Ah, the sweaty macho fantasyland never gets old. It has been a while since the last time the neoreactionaries posted anything entertaining.
So, after the robots take charge of the cooking and mining and driving and manufacturing, the main occupation you predict humanity will devote itself to will be… breaking each other’s nose.
Woe is us.
This post reminds me of a column penned by Ann Coulter last year, where she criticized soccer because (in her deluded mind) it was not bloody and macho enough (she obviously knows nothing about soccer injuries and soccer fan culture). What social benefit can be gained from legal nose-breaking is beyond my comprehension.
You may have added a little note at the end about how this is supposed to make life more pleasant for literally everyone, but the title of it all is still Maletopia, and your proposals for gender relations are not a Consensus (which would imply common goals), but a Compromise (which presupposes conflict as the default state).
Simply put, in Maletopia it would suck to be a woman. Or a Mentsh, for that matter. (Interestingly, you don’t propose a similar division of genders for women.)
“Taking money not fought for is a cowards’ wage.” So, is it shameful to claim your basic income?
Also, Knight Orders? What’s next, Jedi Councils?
What’s the whole point of turning the world into Maletopia? It’s a boring blend of Jugger with the Society for Creative Anachronism in order to solve a problem that doesn’t even exist.
Ah, the sweaty macho fantasyland never gets old. It has been a while since the last time the neoreactionaries posted anything entertaining.
I see parts of mainstream society are now neoreactionary from your point of view.
What social benefit can be gained from legal nose-breaking is beyond my comprehension.
1) its safer than illegal underground boxing clubs
2) physical excersize
3) fun
Not all martial arts result in nose-breaking. Grappling is somewhat safer.
But more to the point, we could go through hobbies you enjoy and argue why they should be made illegal. Do you drink? Do drugs? Have promiscuous anal sex? (1) All of these are dangerous, not that making them illegal would actually stop people doing them.
Or maybe you don’t do any of these things. Maybe you live an entirely cerebral life. And that’s ok, but it doesn’t give you the right to look down your nose at sweaty macho people who enjoy sport.
Simply put, in Maletopia it would suck to be a woman.
Why? Are you claiming that all women hate martial artists? And its explicitly stated that there are lots of tribes, so those who don’t like it can just leave.
1) not trying to be homophobic here, straight people can have anal sex too
Simply put, in Maletopia it would suck to be a woman.
Why?
Women would essentially be second-class citizens—after all, they’d be living in a society designed around men’s needs only.
I’m going to make an exception here from my normal practice and speak specifically as a woman: Those raids sound fun! But I’d probably be excluded from most teams. And as far as partners, my ideal partner would be a Mannfolk-type manly-man, who respects me as an equal—something that DeVliegenteHollander doesn’t seem to think exists. (Perhaps he’s right. If so, that might partially explain my series of pathetic failures at romance.)
I can’t speak for what DeVliegenteHollander believes, but he does say:
there are butch amazon fighting tribes, and of course a million similar hobby organizations for people who are not fighters, for the Mentsh, for women who dislike fighting, for LGBT people, for the disabled, for all.
I got the impression that Maletopia was more of a hobby than a society, but even if it is a society where women are second-class citizens, if there are a million different societies then women who do not want to be treated as second-class citizens can just join egalitopia instead (and for women who do want to be second-class citizens, well, there’s nothing wrong with being a sub).
Women aren’t equal to men in terms of sheer muscle mass, and won’t be until humanity gains mastery over biology. But there are some very skilled female martial artists, and IMO its more interesting to watch a battle of skill than of brute force.
But I’d probably be excluded from most teams.
In real life competitive sports are segregated too, apart from tennis and, apparently, Muggle quidditch. But I don’t want to be subject to status quo bias—just because this is the default doesn’t mean its optimal.
And as far as partners, my ideal partner would be a Mannfolk-type manly-man, who respects me as an equal—something that DeVliegenteHollander doesn’t seem to think exists. (Perhaps he’s right. If so, that might partially explain my series of pathetic failures at romance.)
Don’t get depressed, few people find romance easy, and there are egalitarian manly men. I know some of them. In many ways I am one of them.
(Not that I’m hitting on you—I don’t know you and you probably live thousands of miles away. Just saying that there’s a lot of different people out there.)
I see parts of mainstream society are now neoreactionary from your point of view.
