding the supposedly deeply held values of theirs that you mention to vote for a deficit-spending, irreligious, pro-abortion autocrat. And I didn’t say the uninformed Trump voters were terrible people. Just stupid. They at least are reachable.

@ 130. Thank you for getting the colors of the dogs correct. I am being serious.

135

@121: GhostDog: (kisses two fingers and holds them aloft) muah!
Nicely done.

136

Thank you nocute. Though, no @ 131, thinks some of my words cruel. It’s always in the motivation, no, and my motivation was to assist SADASS.
Not sure I agree with your take, anyway, no. Depression is not some other land, we all know some of it’s shadow. And yes, loving/ liking/ accepting/ forgiving one self does come first, so one is prepared in a healthy way, for any authentic relationship. Otherwise, one can attract damaged others, who learn where to hook in and manipulate.
A healthy self love picks up those attempts quickly and blocks them.

137

I assume none of us here are trained in suicide prevention, no, and SADASS seemed happy with our efforts.
Big question for Dan to put up, and an important topic. Far too many men think of this as the only way forward, and more support is needed, especially now, given the fucking horrors which abound. I choose to hide out and pretend it’s all one big illusion. The news I handle for like five minutes. Some sweet smoko helps dull the mind. Still, life is life. Politics and ugly human behaviour has gone on forever.

138

LW3, This man not only voted Trump, he would have voted Bush as well. A Republican voter says yes to a multiple of horrors. Maybe you could pay him for the sex? A sex worker’s politics is never a client’s concern.

139

@107: I wasn't talking about Gorsuch (who has variously sided with the conservative or liberal wings). I was talking about Barrett, and with Alito and Thomas recently coming out in favor of reconsidering Obergefell, you may end up regretting your defense of those poor misunderstood Republican voters. At this point voting for Trump isn't excusable as a once-a-four-year habit. That's the "Good German" excuse and it's bullshit.

@118: Supporting a candidate who is a racist sociopath, is responsible for the deaths of over 200,000 Americans, and has sexually assaulted more than two dozen women isn't "thinking differently", it's an act of aggression and no one has any obligation to play nice with someone who is a threat to their life and well-being, you fucking bootlicker. Voting against Trump and shunning Trump supporters isn't being mean, it's self-defense.

140

Regarding the third letter: Early voting and mail-in voting is underway all over the country. She didn't find out that her fuck buddy voted for Trump in 2016, but that he voted for Trump in 2020. And a big thank you to everyone in this thread who reached out to SADASS. A lot of terrific advice here from SL readers that I hope SADASS will take to heart.

141

I don't have a lot of experience being a gay asexual submissive, SADASS, but I do have a lot of experience being depressed. My short story is that after spending a few miserable years in bed and trying 6 conventional antidepressants I got into a drug trial for ketamine and was cured in two weeks. Obviously, I'd encourage you to look into drug trials.

No @131 suggests electroshock, and that's something to seriously consider, though I've known people who have suffered memory damage from it. Lavagirl suggests inpatient treatment, and I'd recommend extensively researching different facilities before you commit yourself to one. In Australia at least, there are huge differences between places.

Previous to ketamine I've tried CBT, DBT, ACT, meditation, journalling, and so many goddamn supplements. I've done that workbook about the mindful way through depression too. They were all pretty frustratingly unhelpful at the time, but once I found an antidepressant that worked it was easier to recall the lessons and take them to heart. Even if you don't believe them at first, I think it's helpful to build up an internal repository of positive messages. What I've personally found quite helpful is compassion therapy, pets, good sleep, a belief that things can be different, a long list of incredibly pragmatic life tips for depressed people I found on Reddit, and an intense fear of dying. What I've found unhelpful is spending time in depression forums, or around other depressed people really, and feeling bad about feeling bad. Going back to uni is a pretty good idea to get access to resources (do universities in Canada offer free therapy and food?), and big projects can bring a sense of progression and meaning to life, but PhDs can also be hell and make existing mental health difficulties worse, so choose your supervisors well. I don't know about welfare in Canada, but you might qualify for a disability pension, which might make life a bit easier.

But you know all this already, and maybe I'm being patronising. Depression is so hard. It's like being tortured, really, by someone ruthless who knows all your weaknesses. I hope you climb out of that well soon, and I hope your guy is waiting for you at the top.

