[The Lizard of Oz]

Our old friend Lindy has penned an unusually poisonous and nasty piece for the Guardian, called "Attention, men: don’t be a creepy dude who pesters women in coffee shops and on the subway".

Link

The point of her diatribe is that men who approach women are "violating boundaries" and taking away the infinitely valuable time of females. And men are only doing it because they can "get away with it", which makes it "antisocial behavior" and therefore essentially criminal. She singles out New York's "Subway Romeo" as a particularly egregious offender who has perpetrated a kind of crime against females by approaching them, thereby violating their sacred space and robbing them of infinitely precious solitary time.

Quote:

Last week, the New York Post ran a pathetically slobbering profile of one Brian Robinson, a self-proclaimed (and self-published) “railway Romeo”, whose book How to Meet Women on the Subway purports to teach lonely men how to go on “over 500 dates” with women they find on public transit and then annoy into submission. In other words, this dude’s favourite time and place to target women is when they’re trapped in a sealed metal tube buried three storeys underneath Manhattan. “There’s always beautiful women down here – tons,” Robinson explains, because nothing says “I respect women” like measuring them in bulk.

Attention, Brian; Starbucks blowhards numbers one and two; men in general. Here is a thing you need to internalise: just because you can get away with something doesn’t mean you should do it.

“Whatever I can get away with” is an inherently antisocial standard of behaviour. It strips your partner of agency and precludes any possibility of genuine intimacy. Why would you want to have sex with someone who is just “letting you” instead of eagerly reciprocating? Why would you want to be tolerated when you could be desired? Who’s OK with having sex that’s only distinguishable from rape on a technicality? (Ooh, I know that one. It’s rapists.) That’s why California’s new “yes means yes” law is so exciting – not because of its legal ramifications so much as its ideological ones. Shifting the way we conceptualise our interactions from “I should fulfil as many of my own desires as I possibly can without getting in trouble” to “I should go out of my way to make sure the people around me feel comfortable and respected” has repercussions far beyond the romantic realm.

Like the mangina Wil Wheaton, Lindy is much taken with the recent Gawker piece about the "douchebag" as a term that captures all that is evil about men. The "douchebags", it seems, need to be destroyed. They are the new Kulak class.

Quote:

Michael Mark Cohen has a cleverly articulated essay on Gawker this week in which he declares “douchebag” the only effective signifier for a particular brand of toxic, entitled white male. (He calls it a “racial slur”, a tongue-in-cheek flourish that will surely validate many white racists with martyr complexes.) “The douchebag,” Cohen writes, “is someone – overwhelmingly white, rich, heterosexual, male – who insists upon, nay, demands his white male privilege in every possible set and setting. The douchebag is equally douchey (that’s the adjectival version of the term) in public and in private. He is a douchebag waiting in line for coffee as well as in the bedroom.”

Douchebag supremacy is built on a long history of getting away with as much as possible – in finance, in romance, in literature, in humour, in politics, in the countless subtleties of simply taking up space in the world. If you can get away with it, good. More for you. Generosity and basic decency are favours, not obligations. It’s an isolating idea, the inverse of empathy. It’s also the reason why traditionally male-dominated communities such as gaming feel so threatened by female voices, and why progressive cultural critics are branded the “thought police”. Because getting away with it is getting harder all the time.

She then circles back to the subway Romeo, that douchebag/evil incarnate. Thus far, she notes, he has gotten away with his crimes of approaching women without encountering a violent response; and she concludes her piece with the hope that this will not always remain the case:

Quote:

The Post asked Robinson if he has experienced any memorable rejections, and he replied that a woman once threatened him with mace to get him to stop talking to her. That’s how much it takes to stymie a douchebag’s entitlement. He seemed to find it amusing. Typical female overreaction. But the truth is, he almost got a face full of poison. He almost didn’t get away with it. And, some day, he won’t.