No, the NRx and the machos have overlapping Venn diagrams. Neither one is a subset of the other.
it doesn’t give you the right to look down your nose at sweaty macho people who enjoy sport
I have nothing against vigorous exercise. I have a lot against trivializing/romanticizing physical harm.
in Maletopia it would suck to be a woman.
Why?
Egalitarian relationships can be expected only from one subset of the available men. The Manfolk tribe isn’t under any social pressure to treat women like sentient beings.
I have nothing against vigorous exercise. I have a lot against trivializing/romanticizing physical harm.
“sweaty macho” does sound like you are looking down your nose at sport in general, although perhaps this was not intentional. Anyway, I too am wary of martial arts that involve taking blows to the head, but I don’t think this provides sufficient justification for legislating against it.
If we extend to being against romanticizing mental/emotional harm too (and I don’t see why we shouldn’t), then we get into arguments over the superhappies from ‘three worlds collide’ and whether its meaningful to experience happiness without sadness.
Egalitarian relationships can be expected only from one subset of the available men. The Manfolk tribe isn’t under any social pressure to treat women like sentient beings.
If women don’t want to interact with Manfolk because they don’t treat women like sentient beings, then this creates social pressure to treat women like sentient beings. OTOH, if women do want to interact with Manfolk, then it would only suck to be a woman if women consistently make choices that make them unhappy, such as the choice to interact with Manfolk. But if women cannot make sensible choices, then they shouldn’t be in egalitarian relationships anyway.
But regardless, your statement conflates ‘Egalitarian relationships’ with ‘treat women like sentient beings’. Adults have dominant relationships over children. Do adults think that children are non-sentient?
Furthermore, you have a really stereotypical view of macho people. I know martial arts people, including one who has been in cagefights, and he is really feminist. (The rest of them are mostly into egalitarian relationships as well, except for a few those who are into consensual BDSM)
OTOH, I’ve only met one person who’s in the army, and he threatened to sexually assault me in my sleep. I’ve heard the hypothosis that 80% of people in the army are sociopaths. But there’s a difference between people who would enjoy ritualised combat in controlled conditions, and people who think that killing sounds like a good career.
I know little about neoreactionaries but thanks, if you say they have similar ideas I will look them up. So far I have only seen Moldbug mixing libertarianism with feudalism which I did not like because social democracy IMHO works.
What exactly is wrong with breaking each others noise? Assuming a good healthcare system that fixes the damage fast, and administering painkillers quickly after the bout, the cost is a few minutes of pain, and the benefit is excitement, being proud of one’s courage, power trips, so all kinds of neurotransmitter rush. I think this is a good deal.
Of course, it is clear that you basically dislike people who have these kinds of instincts where such calculations yield positive sums, but given that the whole thing has a good enough hormonal and evolutionary basis, it is probably here to stay, and suppressing then, like the pre 1980′s era (the hippie era) has consequences.
Generally speaking every social benefit must end up as a neurotransmitter rush, as some kind of good feelings materializing in the brain, or what else is the use? What would be the point of a utopia where everything would be very “respectable”, yet boring and unsatisfying? To me the questions is simply what kinds of fun or enjoyment should be optimized for, I look at today videogames and movies to see what is popular, and the answer pops out easy.
I don’t see why would it suck to be woman or Mentsch in this Maletopia, I simply have not fleshed out their groups. But the idea is everybody is living in a very safe welfare society, and pursues hobbies in elective communities and groups. I have only fleshed out the groups of Mannfolk. But I have indicated everybody else follows other hobbies and interests in other kinds of groups, what sucks about that? The only reason to call it Maletopia is because the Mannfolk tribes are the only unusual idea about this, otherwise it would be standard sci-fi utopia, so I found it important to direct attention to it.
“Taking money not fought for is a cowards’ wage.” So, is it shameful to claim your basic income?
This is a motivating statement, not a true statement. Do you understand the difference? Some statements have the utility to predict reality, they are called truth, some statements have entirely different utilities, if you just go to getmotivated.reddit.com you can see a lot of statements whose utility is not mainly in their truth value.
Jedi Councils are a cool idea, but they depend on supernatural powers. I borrowed the idea of knightly orders not from historical e.g. Templars who were too monkish, but Dragonlance. Warriors sticking to a clear moral code. The rough idea is to hack certain motivation circuits in the brain. There is this wonderfully circular circuit. Group X is well respected, because they only take up moral people in the group. I need to be a member of that group, because that makes me respected. Hence I need to behave morally. The trick here is, that the prestige of membership of Group X is higher than what individidual morality as such could gain. Thus it is more motivating.