142

This is a nice article too, about why it's important for you personally to stay alive: https://www.currentaffairs.org/2020/09/why-you-matter

143

Fubar @113, good idea. BYEEEEE indeed.

Ghost @119, we actually don't disagree. I don't think polyamory is a good idea for everyone. We probably do disagree about percentages, but polyamory (which I'm using as a broad term meaning multiple ongoing relationships that could take any form) is appropriate for some people and not others. In the case of SADASS, he is finding it impossible to find one person who can meet a varied checklist of needs. Would you not agree that he may be in the minority of people who, potentially, could solve that problem by having more than one partner? Of course the answer may be no, but this is a suggestion, which of course any LW, with the vast amount of information about themself that their letter didn't and couldn't include, is free to consider or reject as they please.

Griz @126: White Trash House! I love it. He certainly has tarnished the office of the president, potentially beyond repair.

SADASS @128: You're welcome! Glad we've been able to give you a boost. Please do come back and check in if you start to feel low in future. We'll remember you and be happy to give you pep talks if needed -- and we'd also love to hear about any progress you make. No lie, I'm tearing up as I write this. There is always hope that tomorrow will be better. (That's what's keeping us all going in this pandemic, and it applies to your particular situation too.)

Ms No @131: "3) No one is giving you credit for making the decision every day up to this point to stay alive which we all know is a hell of a lot of work and effort under the circumstances you are facing with this illness and you should get credit for that too." I will join you. SADASS, kudos to you for having the strength to resist what seems in the moment like an easy solution to your problems, and pushing through to another day.

Thank you, NoCute @133! Heart emoji.

Chase @139: "you fucking bootlicker"
See, Username? THAT'S a personal attack.

Dan @140, thanks for the clarification. Might be worth editing the letter? She said she just found out he voted for Trump, so she must have done so via the medium of a conversation since votes are secret. So either she found out he voted for Trump this time round, or that he voted for Trump last time and did not express any of the remorse that would have been necessary to forgive that retrospective mistake. Either would reveal a moral bankruptcy that would make dumping the only ethical step forward.

144

I like it when Chase rocks up, there’s always fireworks, then he goes again.

145

Thanks Dan. I hope SADASS did find some warmth and help on his journey, and with Fan, I ask you SADASS to check in with Dan/ us on the thread, and share how you are doing. You’ve touched hearts here.

146

ctmcmull @129: I'm not a fan of scat play myself, but I do have to point out that, unlike a vote for Trump, it doesn't do widespread, consequential damage.

BiDanFan @143: "BYEEEEE indeed." It's a wonderful thing to be able to mute interlopers!

https://github.com/ahoyfubar/SlogBlocker

147

Pan Sapien, sorry you’re going thru struggles too, I’d wondered where you’d got to, fellow Aussie.

148

DS @ 140
Thanks for the clarification, though this information should have been made clear in the letter to begin with.
Either way LW decides to proceed she should tell him what voting for trump means for her.

149

Mr Pan - Most of the other letters are anti-G, and, from their own perspectives, rightly so. I don't grudge it them at all; part of why I advocate for an amicable divorce is to make it easier for us to oppose each other when appropriate instead of pretending all our interests are the same.

I'll agree there are ways to shuffle people around to change raw numbers, but the proportions stay relative similar. Besides, "X numbers are less bad than Y numbers" is mere mitigation. While I give you credit for having the creative elasticity of mind to invite the inference that Marxism would lead to gaytopia, your second point seems part shell game and part just a nice way of telling the uppity f*s to sit down, shut up and wait for benefits to trickle down. As to where the teaching comes from, I'm inclined to suspect religion.

I think the WC will always hate us to a certain extent because we threaten the innate desire for perpetual replication, enough to put a limit on how far we can ally with it.

Now I did yesterday see the interesting argument that social issues have no lasting pull; the side that loses can just wait a while, then claim it was always in favour of the winning position and almost nobody bothers to hold anyone accountable.

By the way, you and M?? Hariet should feel totally free to do whatever you like with the means of production. I have nothing to say against leftist economics. I just object to the oily way so many leftist call for "solidarity" in a way that amounts basically to unilateral disarmament (as well as my earlier image of Lucy pretending she'll really let Charlie Brown kick the football).