********************************

I feel that this piece deserves some attention because there are some remarkable things about its content and particularly its tone. It is, even for its writer, an unusually nasty, belligerent, indeed sinister, piece. And the tone is one of triumphalism and confidence. It basically designates an entire class of men as an enemy of the people who deserve to be punished -- literally, deserve to be pepper-sprayed or worse -- merely for being "douchebags" and daring to approach the sacred female. And it has great and unaffected confidence that, as time goes on, the ability of "douchebags" to "get away", essentially, with being alive, will be ever more circumscribed.

There are no two ways about it: the feminists and Social Justice Warriors are feeling their strength, and are ready to declare a kind of open season on all men they don't like -- essentially all non-mangina heterosexual men, especially though not exclusively white men, who do not worship at the altar of their evil ideology.

When the enemy declares open war against you and announces the intention to destroy you, there is only one choice, and that is to fight back with all you have.

[samsamsam]

She gets away with eating, and I consider it antisocial behavior.

[kbell]

The comments are closed until tomorrow. I have a feeling they won't be opened. I wonder when they will start pushing for laws against daygaming. You know its coming since almost all male sexuality is shamed or made illegal.

[AnonymousBosch]

You know this happened:

1. She read the blurb for the book

2. Realised she took that line every day.

3. Realised she was never approached.

[Going strong]

She's upset because nobody vigorously "violates her boundaries" anymore...

[Libertas]

I'd honestly like to see this bitch ask any of the women I've approached if I was "getting away with something." Especially one of the hottest ones who actually did complain to me about retards hitting on her but actually thanked me because I was the only one that actually approached her like a man.

Wait, she's complaining because nobody would ever in their right mind desire her so she wants to deny the same pleasure to hot girls, using every Cultural Marxist's favorite target of white men as a conduit. Hammer their asses on this.

Oh, and it's fit to be published in the Guardian. Typical.

[CRR]

@Going Strong. I agree however "anymore" implies that she used to get approached.

My response to Lindy West:

Attention Fat Whale. I Do What I Want.

I'll approach women as I choose. If they tell me to leave me alone, I'll do so.

Likewise, women can feel free to approach me. If I want them to leave me alone, I'll politely tell them to do so.

Sincerely,

Entitled White Male "Douchebag" Who Gets Away With It

[Darius]

Being social is anti-social behaviour. 2+2=5 when you have a natural immunity to logic.

Honestly though, the only reason she is offended is because:

a)No one would ever approach her

b)She is miserable

c)She makes a living out of being a victim

d)All of the above.

[NovaVirtu]

Crying out for attention- not just from men in coffee shops but online in general. I'm guessing her funds are running low after being fired from Jezebel.

I wouldn't be surprised if she tried to leverage the gamergate fiasco to try and land a job at another SJW media outlet.

Feel like it's a good time to bring back this old gem:

[The Lizard of Oz]

Darius, my sense from the article is not that Lindy is "offended". My sense is that she is bristling with the glee of power and the hope of dealing punishment.

There is a triumphant tone like that of a Hutu fighter who has been sharpening his machete all night and is now ready to go into the fields and chop Tutsi heads off.

She sounds confidently bloodthirsty. She knows that her allies are in power, and that they're getting less shy about using these powers to do what needs to be done.

[Truck'n]

(10-22-2014 10:10 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

Michael Mark Cohen has a cleverly articulated essay on Gawker this week in which he declares “douchebag” the only effective signifier for a particular brand of toxic, entitled white male. (He calls it a “racial slur”, a tongue-in-cheek flourish that will surely validate many white racists with martyr complexes.) “The douchebag,” Cohen writes, “is someone – overwhelmingly white, rich, heterosexual, male – who insists upon, nay, demands his white male privilege in every possible set and setting. The douchebag is equally douchey (that’s the adjectival version of the term) in public and in private. He is a douchebag waiting in line for coffee as well as in the bedroom.”

So then we should assume that Cohen overwhelmingly agrees with me when I assert that Cohen is recieving his, 'Jewish media priveledge'?

Obviously, he is a poor writer, with poor logic and vapid insight. What other reason, other than his, 'Jewish media priveledge' could provide explanation for why he is published?