Hm, better write separately about.
The problem to solve is the following: masculine instincts got out of touch with modernity and dangerous. However suppressing them is not a good solution either, a good solution is creating a simulated playground.
I know little about neoreactionaries but thanks, if you say they have similar ideas I will look them up.
I think that most of the time accusations of being “neoreactionary” or “progressive” (or any other political label) simply mean: you expressed ideas that disagree with my political tribe, so I model you as a member of the opposing tribe. Such labels often say more about the people who used them than they say about you. They miss the option of not belonging to any tribe, and simply playing with ideas.
Also, accusing people of belonging to the opposing political tribe is a good excuse for promoting one’s own tribe. Hey, they started first!
I have a different view in this. I think a lot of people don’t fight an opposing tribe, they fight the world, and thus if you are not in the tribe, you are in the world, and as such problematic. Two examples. I know a very conservative guy who really likes Rene Guenon and thinks the whole modern world is rotten. I also know a Marxist who thinks every tradition is a legacy of oppression and injustice of past times, so almost everything should be deleted and started anew. These people, from opposite angles, oppose most of what exists. This is what I mean by fighting the world. Since they fight the world, they are correct assuming that if you are not an ally in it, you are more or less an opponent.
A sport like tennis [...] lacks [...] the excitement of conflict, violence and danger
No, that’s golf you’re thinking about.
What games need to feel exciting is creativity. I’ve had sessions of 20 Questions that felt like a massacre.
and the strong us vs. them tribal spirit of camaraderie.
That’s why tennis begat volleyball.
the goal is to simulate that ancestral environment
That would be a huge problem. If you have followed any professional sport, you will know there’s no guarantee that an aggressive player will behave less aggressively in his private life. People (especially your Manfolk) are bad at distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate social contexts.
social market economy
If the producers are all robots, whom do you give your money when you buy something? Robots would have no use for it. Instead of a basic income, you could simply give people the food and save the extra step of purchase.
You have not made a convincing case that doing away with aggressive impulses would be harmful. Why? What’s so good and necessary about machismo?
“People (especially your Manfolk) are bad at distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate social contexts.”
Is there evidence for this concerning either people in general or people who take part in combat sports in particular?
“What games need to feel exciting is creativity.”
Why do you believe this to be true for everyone? Are people psychologically constrained somehow to be excited exclusively by creativity?
Head protection was included in the article precisely for this reason.
Creativity does not simulate war, a warrior’s life, thus dues not channel aggressive or power-oriented instincts. Thus you get the same problem as today, these instincts get bottled up then expressed as e.g. joining right-wing extremist groups.
This is bad. This is really bad. But this happened because they have these instinct like I want to be a tribal warrior, and did not get any proper avenues to vent them.
My deal to people like you is the following: I save you from men like those in the article. As long as they exist and do not find a proper avenue to vent their instincts, they will join extremist groups and be a constant danger for democracy. I will put them into an SPQR team-MMA group and set up matches (raids) against culturally opposing ones, and they will expend all their energies there and will never think about entering politics. Do you see why it is advantageous for you?
If you have followed any professional sport, you will know there’s no guarantee that an aggressive player will behave less aggressively in his private life.
No guarantee, but look at it this way. Only a minority of them did anything wrong. However if e.g. Tyson was not recruited into boxing or military or something similar, maybe a bodyguard, he would guaranteed to become a career criminal because a normal job would be just boring for him. On the whole, it reduced total amounts of violence.
People (especially your Manfolk) are bad at distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate social contexts.
Oh, that is solvable. Rituals. Triggers. It’s a basic Pavlov’s dog thing. Bell rings, saliva comes.
However if you don’t do this, they will go for inappropriate social contexts all the time.
If the producers are all robots, whom do you give your money when you buy something? Robots would have no use for it. Instead of a basic income, you could simply give people the food and save the extra step of purchase.
Now I am a bit confused what your life experience may be. Do you think people purchase exactly the same goods? You haven’t seen people with expensive shoes but drinking cheap wine or vice versa?
