Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 20:34:21 GMT -5
I was observing the drop in public support for a handgun ban from 60% in the 70's to just over 20% in 2014. You remarked, "[Repealing the 2nd Amendment] would reflect that a vast majority of Americans no longer support the gun culture we currently have in this country". As far as I can tell, a "vast majority" of your countrymen never supported a handgun ban (much less repealing the 2nd Amendment), and fewer support it the more time goes on. You're just moving the bloodshed from Sam's right pocket to his left. If a soft ban ever came to pass, assuming there was still such a thing as a "united" states afterward, the hold-outs would openly defy the ban. Police could arrest them, drag them to the courthouses if they wanted to, but each instance would be a mini Ferguson. Judges who didn't simply dismiss cases would live in constant fear for their lives. Eventually they'd stop enforcing the ban. Only a year ago I first read about the grim milestone in small-town Germany where judges are dismissing cases under duress, both for the sake of their lives and the public peace. They know if they convict a man, his whole family and community will rise up and commit far worse acts in retaliation. It'll be no different in post-disarmament America unless "vast majority" is well and truly a vast and overwhelming majority. As in: fewer than 2% of Americans in any given locale willing to openly defy the ban. I have never indicated that I feel this country is close to ready to repeal the 2nd Amendment, only that I support repealing it. It reads to me that you are basing the reaction to what would only take place in a very different environment on the current environment. If this country were ever to get to a place to repeal the 2nd Amendment, I don't see your 2% as unlikely in most areas. I can see a higher percentage engaging in passive resistance which if not pressed would not be significant. And, yes, I don't doubt there would be a few who would need to be martyrs. The Great Malheur County Standoff proved that to be true. But that was one out of how many? Sure. If your premise is a hypothetical "if/when the US is ready to repeal...", how could your conclusion not follow? But the US will be in a position to ban snow leopards long before you're ever ready to toss the 2A. At least support for that isn't going backwards 10% per decade.
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 20:09:43 GMT -5
It's a matter of values and priorities, not raw desire. Notwithstanding higher values, man is a hedonist, seeking the most personal gratification from the least amount of work. That's what societies of all eras blindly strive toward once they're sufficiently prosperous. It's entropic. Our own descent started in the post-war 1950's.
Secondly, the issue is more complicated than "housewife" versus "not a housewife". It concerns factors such as how many children a couple has, whether both parents are present and committed, whether the family is functional, how much time parents personally invest in educating their children (particularly with regards to a moral education), how much time the family spends together, the quality of home life, and the social health of the family (in terms of staying connected with friends and extended family). While it's possible for both parents to work without sacrificing any of the above (particularly in later life), it's exceptionally difficult.
To the extent families fail in these regards, society suffers. Failure occurs in part because we have different values, different priorities, and aren't willing to make the necessary sacrifices. In the end, we have a broken, dying society and none of the happiness we sought.
This isn't the only factor contributing the relative happiness and stability of the 1950's versus the train-wreck-in-waiting of today, but it's a major one.
ETA's: Ms. Barbara Bush, who passed away today, had a great deal to say about priorities. The wife of a US president, having experienced everything from the life of a housewife to the life of a 24/7 campaigner and public figure.
