[2Wycked]

Another absolute grand-slam by The Last Psychiatrist.

Choice quotes:

Quote:

So the system encourages women like Hess to "critique the patriarchy" or "bring awareness" because it stands no chance of moving the money, let alone the power, and also the media gets a cut. Meanwhile men all over the place are left questioning why their opportunities are just as limited but their answer can't be a glass ceiling. "Maybe it's reverse sexism!" Maybe your media is no different than her media, we'll see what kind of sexism there is when the robots replace all of you. What is both obscene and astonishing in its power is that this distraction is foisted on Millennials by other Millennials, they're fighting for the other team, precisely because the immensely hard work of work can be avoided by hoping the problem is sexism. Hess is frantically fighting against-- whom? Cyberbullies? Frat guys? Stand up comedians? What are the results she expects from this fight? The fight is a symptom of neurosis, frantic energy as a defense against impotence, frantic energy as a defense against change. "Why am I in the top 20% of intelligence but I'm running the register at a store whose products I can't afford?" Because trolls are preventing women from earning a living online? "So it's Reddit's fault!"

Quote:

So in order to explain their otherwise irrational feeling of impotence, they pull from any of the media-approved categories of blame, depending on your news network: sexism, racism, feminism. The central importance of the media in soliciting their anger is totally lost on the older "activists" who still believe that the -ism is the primary force. They're enraged that a white Princeton student would dare to write that white privledge doesn't exist; they never wonder why they read it. They are at a loss to explain why the very same trolls who want to "rape" feminist bloggers are even more enraged that women in Saudi Arabia are forced to wear burqas. So do misogynists hate Arab men more than American women? Is there a hate hierarchy? Yet the media is unsurprisingly ambivalent about the burqa, the feminism risks an assertion of cultural priviledge so they'd just as soon not get involved. And to hell with George Bush who made us have to.

Quote:

It is heartwarming to think of the backlash against Sterling as a new intolerance of racism, and I'm told his case is important to society because he's famous and rich, but his money doesn't come with any power. So while you are all glowing in self-righteousness because you outed another racist rich guy, consider that you will never hear a recording of the head of Goldman Sachs making racist statements. "Maybe he's more progressive?" Hmm. Or maybe power won't allow it, power won't even allow you to think about it. The more likely explanation-- remember, basketball is a TV show on The Disney Channel the outcome of which couldn't be less relevant to humanity-- is that it is projection, it represents frantic activity as a defense against change. "I'm not a racist-- because THAT's a racist!"

It is a stereotypically long post that starts out a bit slow but builds serious steam towards the end.

I might bump this thread tomorrow when I reread the post and think about it some more, but he does an exemplary job of framing how media uses us to line their pockets with silver and leaving us with nothing substantive.

[magellan]

Am I the only one that has to reread entire paragraphs to get the message behind TLP posts? I'm not sure if it's the writing style or that the author's thought process is completely different to what I'm accustomed.

That said, it was a really interesting read and roused multiple topics: media, isms, public perception, etc. Something I'm curious about is the assertion that Sterling, as rich as he is, doesn't have power.

[Deuce Anna Half]

(05-14-2014 06:04 AM)magellan Wrote:  

Am I the only one that has to reread entire paragraphs to get the message behind TLP posts? I'm not sure if it's the writing style or that the author's thought process is completely different to what I'm accustomed.

That said, it was a really interesting read and roused multiple topics: media, isms, public perception, etc. Something I'm curious about is the assertion that Sterling, as rich as he is, doesn't have power.

I think power is being defined here as the ability to enact any sort of substantive change. The CEO of Goldman Sachs has the power to fuck with the global economy, Sterling just owned a basketball team that nobody outside of LA cared about until a couple years ago and still had to answer to the NBA commissioner.

What kind of change could Sterling enact, jacking up ticket and beer prices at Staples Center?

[cardguy]

TLP is a really interesting guy.

But I struggle with his articles. I am not sure if I am too stupid or if he needs an editor to shake him up.

I stopped reading him a couple of years ago. I don't mind struggling with stuff in print - but when I am staring at a computer screen, it is not fun re-reading the same pile of pixels over and over.

[lurker]

You're struggling with his articles and rereading paragraphs because TLP's writing style is designed to mimic the message contained therein, which is invariably to lead you along a concept and path you're already familiar with, know the outcome of, and know how to feel about and understand, only to show you a starkly different conclusion - or, more accurately, a starkly different premise for the underlying behavior you thought you had sorted. The sudden shift in the reasoning echoes the sudden shift in your understanding brought about by the article - one that is so massively jarring and initially nonsensical because it conflicts with an understanding you already had internalized, which is a fancy way of saying you had accepted that premise as being so fundamentally true it was beyond the need for active logical parsing.

And yes, if you're rereading this paragraph, it's for you.