[Darius]

(10-22-2014 10:56 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

Darius, my sense from the article is not that Lindy is "offended". My sense is that she is bristling with the glee of power and the hope of dealing punishment.

There is a triumphant tone like that of a Hutu fighter who has been sharpening his machete all night and is now ready to go into the fields and chop Tutsi heads off.

She sounds confidently bloodthirsty. She knows that her allies are in power, and that they're getting less shy about using these powers to do what needs to be done.

I was thinking about putting "being/feigning".

I'm sure for many of these people, like the Anita Sarkeesian's of the world. This is all about money and power. They don't really believe in what they say, as much as they see it as a means to an end.

I do think that Gamergate has shown that they do have weaknesses, at least at the pawn level. They can be attacked when they overreach. There are obviously the King's and Queen's that will be more difficult to combat. Like bankers, the elites and hollywood/mainstream media.

[The Lizard of Oz]

Truck'n:

Please quote the OP correctly. The quote about the Gawker article is Lindy West's not mine, so don't quote it as if it's mine.

Who is your question addressed to?

[Truth Teller]

Basically: "All those other women get approached and I don't! It's a form of harassment!"

[AnonymousBosch]

Gentlemen, I think it's time we start owning the word 'Douchebag'.

[Carlos100]

She understands that when men successfully learn how to approach women in the right way (i.e. know game), like the Subway Romeo, then it shifts the perogative in dating and mate selection away from women to men. As a feminist whose life is dedicated to helping impose the feminine imperative on society, she is using her pulpit to try to shame men into not doing it and persuade women not to play along.

[RawGod]

Sadly, the significance of this is that the douchebag Lindy West is now being published in the Guardian. Which has always been a laughably biased echo chamber, but it is considered mainstream in the UK.

[The Lizard of Oz]

Guys, do not underestimate the enemy. Look past the fat whale and see the chuckling commissar's mug.

It is not that Lindy West, as such, has great power -- but she is allied with great and ascendant power, and she knows this and senses this. She writes with the confidence of the executioner who knows that the gallows is being dusted off, burnished, and made ready for action.

And she is not writing to persuade or shame men. She knows that "douchebags" will not be persuaded, nor does she consider them salvageable or worth redeeming. The appeal to men is purely rhetorical, a mere obligatory figure. It is a warning, rather than an appeal. The real thrust is the anticipation of punishment, the hope and confidence that the days of "getting away with it" in any and every sense are coming to an end. And in that, she may not be far off the mark.

[philosophical_recovery]

There's pressure now against talking to women in public, supported by the Guardian. The manosphere is rapidly becoming the samizdat of the 21st century.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samizdat

[Travesty]

"Complete douchebag" is probably one of the best compliments you could get from a woman you slept with that you aren't really into.

It just means she lost badly in the who likes who more battle.

She is saying she was batting out of her league and couldn't compete.

[StrikeBack]

(10-22-2014 10:25 PM)AnonymousBosch Wrote:  

You know this happened:

1. She read the blurb for the book

2. Realised she took that line every day.

3. Realised she was never approached.

(10-22-2014 10:33 PM)Going strong Wrote:  

She's upset because nobody vigorously "violates her boundaries" anymore...

Even her shitty article started with an anecdote of a man approaching another "young blonde woman" while she watched in silent rage...

[Mike5055]

Lindy is just a fat fuck trying to ramp up attention to her new gig.

[catoblepa]

apparently feminists are now bent on bringing us back to a neo-victorian form of puritanism where you can't even talk to stranger women.

[NilNisiOptimum]

So who won the pool for how long it would take Lindy to bite the hand that feeds at her new gig?

[Paracelsus]

Quote:

It’s an isolating idea, the inverse of empathy.

Digressing epically, I like Dan Simmons'* take on empathy from his website: ( http://www.dansimmons.com/writing_welll/...008_06.htm )

Quote:

Empathy.