I wish I could find the exact quote, but paraphrasing, her message to younger generations was: "As you get older, you won't regret not closing one more deal, earning one more bonus, getting one more promotion. What you will regret is one more hour you didn't spend with your husband, one more gathering you missed with your family, one more afternoon you didn't spend with friends." There's great wisdom in that statement.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 15:36:39 GMT -5
I don't need a study to tell me that I would be miserable if were a housewife. Indeed, but you're a product of your society, the same as the rest of us. Your attitude reflects a particular system of values instilled in you by society. My point in Reply #103. Note that I'm not suggesting you could be "made to enjoy" homemaking, etc. at this point in time. After (insert your age here) years, the canvas of your mind is thoroughly painted on. Nobody is going to change your painting of a sailboat into a painting of a cat at this point.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 15:19:45 GMT -5
As demonstrated presently, I can cite 50 international studies supporting my supposition and you counter with "You really think survey data between 70 years reveals facts?". Hence it would appear we've reached an impasse. And for the record: "my uncle the dr said" wasn't even close to the sum of my argument in that debate, whereas "You really think survey data between 70 years reveals facts?" is the sum of yours here. I Where are the citations? Two in the post citing the UCR data, six in the HuffPo article.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 15:15:59 GMT -5
All that was for "Do I really need to tell you this?" This is YMAM. Be glad he isn't telling you to "Stop making shit up."--based on nothing at all--and raking in 13 'likes' and several kisses on his fanny for his trouble.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 15:07:09 GMT -5
Yes. Especially when we're talking about numerous methodologically-defensible studies comprising the data of 1.3M people. They might have had snow leopards sitting on them for all we know. You're a scientist. You have a hypothesis to explain the data. Prove it. By all means, make your case. How about make your case that they're equivalent? As demonstrated previously, I can site 50 NIH studies supporting my supposition and you counter with "my uncle the dr said" and think you win. #Ain'tnobodygottimeforthat I'll save my research discourse for peer reviews. As demonstrated presently, I can cite 50 international studies supporting my supposition and you counter with "You really think survey data between 70 years reveals facts?". Hence it would appear we've reached an impasse. And for the record: "my uncle the dr said" wasn't even close to the sum of my argument in that debate, whereas "You really think survey data between 70 years reveals facts?" is the sum of yours here.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 14:56:29 GMT -5
Eh... you might not want to look at the last and second-to-last plots in this 2015 piece by The Economist. I'd check the data, but neither does this bode well for a happy disarmament. I would support a plan that has no door to door forced disarmament. I think that those few who have to retain their guns while refusing to register them will bury them so deep that they will be of zero significance. I was observing the drop in public support for a handgun ban from 60% in the 70's to just over 20% in 2014. You remarked, "[Repealing the 2nd Amendment] would reflect that a vast majority of Americans no longer support the gun culture we currently have in this country". As far as I can tell, a "vast majority" of your countrymen never supported a handgun ban (much less repealing the 2nd Amendment), and fewer support it the more time goes on. You're just moving the bloodshed from Sam's right pocket to his left. If a soft ban ever came to pass, assuming there was still such a thing as a "united" states afterward, the hold-outs would openly defy the ban. Police could arrest them, drag them to the courthouses if they wanted to, but each instance would be a mini Ferguson. Judges who didn't simply dismiss cases would live in constant fear for their lives. Eventually they'd stop enforcing the ban. Only a year ago I first read about the grim milestone in small-town Germany where judges are dismissing cases under duress, both for the sake of their lives and the public peace. They know if they convict a man, his whole family and community will rise up and commit far worse acts in retaliation. It'll be no different in post-disarmament America unless "vast majority" is well and truly a vast and overwhelming majority. As in: fewer than 2% of Americans in any given locale willing to openly defy the ban.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 14:19:21 GMT -5
It's a fair theory. I can neither affirm it nor debunk it as this point. Personally I suspect information overload (and grief porn in particular) does have some effect on depressing happiness. Not enough to account for the shift we've seen over the decades, but some. Access to information isn't what's rotted the last vestiges of sustainability out of our society (since the 1970's in particular), however.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 13:57:39 GMT -5
Their arguments aren't so unreasonable. Not everybody here wants to ban assault weapons. I daresay only a minority do. Those who favour the ban do so because they believe it will save Americans' lives (which it might, if only a handful), and because they believe nobody has any business owning an item whose sole function is to effect lethal force far in excess of what is reasonably needed for hunting or self-defense .