Your theory about the origin of aggressiveness puts more weight on the genes; mine puts more weight on the culture. You work from the assumption that aggressiveness is an instinct; I have found it’s more a personal choice, related to each person’s degree of maturity and empathy. Obviously we will look for solutions in opposite poles.
Do you think people purchase exactly the same goods? You haven’t seen people with expensive shoes but drinking cheap wine or vice versa?
Well...
In the utopia where I’m absolute dictator, liquors are illegal.
But in the utopia where I can expect some people to actually want to live, an apple is an apple. This means there should be no status marks linked to basic goods, so the bread I get should not be fancier than the bread you get. The same goes for clothes and housing. This allows for universal basic income to be given in the form of basic goods; if, after being fed by the state, you still want caviar, then you have to work extra to pay for it.
I think I should post my utopia in the Discussion board too. But LW would collapse in laughter.
Your theory about the origin of aggressiveness puts more weight on the genes; mine puts more weight on the culture.
You do know that this is a controversial topic since at least 1963 when Konrad Lorentz published his On Aggression, right? If you want to talk about theories it’s a good habit to be aware of existing literature :-/
This is a good and interesting discussion, finally. Upvoted.
First of all—my main point is that aggressiveness is not simply a bad thing. It is certainly dangerous. It is arguable whether it is a net negative, but it also has good aspects, or, to put differently, it is caused by things that have other effects and some of those are good, and removing the roots of aggressiveness would also remove them.
Second—aggressiveness is not really well defined term. Let’s see two examples. Let’s look at a fair and equal fight, duel-like, even with weight classes like boxing, and obviously a voluntary one. The other example is simply beating up someone who is defenseless, a victim, out of hatred.
The two things are IMHO very different and hardly ever connected. The second type aims to cause harm, the weaker and more defenseless the victim is the better. The first type looks for challenge: in the first type of encounter if the opponent is defensless or bad at defending himself the whole thing becomes boring and pointless.
So the difference is rather huge and it is not the same thing. The issue is, humanist intellectuals who hate both types tend to conflate them. I am not sure you do. I am sure Erich Fromm did conflate them in The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness which is a textbook case of how to miss this kind of point.
We really need different terms for this, as I obviously endorse only of the first. The first is more of a more intense version of competition and dominance, really a more intense form of volleyball. The second is something much more evil.
The first is lot like challenging each other to a test: if I tried to do the second on you, could you defend yourself? The second is largely outgroup, it is a destroy-the-enemy ethos. The first is closer to an in-group dominance fight, more of a let’s see who is boss around here. (At this point I admit the confusion that I modeled the first type, but between out-groups, but what else can I do? )
I would not collapse in laughter. A form of communist puritanism has a certain appeal to me, but probably for the wrong reasons: it channels status-seeking to more excitingly aggressive forms. It is, quite literally, Sparta.
I wouldn’t be so sure about it. All it takes is one charismatic political leader that can get their sympathies… for example because he also is a good sportsman in their team.
But yeah, it is better if they have also other things they can turn their attention to.
Ah, the sweaty macho fantasyland never gets old. It has been a while since the last time the neoreactionaries posted anything entertaining.
So, after the robots take charge of the cooking and mining and driving and manufacturing, the main occupation you predict humanity will devote itself to will be… breaking each other’s nose.
Woe is us.
This post reminds me of a column penned by Ann Coulter last year, where she criticized soccer because (in her deluded mind) it was not bloody and macho enough (she obviously knows nothing about soccer injuries and soccer fan culture). What social benefit can be gained from legal nose-breaking is beyond my comprehension.
You may have added a little note at the end about how this is supposed to make life more pleasant for literally everyone, but the title of it all is still Maletopia, and your proposals for gender relations are not a Consensus (which would imply common goals), but a Compromise (which presupposes conflict as the default state).
Simply put, in Maletopia it would suck to be a woman. Or a Mentsh, for that matter. (Interestingly, you don’t propose a similar division of genders for women.)
“Taking money not fought for is a cowards’ wage.” So, is it shameful to claim your basic income?
Also, Knight Orders? What’s next, Jedi Councils?
What’s the whole point of turning the world into Maletopia? It’s a boring blend of Jugger with the Society for Creative Anachronism in order to solve a problem that doesn’t even exist.
I see parts of mainstream society are now neoreactionary from your point of view.