Empathy is not sympathy. In most ways it is anti-sympathy. Do not get the two confused. Sympathy is for Christians with four aces up their sleeves. Sympathy is a safe emotion, combining as it does three parts noblesse oblige with two parts droit du seigneur.

One day Jōshū fell down in the snow, and called out, “Help me up! Help me up!” A monk came and lay down beside him. Jōshū got up and went away.

Need I say that the monk had been enlightened?

The student said to Mr. Simmons, “ Does the Buddha-nature feel sympathy toward the afflicted and oppressed?” Mr. Simmons asked the student, “Do you feel sympathy toward the afflicted and oppressed?” “Yes,” said the student. “Kwatz!” cried Mr. Simmons. (THUMP. “Ow!”) “Do you feel sympathy toward the afflicted and the oppressed?” Mr. Simmons again asked the student. “No!” cried the student. “Kwatz!”cried Mr. Simmons (THUMP. “Ow!”) “You did not feel it before since you had not experienced affliction and oppression, but you do now and will tomorrow,” said Mr. Simmons.

The student limped off toward the nurse’s office and was enlightened.

In a real sense, we cannot help other people in those situations where people most deeply need difficult soul-help, as opposed to easy physical food-and-shelter help. When someone loses a wife or husband or father or mother or son or daughter or lover or friend or someone else to Death, we say, “Let me know if I can do anything to help . . . anything at all.”

These are words at their most sincere but also at their emptiest. We know, through our own worst experiences, that we can do nothing. At least do nothing real to assuage or even share such bone-deep, soul-damaging pain and loss.

As R. H. Blyth said, “We cannot help other people, in things that really matter. We can only look or act our fellow-feeling.”

Christ and the Prophet and the Talmud cannot take us to Heaven. We go on our own wings or we don’t go at all. Zen understands that there is jiriki, self-power, and tariki, other-power but – as with all things Zen – there is a time when these opposites are one and the same thing.

The monk knew that Jōshū could either lie there in the snow until he froze to death or get up and walk into the warm Hall to have his dinner. The monk, who knew, chose neither jiriki or tariki but rather the Third Path of showing his awareness of the rising or not rising of others – in this case, the rising or not-rising of Jōshū.

Writer, either have and use this Third Path of true empathy or do not presume to write.

It is easy to show empathy toward Gandhi and Christ and Martin Luther King. Even an unenlightened semi-human (such as a politician) can do this. To be a writer, you must be able to show empathy toward Adolf Hitler, if Adolf Hitler is your character. You must lie down in the snow next to Hitler – or in this case, in the flames – and rise, or not rise, secure in your hatred of all Jews.

If you’re a great African-American novelist who cannot see into the human soul of a white man or woman because all you see is racism and historical inequity, quit writing fiction. If you’re John Steinbeck who knows every niche in the human heart of the displaced and powerless Oakies but has no clue as to the thoughts and feelings of the lettuce-growers and ranchers, admit defeat and do not publish fiction. (Or, if published, have your ghost call back the books and have them posthumously pulped.) If you have received the Nobel Prize for your sympathetic fiction-portrayal of the Oppressed and Downtrodden in South Africa but have no real understanding of why the landowner grandsons and granddaughters of colonists acted and thought as they did, pack it in. If you’re the screenwriter who drove Thelma and Louise triumphantly over the cliff of the Grand Canyon in a world where all men be slime, rent a Cadillac and go thou and do likewise.

It goes without saying that the reverse spin on all of these failures at empathy deserves the same fate. But it is easier to claim personal empathy when all one is feeling or showing is the somewhat smug and consensus-happy sympathy of the crowd secure on their pyramid-pinnacle of looking-back-at-history and self-pronounced enlightenment.

* Here's the scary thing about Dan Simmons: when he wrote Flashback he was basically sent to literary Coventry for having his characters rant politically and for his "racist" attitude as to the future direction of America, notwithstanding he made it clear several hundred times the book was intended as a dystopian fantasy in the manner of 1984. What's frightening is that Flashback is getting more relevant as time goes on -- and the relevance has nothing to do with its extrapolations about where Islam is likely to end up.