150

Ms Cute - I can see how that assessment might have come about, and I readily grant that the extremity of the current position may require extreme measures. The difficulty may lie in getting rid of the mechanism required to bring about the desired result.

And of course then we jump to Tennyson's Maud - "faultily faultless; icily regular; splendidly null". (Justice Souter?)

At any rate, good luck with whichever class you throw in your lot.

151

wambenger @141 - would you be willing to post here the "incredibly pragmatic life tips for depressed people I found on Reddit," or else post a link so the rest of us can find them? I'd love to see them and believe others would too.

152

Lava. Nope. All the way nope. Ask a (competent) shrink. It's the well meaningness that makes it extra cruel. And the stubborn adherence when told it is actually harmful! Oh, to be able to blissfully ignore the terrible advice of the relatively sane. Chuck it in the bin w/ meditation and yoga.

153

Inpatient is a holding pen and is absolutely great if that's what you need but unless you are undergoing eshock when in it's highly unlikely to assist in any way. Maybe if you are actively psychotic and they manage to inject you with something too scary for outpatient use. Does nothing for chronic shit.
Seconded on group - generally unuseful, shrinks will back that, if you do go to one it needs to be pro-run by someone w/ chops, otherwise harmful. Exceptions for non-mood disorders like schizo, where I could see it being genuinely helpful.
Exceptions for both of the above if you are treating addiction.

154

Also second ketamine. Miracle cure for those it works for, as w/ lithium. Hard/impossible to access many places legally. In US, off-label expensive but widely available in major cities, or FDA approved treatment w/ heavy restrictions currently scarce due to relatively new and requires dedicated clinic, hopefully that will change. Something to be hopeful about.

156

@155, yup, that's why I said those it works for. Like anything in psych treatment including talk therapy, it can be awful. The theraruetic dose is far smaller than what is recreationally available, and is administered under observation by a psych nurse, but nothing mind altering is exempt from possible harm. The question is, is it worth the risk? If suicide is the alternative, then often yes, but everyone gets to make their own decisions. For someone who has failed on all available alternatives it's certainly an option that looks a lot better than experimental brain surgery. Nothing is benign. Having had many psych meds be personally life endangering I'd find anything less than lethal a reasonable option in SADASSes situation, were it me.

157

SADASS, these might be helpful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weHPSnnPe68

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NK6CzRSufo

158

@155 con't - the reason why ketamine and the other recreational drugs being hopeful is because they don't work on the same systems or in the same way as most other psych drugs (lithium excluded because we aren't entirely sure why that works although there's reasonable guesses), which means if you even resoundingly fail on the standard issue antidepressants you can still have a good response to these. That's why it's meaningful for the treatment resistant, which I assume you were as well as ketamine is certainly not (currently anyway) a first line treatment, and why your psych team recommended it. I hope their follow up care through your trauma was good. Lack of experience w/ these drugs therapuetically on the part of one's own psych team is certainly a concern, but it's largely unavoidable at this time. As a treatment resistant person yourself, I'm sure you're familiar w/ being a guinea pig for novel treatments or at least novel to your practitioner treatments, it's just par for the course. If you only had one go wildly awry it's honestly pretty lucky.

159

@155 For example, lithium is a miracle cure for those it works for, but also it will eventually kill everyone on it. It's one of the gentler meds. It is obviously very much worth taking. You could make a very good case for universal administration via the water supply, it's that gentle and effective.

160

Eshock is also a miracle cure. There is simply a price to pay.

161

All the wAy nope with you too, no. Drugs? That all you got? Western medicine/ western drugs. Like it’s the holy grail. Yes meds help. Obviously. They are also man made chemicals, and the mind can be healed by these and other means. Nope to reading any more of your comments. Can’t believe this adoration for western medicine.
It’s one form humans have developed, in helping heal the body and mind.

162

Lithium in the water supply, no? Are you freakin‘ serious.

163

@143 BiDanFan: I know, right? I'd love for that ugly blob to get catapulted into outer space. We'd need an industrial sized rocket launcher. Hopefully then Trumpty Dumpty would land in a Black Hole.

Who's hungry for a Double Whammy (@169)? Tick...tick...tick...

164

@140 Dan the Man: Thank you for the clarification and update on LW3.