Only Weltz is in favour of a Canadian-style handgun ban, which reflects her belief that a complete ban would significantly reduce the US homicide rate. She's made it clear many times she believes such a ban would only have impact if it were nation-wide (or at least implemented in circumstances where borders are tightly secured), and I agree with her. Your examples of crime in nominally "gun-free" cities are irrelevant to the argument she's making. You'd do better to post articles about gun crime in Canada, but that's useless too since such cases are purely anecdotal. The gun crime stats tell the big picture, and if you make the debate solely about Canada's body count versus the US's, you lose. Badly. Argue on the basis of fundamental liberty, the recreational uses of guns, defense against government tyranny, greater self-reliance, the unique factors contraindicating a successful ban in the US (e.g. culture, prevalence of gangs, proliferation of 3D printing, etc.), and you have the stronger argument in each case. Treat their arguments seriously. "But the posters here insist that the assault weapons are the root of all evil, if the are banned and confiscated, the entire world will be saved!" isn't treating opponents' arguments seriously. I don't know the particulars of Canadian gun law but I do support the US going through the Constitutional process to repeal the 2nd Amendment. Doing so would reflect that a vast majority of Americans no longer support the gun culture we currently have in this country. Eh... you might not want to look at the last and second-to-last plots in this 2015 piece by The Economist. I'd check the data, but neither does this bode well for a happy disarmament.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 10:36:16 GMT -5
Virgil,you are most likely right. The point was over the two week period, all the shootings, in a gun free city,It appears not one of those involved an assault weapon, But the posters here insist that the assault weapons are the root of all evil, if the are banned and confiscated, the entire world will be saved!!!!!!!!!!! I haven't even begin to list all the other that I may have missed. In fact I haven't come across an article where an assault rifle has been used any where in the U.S. over the last couple of weeks. One thing that does stand out,is people kill people by any means they can. Like the woman in Cali, that drove off the cliff at 90 mph, that killed 9 people, that indeed is a mass murder! Their arguments aren't so unreasonable. Not everybody here wants to ban assault weapons. I daresay only a minority do. Those who favour the ban do so because they believe it will save Americans' lives (which it might, if only a handful), and because they believe nobody has any business owning an item whose sole function is to effect lethal force far in excess of what is reasonably needed for hunting or self-defense .
Only Weltz is in favour of a Canadian-style handgun ban, which reflects her belief that a complete ban would significantly reduce the US homicide rate. She's made it clear many times she believes such a ban would only have impact if it were nation-wide (or at least implemented in circumstances where borders are tightly secured), and I agree with her. Your examples of crime in nominally "gun-free" cities are irrelevant to the argument she's making. You'd do better to post articles about gun crime in Canada, but that's useless too since such cases are purely anecdotal. The gun crime stats tell the big picture, and if you make the debate solely about Canada's body count versus the US's, you lose. Badly. Argue on the basis of fundamental liberty, the recreational uses of guns, defense against government tyranny, greater self-reliance, the unique factors contraindicating a successful ban in the US (e.g. culture, prevalence of gangs, proliferation of 3D printing, etc.), and you have the stronger argument in each case. Treat their arguments seriously. "But the posters here insist that the assault weapons are the root of all evil, if the are banned and confiscated, the entire world will be saved!" isn't treating opponents' arguments seriously.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 9:50:21 GMT -5
Maybe that's the part you don't like - that society used to impose certain standards of conduct on wives, husbands and families, and now everyone is choosing their own parenting style, willy nilly? Because I don't think you really care much whether women are happier or less happy, as a group, than they were in the 50's. I think you just miss the regimented social order of the 50s. My parents lived through the late 50's in diapers. I'm two generations removed from being able to 'miss' anything. As for a love of regimented social order: What good is regimented social order if it doesn't lead to a happier, safer citizenry, subject to long-term sustainability? None. At best, it's useless. Of course the importance of sustainability in particular can't be overstated. Even if crime, happiness, and the other factors we've discussed were unchanged from the 1950's, we're presently on a train wreck trajectory unimaginable in the 50's. Take your pick: unpayable debts, unsustainable social programs, an evaporating middle class, deteriorating demographics, unsustainable lifestyles, worsening race and class warfare, the burgeoning police/surveillance state, near-total loss of public faith in government, and the list goes on. Thyme suggested earlier that I believe we live in a "dystopia". Hardly. We may not be as happy as families in the 1950's, but we have it good in terms of comfort, safety, and wealth. Better than any other generation in human history in many respects. The dystopia comes in when we inevitably derail. It's such a daunting prospect that several YMAM posters readily admit they don't entertain the possibility. We all want to believe things will get better, and all the more so want