1) its safer than illegal underground boxing clubs 2) physical excersize 3) fun
Not all martial arts result in nose-breaking. Grappling is somewhat safer.
But more to the point, we could go through hobbies you enjoy and argue why they should be made illegal. Do you drink? Do drugs? Have promiscuous anal sex? (1) All of these are dangerous, not that making them illegal would actually stop people doing them.
Or maybe you don’t do any of these things. Maybe you live an entirely cerebral life. And that’s ok, but it doesn’t give you the right to look down your nose at sweaty macho people who enjoy sport.
Why? Are you claiming that all women hate martial artists? And its explicitly stated that there are lots of tribes, so those who don’t like it can just leave.
1) not trying to be homophobic here, straight people can have anal sex too
Women would essentially be second-class citizens—after all, they’d be living in a society designed around men’s needs only.
I’m going to make an exception here from my normal practice and speak specifically as a woman: Those raids sound fun! But I’d probably be excluded from most teams. And as far as partners, my ideal partner would be a Mannfolk-type manly-man, who respects me as an equal—something that DeVliegenteHollander doesn’t seem to think exists. (Perhaps he’s right. If so, that might partially explain my series of pathetic failures at romance.)
I can’t speak for what DeVliegenteHollander believes, but he does say:
I got the impression that Maletopia was more of a hobby than a society, but even if it is a society where women are second-class citizens, if there are a million different societies then women who do not want to be treated as second-class citizens can just join egalitopia instead (and for women who do want to be second-class citizens, well, there’s nothing wrong with being a sub).
Women aren’t equal to men in terms of sheer muscle mass, and won’t be until humanity gains mastery over biology. But there are some very skilled female martial artists, and IMO its more interesting to watch a battle of skill than of brute force.
In real life competitive sports are segregated too, apart from tennis and, apparently, Muggle quidditch. But I don’t want to be subject to status quo bias—just because this is the default doesn’t mean its optimal.
Don’t get depressed, few people find romance easy, and there are egalitarian manly men. I know some of them. In many ways I am one of them.
(Not that I’m hitting on you—I don’t know you and you probably live thousands of miles away. Just saying that there’s a lot of different people out there.)
No, the NRx and the machos have overlapping Venn diagrams. Neither one is a subset of the other.
I have nothing against vigorous exercise. I have a lot against trivializing/romanticizing physical harm.
Egalitarian relationships can be expected only from one subset of the available men. The Manfolk tribe isn’t under any social pressure to treat women like sentient beings.
“sweaty macho” does sound like you are looking down your nose at sport in general, although perhaps this was not intentional. Anyway, I too am wary of martial arts that involve taking blows to the head, but I don’t think this provides sufficient justification for legislating against it.
If we extend to being against romanticizing mental/emotional harm too (and I don’t see why we shouldn’t), then we get into arguments over the superhappies from ‘three worlds collide’ and whether its meaningful to experience happiness without sadness.
If women don’t want to interact with Manfolk because they don’t treat women like sentient beings, then this creates social pressure to treat women like sentient beings. OTOH, if women do want to interact with Manfolk, then it would only suck to be a woman if women consistently make choices that make them unhappy, such as the choice to interact with Manfolk. But if women cannot make sensible choices, then they shouldn’t be in egalitarian relationships anyway.
But regardless, your statement conflates ‘Egalitarian relationships’ with ‘treat women like sentient beings’. Adults have dominant relationships over children. Do adults think that children are non-sentient?
Furthermore, you have a really stereotypical view of macho people. I know martial arts people, including one who has been in cagefights, and he is really feminist. (The rest of them are mostly into egalitarian relationships as well, except for a few those who are into consensual BDSM)
OTOH, I’ve only met one person who’s in the army, and he threatened to sexually assault me in my sleep. I’ve heard the hypothosis that 80% of people in the army are sociopaths. But there’s a difference between people who would enjoy ritualised combat in controlled conditions, and people who think that killing sounds like a good career.
I think less than half of the women I’ve dated wanted an egalitarian relationship. And I strongly prefer women who want an egalitarian relationship.
I know little about neoreactionaries but thanks, if you say they have similar ideas I will look them up. So far I have only seen Moldbug mixing libertarianism with feudalism which I did not like because social democracy IMHO works.