I was once married to someone who I am certain would be bald, fat, proudly MAGA-capped and rabidly pro-Trump not only in 2016 but even more so in 2020. His current wife, ex-wife #2, and any children either might have had with him get my deepest sympathy.
On a positive note, as of October 16, 2020 I have been happily divorced for nineteen healthier saner years.

165

@161 Yes, lithium occurs naturally in the water supply in large areas of the planet and it drops the suicide, murder and domestic violence rates with no measurable downside. Chronic depression and other mood disorders are the majority of the time the same as epilepsy just not in the motor cortex which is why the meds are the same. Hope you're out there telling epileptics to disdain medication, wondering how that's going for you.

166

@161 by "Western medicine" you mean "evidence based medicine". It would be more honest to use the second term.

167

@EricaP from 151, sure thing. I think the original post is lost to time, so email me at the entire population of Australia (without spaces) at gmail dot com and I'll send over a copy.

168

@132 - Cheers, nocute. You know what they say - you can split the boy from the revolutionary Trotskyite cell, but you can't split the revolutionary Trotskyite cell from the boy.

@147 Lava - thanks for the good wishes. I am actually quite lucky in that I am stranded in a fantastically beautiful part of the world, with the support of my family and with anti-depressants the work for me. Unluckily, stress is bad for my heart and its still 2020. Oh, well, you can't have everything.

@149 Mr Venn - an elegant and thought-provoking response. My previous attempts to compose a reply have, unfortunately, spun out to Capital length rants on class, intersectionality and the true meaning of solidarity, which I may well use the basis for a lengthy essay, but which is ill-suited to the medium of Savage Love comments. We may just have to agree to disagree.

169

GRIZ?

170

Double whamsky for me! And happy divorce-iversary to Griz.

171

I have been up watching horror classics, tonight: Psycho (1960) and Halloween (the 1978 original). Griz got hungry for the Double Whammy (Lucky @69 + Big Hunsky @100 = @169). I have been diagnosed with arthritis in my middle back and possibly my neck, and am on serious painkillers (800 mg of Ibuprofen), homemade ice packs, tub baths, and took a sip of red wine. Nothing is working. Griz needs all the good luck she can get.

172

@170 BiDanFan: WA-HOOOOOOOOO!!!! Major congrats on scoring double prizes! I declare you and I each win the Double Whamsky in a tie. And thank you for the congrats on my happy divorce. It was a long time coming. :)

173

Griz! Ah, I suppose the divorce-day girl deserves the double whammy! Happy to share the honours with you.

174

All the support for SADASS is a reminder of the good in humanity and the potential for the interwebs to help not harm us! A few thoughts - like a rare kink your confluence of wants is unlikely in one person / relationship but perhaps a large city asexual community and then LDR? And therapy is partly you get out what you put in - there are hundreds of types as you know perhaps some self-help more action focused ones would be good to get you out of your headspace like Morita therapy? Or Albert Ellis. He faced some tough times in his old age and used his own therapy on himself to get through it - he donated a townhouse (NYC $10 million plus) to an Institute in his name on condition he got to live out his days on the top floor with expenses paid by the Institute - and the Board of Directors took him to court when he was an invalid to kick him out when the nursing costs got too much. Good wishes to you!

175

Mr Pan - I could easily work with leftists who honestly admitted that the WC is anti-gay; then we could determine how far that could be changed and to what extent we could ally. Instead, all I've been seeing lately are cries for (one-sided) solidarity and the fetishization of democracy to an extent that is highly dangerous for such a small minority. You and many others say the ruling class wants to keep groups pitted against each other, but what I see are leftists who want gays' time so much taken up by the nearly impossible task of keeping our approval level over 50% that we'd never have time, energy or funds to do anything else. The magical thinking accompanying the promise that the WC will turn pro-gay once it holds all the power is just fobbing us off with Chicken McNuggets instead of lobster. Now I might entertain or engage with an argument that I should settle for the McNuggets temporarily, but I cannot be convinced they're lobster, and I don't look kindly on anyone who gives the air of thinking I'm easily tricked.

As I said before, do whatever you want with the means of production; just don't pretend it's in the G's best interests. If you sincerely think it is, FTWL and I just hope you don't end up flat on your back next to an unkicked football.

176

@109. Username. I would find it regrettable if anyone made any personal comment about you, since we can't know your circumstances.