to believe things aren't going to get a lot worse. Hence let's suppose you're correct, the data mean nothing, and "the regimented social order of the 50s" was a great depressor of men and especially women. If that regimented order was responsible for staving off the nightmares we're piling up for ourselves in this golden era of dependence, largess, and lack of restraint--and it no doubt did to a large extent--it's far superior to the present day social order on that basis alone. That's something all of us should fear: when the myths of democratic liberalism fall apart completely in front of everyone's eyes, at a time when the West is plunged into chaos and severe need, and militant right-wing reactionaries who make Paul, OC, and me look like hippie beatniks by comparison rise to power over the rubble and ashes of yet another failed social experiment. And I'm not talking about Islamic reactionaries.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 17, 2018 6:29:51 GMT -5
There is no such fact here. I suppose you may be referring to survey data? You really think survey data between 70 years reveals facts? Yes. Especially when we're talking about numerous methodologically-defensible studies comprising the data of 1.3M people. Women 70 years ago may not have even felt free enough to be honest about how they felt. They might have had snow leopards sitting on them for all we know. You're a scientist. You have a hypothesis to explain the data. Prove it. Let's start with differences in the response rates. By all means, make your case.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 21:24:53 GMT -5
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 21:07:29 GMT -5
I would guess that what makes women happy is having the ability and the freedom to determine on their own what they want their life to be. If it is having a career, fine. If it is staying home being a housewife and raising children, fine, provided of course that she finds someone who wants her to be that. What makes them unhappy is being dictated to and told that they do not have the same rights as men do. That they are not allowed to find their own personal fulfillment in their own way. But I'm a man. What do I know? You're talking about a vacuum world where "freedom to determine on their own what they want their life to be" exists independently of a million and once interests competing to cram ideas into people's heads about what they want and don't want. Society is an all-consuming animal. It sates our yearning to be special, independent, and a product of self-will rather than indoctrination and circumstance, but what a fantastic fallacy that is. Ah well. I didn't mean to hijack your... eh... "not simply an anti-Trump diatribe" thread. There's a sobering thought for you: You want true individuality? Pres. Trump is the closest thing you're going to get circa 2018. A truly exceptional man in many regards, very few of them good. Individuality. Total freedom to determine what your own life is going to be, immune to the criticisms, preconceptions, judgments, requirements, and expectations of your whole society. Grand, ain't it?
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 20:41:07 GMT -5
The value of these message boards is that an article (such as this MSN piece) is shared, it can be critiqued, and readers will hopefully come to a better understanding of where it holds up and where it falls flat. This particular article leaves more than a few questions open: - How does the Pentagon assess who is or isn't a Russian troll? The article is forthright, if not forthcoming: the DoD isn't disclosing their methodology or where the 2,000% number comes from.
- As a general rule, large percentages are often due to small denominators. A church that goes from 1 member to 21 can proudly claim a 2,000% increase in membership, while a 0.5% increase in membership in the Catholic church would entail millions of new members. Is this the phenomenon we're witnessing with these putative Russian trolls? We've gone from 10 to 200, hence stop the presses?
- Is it not likely the Pentagon considers a Russian troll to be any Russian-IP-originating account that supports Moscow's narrative and contradicts the DoD's? Would we call every American account supporting the DoD's narrative and contradicting Moscow's an "American troll"?
If these Russian troll accounts are being run out of some Kremlin-run factory in Moscow, the appellation is just. But then we have to ask: i) How can the DoD reliably distinguish between a state-sponsored troll and a Russian citizen who simply believes his/her government?, and ii) How is a 2,000% increase in trolling consistent with the idea of a troll factory with a year-round mission and dedicated staff?
ibid.: Laura Rosenberger, director of the Alliance for Securing Democracy and a senior fellow at The German Marshall Fund of the United States, says her organization's Hamilton 68 dashboard has tracked "a concerted campaign to present alternative narratives to sow doubt about the evidence that Assad was responsible for the chemical attack." I'm a part of it. Pres. Assad's involvement doesn't make a lick of sense, and I don't trust the US DoD as far as I can throw an aircraft carrier. "Trust us, and don't believe all that fake news the Russians put out," isn't going to cut it anymore, Ms. Haley. If my skepticism makes me a Russian troll in the eyes of the US DoD: so be it, comrades.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 19:28:32 GMT -5
Do the Russian still think that works?
Are there still people who believe what gets passed around on Facebook is 'news?'
IMHO, anything anywhere on social media is gossip, lies, wishful thinking or doggerel. Go someplace with actual journalists for news. You realize that message boards are considered social media? If so, is this your admission that you can't get enough gossip, lies, wishful thinking, and doggerel?