What exactly is wrong with breaking each others noise? Assuming a good healthcare system that fixes the damage fast, and administering painkillers quickly after the bout, the cost is a few minutes of pain, and the benefit is excitement, being proud of one’s courage, power trips, so all kinds of neurotransmitter rush. I think this is a good deal.
Of course, it is clear that you basically dislike people who have these kinds of instincts where such calculations yield positive sums, but given that the whole thing has a good enough hormonal and evolutionary basis, it is probably here to stay, and suppressing then, like the pre 1980′s era (the hippie era) has consequences.
Generally speaking every social benefit must end up as a neurotransmitter rush, as some kind of good feelings materializing in the brain, or what else is the use? What would be the point of a utopia where everything would be very “respectable”, yet boring and unsatisfying? To me the questions is simply what kinds of fun or enjoyment should be optimized for, I look at today videogames and movies to see what is popular, and the answer pops out easy.
I don’t see why would it suck to be woman or Mentsch in this Maletopia, I simply have not fleshed out their groups. But the idea is everybody is living in a very safe welfare society, and pursues hobbies in elective communities and groups. I have only fleshed out the groups of Mannfolk. But I have indicated everybody else follows other hobbies and interests in other kinds of groups, what sucks about that? The only reason to call it Maletopia is because the Mannfolk tribes are the only unusual idea about this, otherwise it would be standard sci-fi utopia, so I found it important to direct attention to it.
This is a motivating statement, not a true statement. Do you understand the difference? Some statements have the utility to predict reality, they are called truth, some statements have entirely different utilities, if you just go to getmotivated.reddit.com you can see a lot of statements whose utility is not mainly in their truth value.
Jedi Councils are a cool idea, but they depend on supernatural powers. I borrowed the idea of knightly orders not from historical e.g. Templars who were too monkish, but Dragonlance. Warriors sticking to a clear moral code. The rough idea is to hack certain motivation circuits in the brain. There is this wonderfully circular circuit. Group X is well respected, because they only take up moral people in the group. I need to be a member of that group, because that makes me respected. Hence I need to behave morally. The trick here is, that the prestige of membership of Group X is higher than what individidual morality as such could gain. Thus it is more motivating.
Hm, better write separately about.
The problem to solve is the following: masculine instincts got out of touch with modernity and dangerous. However suppressing them is not a good solution either, a good solution is creating a simulated playground.
I think that most of the time accusations of being “neoreactionary” or “progressive” (or any other political label) simply mean: you expressed ideas that disagree with my political tribe, so I model you as a member of the opposing tribe. Such labels often say more about the people who used them than they say about you. They miss the option of not belonging to any tribe, and simply playing with ideas.
Also, accusing people of belonging to the opposing political tribe is a good excuse for promoting one’s own tribe. Hey, they started first!
I have a different view in this. I think a lot of people don’t fight an opposing tribe, they fight the world, and thus if you are not in the tribe, you are in the world, and as such problematic. Two examples. I know a very conservative guy who really likes Rene Guenon and thinks the whole modern world is rotten. I also know a Marxist who thinks every tradition is a legacy of oppression and injustice of past times, so almost everything should be deleted and started anew. These people, from opposite angles, oppose most of what exists. This is what I mean by fighting the world. Since they fight the world, they are correct assuming that if you are not an ally in it, you are more or less an opponent.
Point taken.
What exactly is wrong with you?
No, that’s golf you’re thinking about.
What games need to feel exciting is creativity. I’ve had sessions of 20 Questions that felt like a massacre.
That’s why tennis begat volleyball.
That would be a huge problem. If you have followed any professional sport, you will know there’s no guarantee that an aggressive player will behave less aggressively in his private life. People (especially your Manfolk) are bad at distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate social contexts.
If the producers are all robots, whom do you give your money when you buy something? Robots would have no use for it. Instead of a basic income, you could simply give people the food and save the extra step of purchase.
You have not made a convincing case that doing away with aggressive impulses would be harmful. Why? What’s so good and necessary about machismo?
“People (especially your Manfolk) are bad at distinguishing between appropriate and inappropriate social contexts.” Is there evidence for this concerning either people in general or people who take part in combat sports in particular?
“What games need to feel exciting is creativity.” Why do you believe this to be true for everyone? Are people psychologically constrained somehow to be excited exclusively by creativity?
Head protection was included in the article precisely for this reason.
Creativity does not simulate war, a warrior’s life, thus dues not channel aggressive or power-oriented instincts. Thus you get the same problem as today, these instincts get bottled up then expressed as e.g. joining right-wing extremist groups.