I agree with the opposite side to that I've taken (in this debate), in thinking that there are many things Trump has said, and done, where there are just not two legitimate opinions. That there are fine people on both sides of the Charlottesville race riots, for instance...--no, there are not; there are neo-fascists on one side, and their opponents on the other. Or many remarks about personal conduct and morality made by Trump could, and might well, be enough to sour a genuinely values-oriented social conservative against this man as their representative.

But not all these things will have reached many Trump voters. I think the task for the lw, on the basis of what she knows of her lover (and not any generalised or moralised picture that might be inferred by commenters), is gently to point out these outrages and see whether he can take the side of decency.

177

@112. Bi. One person's empathy is usually another empathy sh-empathy, or their selfish group feeling, in turn. What about our, liberal professionals', cosmopolitan liberal professionals', empathy--for the poor and overlooked? The people who don't have the cultural capital or literacy to come within a deep, longing inhale of the schools we went to? (And didn't have to exert ourselves over-much to get in?) People who don't know anyone like us e.g. binational or non-white non-monogamous non-heterosexuals, so that what they say in frustration about minorities, or think they think about us, has no personal purport, or malice, at all?

There are people who need greater reserves of fortitude than I've ever drawn on (I'll say for myself--maybe just for work or public life) just to put food on the table before their kids. In what down-time between which of their two or three jobs do you want them to do the research to get woke, and think like the cookie-cutter city democrat?

@118. Treehouse Boat. So are you inclining to Trump, or have you already voted that way? What is the 'perspective' from which this is the right way to cast your ballot?

@129. ctmcmull. A bit of light, inadvertent scat during fucking is surely not such a big deal? I think my attitude is the same as brushing up against a Trump supporter (one does occasionally run into lawyers who are liberatarians, 'textualists' etc.).

@130. venn. I don't think I'd ever have voted for Lieberman. Anyone with blue-collar support from Connecticut is likely to be a big supporter of organised labor, so that might have been a reason in favor. There will be views of his I don't know--esp. on GLBTQA--but his votes to limit the scope of class actions struck me as really appalling. I didn't mind holding my nose for Gore-Lieberman.

The stated views of the rural poor are one thing, and how they act when they find out that their child, nephew etc. is gay sometimes another. The whole country is more socially liberal than it was thirty years ago.

178

@132. Pan Sapien. Bah, it's too easy for leftists to attribute any working-class view they don't like to 'false consciousness'. What is the mechanism for sorting through the views one holds oneself, to determine which are class-based ideological misconceptions and which correct?

@139. Chase. The one time I wanted to marry, as someone male on their birth certificate, I couldn't marry in the non-coastal state my ex-husband (though never husband in law) wanted putatively to reside in. Now I now longer want to marry.

And of which political persuasion, do you think, have been the people on here who responded to my description of my marriage, in which I supposedly stayed at home and helped raise his child, in which I lived as a woman, by taking it as a charade, a pantomime evincing no commitment to marriage, to femininity (on my part), family values, decency or normality? Who saw in it something essentially ludic or voluntary, as if I was possibly burlesquing het institutions?

The view that 'Trump is a threat to your, to gay people's, to black people's, to feminists', to non-binarians' very existence' is laughable. And some Democrats voters aren't, too? And radical cisfeminists aren't to transwomen's and the GQ? And Democrats' views on social issues are white as the driven snow? The het feminists on this board never encounter a smidgen of gender-based resentment from the guys they date and live with? Please.

To some extent, I see in the current political face-off two groups of people talking up their own interests while claiming superior values. In red states, citified Dem intellectuals are seen as condescending, selfishly individualistic and atomistically apart from the interests of ordinary communities. Maybe a difference is that the more educated people, the Dems, are less honest about how the weight they want to grant to expertise, education, certification etc., favors them.

179

@140. Dan. I don't think throwing over a 2020 Trump supporter is such an awful course if it makes sense to someone morally in the context of their own lives, in terms of who they think they are and what they're doing as a person. The hardcore 'never-a-Republican' types and political segregationalists, in terms of their intimate lives, are likely to be 'down in the trenches', improving people's lot on a daily basis, in a way that I'm, e.g., not (or I do it through institutions, not community activism).