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 19:24:15 GMT -5
A good many people were upset by Benedict Cumberbatch playing 'Khan' in the updated release of "Star Trek: Wrath of Khan" for the same reason. Per Star Trek lore, Khan is Indian (the descendant of Sikhs, I believe), and Mr. Cumberbatch... well... isn't. It does come across as pretentious when an actor is cast against the race or gender type of a famous character, and quite often awkward, but it is what it is. It's not life or morally threatening. Try not to let it mar your enjoyment of the show. Were they equally perturbed the first time around when Ricardo Montalban played him? No. Apparently he has some Asian/Indian in his ancestry. Also, we might say he's been grandfathered in. The Star Trek franchise has always been cautious about racial stereotypes, and casting for the original movie took place in a climate where producers wanted to avoid too many non-whites in villainous roles. Or so I've read.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 19:11:09 GMT -5
What it is NOT from, as I highlighted for you above, is the yearning that women have to go back to the 50's. I don't believe the shift is explainable by a "yearning to go back to the 50's". But just because people don't yearn for it doesn't mean people weren't happier in that era. Clearly the data tell us they were--and women in particular. Human desires aren't always aligned with human happiness, especially when society itself is such a great pusher of ideas on what ought to make people happy. Christmas is a good example. Supposedly the most wonderful time of the year--or so society tells us--and yet by the data, Christmas is an incredible burden. Stress. Misery. Loneliness. Overextended finances. Suicides. Rabid consumerism. Hence over the decades society has scrambled toward a bigger, longer, more extravagant "Christmas season" in a futile bid for happiness, and year after year we fall shorter of our goal. The same thing has happened vis a vis family and home life. Society tells us women ought to be far happier crunching numbers on spreadsheets, hammering away on construction sites, pushing IVs in hospitals in a full-time career, just like men, rather than raising a family and managing a household. And so people believe it. Society tells us homemakers are wasted potential, "slaves to men", fools who'll rue their lack of independence. And so people believe it. Society tells us women have no special skills in the household, no innate social need to care for a family, no emotional or psychological differences from men. And so people believe it. Even in this thread, whether contributors intend it not, there isn't a sole reader who'll walk away without a greater awareness of society's contempt for anyone--man or woman--who rejects the consensus. You ladies and gentlemen aren't subtle in your criticisms, and the casual reader doesn't know your belief in the superiority of progressivism is erroneous. She'll walk away convinced life was hell in 1950, any woman who was happy in that era was ignorant, and that any woman today who subscribes to gender roles and the nuclear family is somehow confessing to inherent inferiority in women--which couldn't be further from the truth. All this takes a toll on the public mindset, driving us deeper into an invalid social consensus on what ought to make people happy, and further away from what actually does. Frankly, it's a miracle there are any women left at all who don't think true happiness is kicking men's assess in the war of the sexes. It's just as much of a miracle Pres. Trump hasn't stirred up more male support for his kicking women's asses in the war of the sexes, which is just as rotten and harmful to society. Anyway, I got a shot at Pres. Trump in there, so that ought to win me some brownie points in the rebuttal.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 16:07:35 GMT -5
If you read the full article, the section "What’s goin’ on?" presents--and debunks--several theories to explain the change, one of which is the "second-shift" theory you describe above. It's worth reading the entire section. You didn't read his subsequent article on the topic, which debunks your theory that women would be happier if they lived like they did in the 50's:
Some of you suggested that what was causing the decline was women straying too far from their natural role as caretakers of the home and family, that, in a sense, women were better off 40 years ago, when the challenges of running a home and raising kids gave women a unique, valuable and, above all, focused role to play. (As I mentioned in my previous post, 42% of men and 39% of women do believe that it is natural for women to play this role.)
What we know for certain is that returning women to the role of primary caretaker won’t make most women happier. We know this because whenever and wherever the research is done on this subject, the results are always the same: women with no kids are, in general, happier than women with kids. I realize this sounds perverse—who doesn’t love their kids—and yet the research has been repeated so many times, in so many countries, there’s no escaping it. Kids, it turns out, are a bundle of stress.
www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/womens-happiness-what-we_b_295876.html
Which re-affirms my original statement - modern women would be happier if they had more time (time to reduce the stress of parenting/working/housework). Not going back and living like it was the 50's again.
No... it affirms that life is less stressful with no kids, which I can certainly believe. Unfortunately, low birthrates carry their own--more severe--impact on society, something Europe is learning with greater pain year after year. Canada and the US are a half-generation behind in some regards; our demographics aren't quite as bad. But it will ultimately bring us to our knees too, provided something else doesn't do so first. You're also overlooking the fact that women are still unhappier today than they were in the 1950's. I guarantee you it's not because women today are having more children.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 11:47:52 GMT -5
Heap up your anecdotes. It obviously makes you feel better. www.huffingtonpost.com/marcus-buckingham/whats-happening-to-womens_b_289511.html (bold by me): Yet the biggest surprise would have come if you had asked her just one more question. Given all the evidence of women running corporations and universities, hospitals, media empires, branches of government, army divisions, and countries, do you think women in the future will be happier?