Look at these guys: http://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2014/jul/18/skinhead-fascists-italy-photography-paolo-marchetti
This is bad. This is really bad. But this happened because they have these instinct like I want to be a tribal warrior, and did not get any proper avenues to vent them.
My deal to people like you is the following: I save you from men like those in the article. As long as they exist and do not find a proper avenue to vent their instincts, they will join extremist groups and be a constant danger for democracy. I will put them into an SPQR team-MMA group and set up matches (raids) against culturally opposing ones, and they will expend all their energies there and will never think about entering politics. Do you see why it is advantageous for you?
No guarantee, but look at it this way. Only a minority of them did anything wrong. However if e.g. Tyson was not recruited into boxing or military or something similar, maybe a bodyguard, he would guaranteed to become a career criminal because a normal job would be just boring for him. On the whole, it reduced total amounts of violence.
Oh, that is solvable. Rituals. Triggers. It’s a basic Pavlov’s dog thing. Bell rings, saliva comes.
However if you don’t do this, they will go for inappropriate social contexts all the time.
Now I am a bit confused what your life experience may be. Do you think people purchase exactly the same goods? You haven’t seen people with expensive shoes but drinking cheap wine or vice versa?
Your theory about the origin of aggressiveness puts more weight on the genes; mine puts more weight on the culture. You work from the assumption that aggressiveness is an instinct; I have found it’s more a personal choice, related to each person’s degree of maturity and empathy. Obviously we will look for solutions in opposite poles.
Well...
In the utopia where I’m absolute dictator, liquors are illegal.
But in the utopia where I can expect some people to actually want to live, an apple is an apple. This means there should be no status marks linked to basic goods, so the bread I get should not be fancier than the bread you get. The same goes for clothes and housing. This allows for universal basic income to be given in the form of basic goods; if, after being fed by the state, you still want caviar, then you have to work extra to pay for it.
I think I should post my utopia in the Discussion board too. But LW would collapse in laughter.
You do know that this is a controversial topic since at least 1963 when Konrad Lorentz published his On Aggression, right? If you want to talk about theories it’s a good habit to be aware of existing literature :-/
If you want to talk about books it’s a good habit to check they’re not outdated.
Well, at least you’re being internally consistent.
This is a good and interesting discussion, finally. Upvoted.
First of all—my main point is that aggressiveness is not simply a bad thing. It is certainly dangerous. It is arguable whether it is a net negative, but it also has good aspects, or, to put differently, it is caused by things that have other effects and some of those are good, and removing the roots of aggressiveness would also remove them.
Second—aggressiveness is not really well defined term. Let’s see two examples. Let’s look at a fair and equal fight, duel-like, even with weight classes like boxing, and obviously a voluntary one. The other example is simply beating up someone who is defenseless, a victim, out of hatred.
The two things are IMHO very different and hardly ever connected. The second type aims to cause harm, the weaker and more defenseless the victim is the better. The first type looks for challenge: in the first type of encounter if the opponent is defensless or bad at defending himself the whole thing becomes boring and pointless.
So the difference is rather huge and it is not the same thing. The issue is, humanist intellectuals who hate both types tend to conflate them. I am not sure you do. I am sure Erich Fromm did conflate them in The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness which is a textbook case of how to miss this kind of point.
We really need different terms for this, as I obviously endorse only of the first. The first is more of a more intense version of competition and dominance, really a more intense form of volleyball. The second is something much more evil.
The first is lot like challenging each other to a test: if I tried to do the second on you, could you defend yourself? The second is largely outgroup, it is a destroy-the-enemy ethos. The first is closer to an in-group dominance fight, more of a let’s see who is boss around here. (At this point I admit the confusion that I modeled the first type, but between out-groups, but what else can I do? )
I would not collapse in laughter. A form of communist puritanism has a certain appeal to me, but probably for the wrong reasons: it channels status-seeking to more excitingly aggressive forms. It is, quite literally, Sparta.
You say aggressiveness
What are those other effects, both good and not?
I wouldn’t be so sure about it. All it takes is one charismatic political leader that can get their sympathies… for example because he also is a good sportsman in their team.
But yeah, it is better if they have also other things they can turn their attention to.
DeVliegendeHollander, might you be a variant of a concern troll?