@137. Lava. I'm not trained in suicide prevention, and I observed what Dan said very carefully ('the world is more interesting with you in it', or to that effect). There's no way that someone in his position wouldn't not know the boilerplate. It's not 'you have so much to live for', 'everyone will be so sad to see you go', 'you don't really want to do it', 'you can get through this bad patch', etc. I can understand why all of those might be the wrong thing to say. There were apparently many reassuring formulae that were just not the boilerplate.

@149. venn. People who have an attachment in principle to conventional families are doubtful, possibly queasy, about gay nonprocreators and lesbians, and people who find the best families those thrown together through happenstance and choice tend not to be homophobic. I recognise the set of issues, but don't associate it with class.

180

Harriet, Pan Sapien, and Mr. Venn: Thanks very much for an interesting discussion this week. I believe I've observed - from the sidelines, of course - that homophobia correlates inversely with education and travel, and I wonder if the working class simply hasn't benefitted enough from those things. It also correlates strongly with religion, the proverbial opiate of the masses, which was designed to keep working people from complaining about their lot.

181

@175 Mr Venn - I am certainly not arguing that the proletariat is pro-gay, but I am not convinced it is more virulently anti-gay than the bourgeoisie.

182

fubar @ 180
During my travel years I noticed the difference in attitudes towards homosexuality, which nowadays also include gender and sexuality in general more than it used to be back in the days, to be mostly geographical and can vastly differ between neighboring countries and cities, despite a common religion.
(I agree though that most interpretations of religions like to keep people sexually oppressed. Believers are easier to control if imposed to constant shame and guilt, which may also result in increased devotion and donations.)

For me the class question is a tricky one. While no denying it’s likely easier to come out as whatever when you have the economic and social status that can absorb a possible downfall of any kind, one can often find plenty genuine acceptance and comradery in lower classes.

183

Harriet and Mr Venn - you are both asking excellent and interesting questions - I'm certainly finding it challenging to answer them with the thoroughness they deserve while maintaining some degree of brevity, so please forgive me if I oversimplify your positions in my response.

Firstly, Mr Venn, I would like to be clear that I do not believe that solidarity should be an issue of quid pro quo or, as you rightly point out, quid pro nil as it often represented by some on the left. Solidarity properly arises from a recognition that justice and equality are fundamental rights for all people, and so while it may be necessary to make tactical decisions about which cause to prioritise, any movement whose aims do not include justice and equality for everyone is unworthy of solidarity.

Furthermore, any call to 'democracy' that aims for simple majority support without recognising the danger of such an approach to minorities is naive at best, and disingenuous at worst. Democracy, to be of any value, must ensure that it represents the diversity of society and actively promotes the voices of marginalised and minority groups. Any movement or party that claims to be democratic but does not advance QuILTBAG+ folk, people of colour or women to leadership roles has failed at democracy. Incidentally, promoting minority voices consciously and consistently will ultimately help make the working class, and indeed, society as a whole, less anti-gay.

Finally, to address Harriet's question - the mechanism for sorting false-consciousness from genuinely progressive values is one of those easy-in theory but hard-in-practice things - one must undertake self-reflection and constantly ask oneself and one's comrades "Does this idea/value/belief/action help build a world where dignity, justice and a meaningful life are available to all people, not just the people I agree with?" That may not satisfactorily answer your question, but I certainly enjoyed trying.

184

@173 BiDanFan: Let us both clink glasses to celebrate our shared good fortune. Cheers! :)

Who's up for the Big Double Hunsky Award? Tick...tick...tick...

185

Advising someone to destroy a great relationship because one partner, who is described in positive terms in all aspects that really matter, is exercising their independent free will is the height of reckless intolerance.

186

Harriet @177, hours of research are not necessary to hold beliefs that no race is superior or inferior to others, or that the government should use its powers to tax the wealthy and support the less advantaged (as, indeed, they are not doing for the very people you're talking about), or that all religions and sexualities are valid. I knew this stuff when I was five years old.

187

@185, So where does one draw the line in saying no to fascism? How does one separate a person’s core beliefs from their cock, and remember the personal is political and one can’t pretend otherwise.

188

Collaborators, they were called during the Second World War, those who slept with the enemy. And isn’t this a fucking war for democracy?

189

Thanks to all the men who shared their intimate stories on this thread, starting with LW1. I do think girls get that upper hand, because their chatting about their intimate selves is ‘allowed’, and uninterrupted into womanhood.
Strategies for dealing with pain, there are many out there. Talking and sharing the ouch and despair of our inner pains with others, with whoever, is part of moving along.
Hugs to all you men, and a special one to CMD, just because.