Of course they will be happier, she would have said. With all these opportunities and achievements, how could they not be?
Well, as it turns out, too easily. ...
First, since 1972, women’s overall level of happiness has dropped, both relative to where they were forty years ago, and relative to men. You find this drop in happiness in women regardless of whether they have kids, how many kids they have, how much money they make, how healthy they are, what job they hold, whether they are married, single or divorced, how old they are, or what race they are. (The one and only exception: African-American women are now slightly happier than they were back in 1972, although they remain less happy than African American men.)
...
And, in case you’re wondering, this finding is neither unique to this one study, nor is it unique to the United States. In the last couple of years, the results from six major studies of happiness have been released: ...
All told, more than 1.3 million men and women have been surveyed over the last 40 years, both here in the U.S. and in developed countries around the world. Wherever researchers have been able to collect reliable data on happiness, the finding is always the same: greater educational, political, and employment opportunities have corresponded to decreases in life happiness for women, as compared to men. It's unfortunate the article doesn't take the data all the way back to the 1950's, since the trend is the same. But even with the shorter series, quite the conundrum: even with the horrid conditions women faced decades ago, and the overwhelming prevalence of unreported atrocities, relative to today (an era in which domestic violence is all but totally nonexistent), women were considerably happier. I would argue that's because women are unhappy for a different reason than you seem to think.
Women probably are less happy. All of society is less happy, men and women both.
There was a study done recently where researchers gave a small chunk of money to two sets of couples. One set were told to buy something new with it. The other set were told to spend the money on a service that would do the task they most hate to do - laundry, housecleaning, yard work, etc.
Overwhelmingly, the group that was most happy at the end of the study was the group that used the money to buy themselves more time.
Women (and men) are less happy today because they no longer fulfill one task - SAHM or breadwinner. Now, with most couples working full time, the chores that a SAHM used to do have to be split between the two of them, and statistically, most of that 'extra' work falls to women, so they are most likely to be the least happy.
I remember back when DS was little, how overwhelming it seemed at times to juggle a full time job, doctor's appointments, his sports activities, playdates, grocery shopping, laundry, housecleaning, etc. And I was fortunate to have a DH who shared a lot of the burden. I was stressed - and so are a lot of people these days.
I would caution you against claiming that stress would go away if everyone just went back to being SAHM's and breadwinners. Now that women feel like they have control over their lives, careers and families, very few of us want to go back to a time when SAHM was the only career choice open to us. Rather, we would be more happy if we gave up trying to 'keep up with the Joneses' by buying more and bigger 'stuff' and instead, subcontracted out some of our most hated chores to free up more time for fun stuff. If you read the full article, the section "What’s goin’ on?" presents--and debunks--several theories to explain the change, one of which is the "second-shift" theory you describe above. It's worth reading the entire section.
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 9:25:10 GMT -5
It's a little-known fact that Dr. Einstein detested snow leopards. Positively detested the creatures. It's rumoured his work on general relativity and the structure of spacetime was motivated by a desire to develop a "gravity cannon" that could collapse a snow leopard into a singularity in the blink of an eye. (Naturally, most biographies omit this fact. Too controversial.) Truly a great man.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 8:48:54 GMT -5
He lives on in our hearts, our minds, and our Internet memes.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 8:45:49 GMT -5
Virgil doesn't want to hear our "anecdotes". Evidently, they're meaningless. In terms of the debate over the social health of Western society in 1950 versus today, unfortunately they are meaningless. Anecdotes reflect tiny samples drawn from a biased pool (i.e. YMAM), while statistics represent the aggregate data of millions in this case. Hence for every instance of grief and indignity you cite here, it's a trivial matter to cite a grief or indignity of the present day. You're falling prey to the same fallacy as the climate change "denier" who cites a bitterly cold snowstorm as evidence climate change is a hoax. It doesn't make much difference to the man waist-deep in snow in -20° weather, just as your personal experiences growing up aren't undone by my citing statistics, but the slowmoving aggregate trends are nevertheless real and extremely important (as any climate scientist will tell you). The value of your anecdotes is in exposing your viewpoint: what objectionable behaviours you believe were more prevalent in the past, and why you object to them.