190

Hey Grizelda, hugs to you as well.. I’ve been listening more closely to early Beatles songs and have only now discovered what Please Please Me, is about. Here I was thinking it was same as I Wanna Hold Your Hand, etc, a bland boy song. But no, it’s about oral sex. John et al going mad on some girl because she won’t reciprocate.
How cheeky was that.

191

Cheeky for the times, I mean. And The Beatles. Clean cut young lads that they tried to be.

192

@186. Bi. Yes, and the median voter, the guy sitting on the fence, would agree with you on each of these items. And then he, or she, would shrug and wonder what either presidential candidate was going to do for them. Are the jobs coming back to the Midwest? Hearing you, these people would likely find your views so high-minded, your concerns so abstract, that they'd write you off as living in another world.

@180. Fubar. I agree with Pan that the working class is more plural than caricatures of it; and that Black and other ethnic minorities, younger people along a generational faultline, more educated people, likewise, and younger women more than older men are moving towards more progressive positions on social and some economic issues. I'd also think that in many blue-collar cultures, there's a greater tolerance towards any kind of personal failing or peculiarity (which can include e.g. addiction, mental illness, setbacks due to self-sabotaging behavior, dissonant sexuality--not that this is a failing, of course), as against among the professional middle classes, who are just more tight-assed, and for whom a shitshow is just a shitshow. But this degree of tolerance will probably vary family by family, more than social fraction by social fraction.

193

@183. Pan. I think that in asking 'will this build a genuinely decent world?'--a sort of Kantian question--people will still be talking up, and favoring, the skills they personally have. A divorce lawyer will insist on the value to wives, let's say, of skilled, combative representation; and a nickel miner in northern Minnesota will ask why the U.S. needs to import the metal when it's here in the ground. And the one of these who's the swing voter will ask why Obama did nothing for nickel miners, and why the libs seem to have a predilection in favor of people like themselves.

The answer to the question of whose interests get forwarded, the divorce lawyer's or the nickel miner's, is probably that society debates these issues in an integral, inclusive, deliberative way. There still seems a kind of dishonesty to me in so many liberals not realising that the values they claim, on principled grounds--tolerance of diversity; respect for expertise, education, articulacy--are solidly ones that suit their book. 'On climate change we should respect the scientists' independent expertise'. 'On questions of morality we should hew to enlightened liberal opinion'. Of course you, liberals, think that--because you want us to value your independent expertise; you want us to put weight in your enlightened views and university education.

194

Maybe some, like Dan, don’t like hugs. So I’ll send dopamine bursts instead. Sending feel good hormones, to all. Gonna be a scorcher today, my way.

195

@190 LavaGirl: Big hugs, positrons, and VW beeps coming right back atcha! Thank you, too, for sharing more about the Beatles. I was drawn to Google search Please Please Me, by the Beatles (from...1964?----WOW----the year I was born!), and had to give a YouTube recording a listen for the lyrics. Cheeky, indeed, much like the California surf scene, striped-shirt-clean-cut image of The Beach Boys (Brian, Dennis, and Carl Wilson, the Wilson brothers' cousin, Mike Love, and Al Jardine) from the same era. Another good example of 1960s male cheekiness in '60s rock 'n' roll lyrics: listen to Caroline, No from the Beach Boys Pet Sounds album from 1966 Brian Wilson describes the sing's content as his remorse for girls who start out as sweet and innocent when they're little, turning into bitchy, cynical women as they grow older. Hmm. I can't help but wonder if Caroline became a much more happily divorced, thus liberated asexual like Griz. You think?

196

@194 LavaGirl: Happy Spring your way Down Under, Lava. Hit the beach for me! :) Hopefully you don't have the same nasty fire season as last year. We are supposed to have a La Nina winter season here in the Pacific Northwest: wetter and snowier. The temperatures have really dropped; frost and fog. Eastern Washington is already getting snow. Autumn with a vengeance. I am hopeful that we are thus spared another awful wildfire season by summer 2021. 2018's was particularly unbearable.

197

@190 - Lava - I will never listen to Please, Please Me in the same way again. Of course, Bob Dylan thought I Wanna Hold Your Hand was a stoner anthem - he heard the lyrics in the chorus as 'It's such a feeling that my love, I get high, I get high'.

198

Harriet @192, London IS another world to the rural Midwest, so what's your point? They can still see with their own eyes what Trump is doing, and have the intelligence to conclude that Biden -- or anyone else, anyone at all -- would be an improvement. "I'm struggling to pay my medical bills, therefore it's fine for cops to shoot black people or put immigrants' children in cages" is not logic I would condone in anyone. "I'm struggling, so the rest of the world can burn." Charming. I've no doubt that IS the calculus that got Trump as many votes as he did in 2016, but even rural people have the brains to see where that got us and make a better choice this time.

199

I never much liked Please Please Me, Pan Sapien@197, didn’t tune in consciously to the lyrics, even if I did I was a sixteen year old Catholic virgin, who would have had no idea what he was on about anyway. Brazen lyrics or what?
‘ last night I said these words to my girl, you don’t even try girl, cmon cmon cmon cmon please please me Oh yeah like I please you..’ gist of it. haha.

200

1964? Grizelda.. then I was a thirteen year old Catholic virgin. Beach Boys, loved Dennis, of course, the died young crazy tragic one. When John Lennon died, something broke for a lot of people. Our Prophet, or one of them, was taken from us. Dylan, being another one.

201

@198. Bi. My point is that the nickel miner in Minnesota, to use my previous example, might think the likes of you and I don't care about whether he gets his skilled job back--and perhaps he's right? He doesn't care about the Black woman wantonly shot in the back (or rather it's not within his horizon), and you maybe don't care about him. But shouldn't the best informed people, the most enlightened, have the broadest sympathies?

202

M?? Harriet - Isn't that it's called a failing enough? At the moment, the situation reminds me of Anne Elliot's comparing the attitudes of her sisters Mary and Elizabeth. "To be claimed as a good, though in an improper style, is at least better than being rejected as no good at all..."

On the WC side of the ledger, it seems to depend on whether one views hate as a luxury or a staple. One of my apprehensions about the workers obtaining total control is that it will provide leisure to those for whom that was all that was wanting to take up stomping on us. A lot of tolerance is really just lack of resources to address something bad rather than the true spirit of FTWL. At the moment, they just have too much else to do.

Quite agreed that each group pumps its own wheelhouse, and should own it. It reminds me of the garage hand in Sad Cypress who commented that his gentleman rival was all right in his way, but wouldn't be of any use when a car broke down.

I did see the false consciousness argument a couple of days ago in an article trying to persuade liberals to reject the Bidenesque efforts of the right to lure them into a temporary alliance against the socialists. It made a decent case against the right, but didn't really offer any substantial positive reasons to ally with the socialists. I think it's partly an attempt to gloss over a poor leftist track record.
xxx
Mr Pan - Perhaps we need Humpty Dumpty to draw the lines for virulence. From what I've seen, the characteristics that tend to coincide with anti-gay attitudes exist in greater numbers among the working class. That's about as far as I'll go regarding anything inherent.

The portrait of solidarity belongs on a chocolate box, and it's not what I can tell I'm being sold. As for the results of the amplification of minority voices, I'm not so sure. If people were determined to learn from the Dutch example, that would be one thing.

It's possible that my thoughts might clarify a little on seeing the rest of The Trouble With Maggie Cole, in which Dawn French gives a strong performance in the role of a self-important villager who gets tiddly before a radio interview and trashes half a dozen of her friends and neighbours - which they all hear at her home during a party she throws for the interview's airing. One of the big themes for an upcoming episode will be her treatment of the Polish family currently twelve years residing in the village, but I suspect her being anti-gay will be one of her few prejudices left unexamined.

203

@ many on Trump - y'all should read this:

"Republicans closely resemble autocratic parties in Hungary and Turkey – study
Swedish university finds ‘dramatic shift’ in GOP under Trump, shunning democratic norms and encouraging violence"

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/oct/26/republican-party-autocratic-hungary-turkey-study-trump

Fact is a Republican voter in 2000 was for a party with political right wing ideas that supported the United States and democracy. Today a Republican voter, not just for Trump but voting ANY Republican, is voting in a party that wants to turn us into even more of an autocracy than we already are and turn their backs on democracy, whilst wrapped in a flag of false patriotism


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