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Virgil Showlion
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 16, 2018 7:42:55 GMT -5
You're making a case for not banning assault weapons. Your audience is reading a case for a nationwide ban on handguns. Maybe just quit while you're ahead.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 15, 2018 18:20:47 GMT -5
Certainly not. Einstein was a physicist, scientist, and professor, so did not have an anti-intellectual, anti-science bias. He worked against war and racism, and for civil rights, and he was a pacifist. No way in hell he was a conservative. he was a flaming liberal on the scale of Mark Twain and Thomas Jefferson. good company to keep, imo. "Flaming liberal" in the 1950's is today's libertarianism and paleoconservativism. I somehow doubt we'd find Dr. Einstein marching with BLM, screaming at Congress to open the borders, banning conservative speech, or plugging socialist policies mathematically guaranteed to fail in a generation. He was also quite the mathematician, hence I suspect he'd be quite a thorn in the side of the AGW crowd, whose perennial failure to accurately model climate is legendary.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 15, 2018 18:09:10 GMT -5
...but we will get to the truth. I don't share your optimism. Each of us will have to make a judgment call based on inscrutable, conflicting, and generally insufficient data. It will ultimately be based on who we trust.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 15, 2018 15:46:12 GMT -5
He may even decide that chemical weapons use......... is not worth the fuss it causes with everyone else. Exactly. If he's an even part-way reasonable individual--which it seems to me that he is--he won't deploy chemical weapons again. He's won the war. He wants to avoid at all costs giving numerous hostile foreign powers an excuse to destroy and/or invade his country. His not deploying chemical weapons again is clearly in his own self-interest. Hence when the next report comes in of a chemical weapon attack, remember this was our present conclusion.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 15, 2018 15:34:07 GMT -5
Poor bastards didn't get the memo in time, it would seem.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 15, 2018 10:05:52 GMT -5
RT just put this out in defense of Russia: The substance used on Sergei Skripal was an agent called BZ, according to Swiss state Spiez lab, the Russian foreign minister said. The toxin was never produced in Russia, but was in service in the US, UK, and other NATO states.
Sergei Skripal, a former Russian double agent, and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with an incapacitating toxin known as 3-Quinuclidinyl benzilate or BZ, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said, citing the results of the examination conducted by a Swiss chemical lab that worked with the samples that London handed over to the Organisation for the Prohibition of the Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
The Swiss center sent the results to the OPCW. However, the UN chemical watchdog limited itself only to confirming the formula of the substance used to poison the Skripals in its final report without mentioning anything about the other facts presented in the Swiss document, the Russian foreign minister added. He went on to say that Moscow would ask the OPCW about its decision to not include any other information provided by the Swiss in its report.
Lavrov said that the Swiss center that assessed the samples is actually the Spiez Laboratory. This facility is a Swiss state research center controlled by the Swiss Federal Office for Civil Protection and, ultimately, by the country’s defense minister. The lab is also an internationally recognized center of excellence in the field of the nuclear, biological, and chemical protection and is one of the five centers permanently authorized by the OPCW. Just an FYI for those taking an interest in the case.
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Post by Virgil Showlion on Apr 15, 2018 7:48:28 GMT -5
I love this type of period show. I watched the first season of Versailles and now that the second is available in Netflix I can't wait to start watching it. But for some reason, I find it off putting that they changed the race of some of the protagonists. To me, it takes away the magic and I am instantly aware I am just watching a show. I don't understand what they were trying to prove. It's been happening more and more. It doesn't bother me until it becomes obvious that they're going for diversity by using an apparent quota. Your problem with it originates from familiarity with the subject matter. You start with a preconceived notion for how the story should look, and you're constantly judging whether the story you're seeing is better or worse than what you had in mind. I had a similar problem with Jesus Christ Superstar, not with the races of the actors, but with the story that was presented. A good many people were upset by Benedict Cumberbatch playing 'Khan' in the updated release of "Star Trek: Wrath of Khan" for the same reason. Per Star Trek lore, Khan is Indian (the descendant of Sikhs, I believe), and Mr. Cumberbatch... well... isn't. It does come across as pretentious when an actor is cast against the race or gender type of a famous character, and quite often awkward, but it is what it is. It's not life or morally threatening. Try not to let it mar your enjoyment of the show.
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