Quote from: Cadenza on November 30, 2015, 05:07:27 PM

I'd like to remind everyone that atheism is one of communism's most effective tools; you're free to dance that dance but don't ever forget who's playing the tune.

What.

A tool to make people arrogant, ignorant, and immoral. Atheism tells people that there is no absolute standard that you should hold yourself to, that anyone who claims as such is irrational and not nearly as smart as yourself, that you are above god and religion while simultaneously making "science" your new god and religion. I've spent enough time as an atheist to understand that it's all just a scam to trick people who believe they're far smarter than they actually are into believing bullshit. And the way in which it attacks western history and morality has communism written all over it.

I'd like to remind everyone that atheism is one of communism's most effective tools; you're free to dance that dance but don't ever forget who's playing the tune.

As for belief, I think it's one of those ideas that while everyone knows about and has some form of opinion, you really can't handle those ideas without certain life experiences and perspectives, such as the importance of family, community, morality; and susceptible the human mind is to manipulation. I was brought up as a christian child but it never meant anything to me because I lacked the perspective on humanity that I know have; back then my Grandma died and all I could think of was "why would god allow that happen if he's so great?", that made me an atheist and stunted my mental growth for at least a decade.

To use an analogy, it's like people are trying to understand trigonometry without ever having seen a right angled triangle; while it's entirely possible to derive all the trig functions as solutions to differential equations in the form of their Taylor series without any reference to triangles, there's almost no justification to doing so, or explanation of it's quirks that way. You need the geometry behind the trig functions in the same way that people need to seriously examine the human mind and it's influences to understand god and religion.

I guess there's some hope that the franchise can finally die in the future, I just don't see how people haven't gotten completely sick of star wars after almost 4 decades.

Haven't even played the game but damn does this sound good.

That's quite charming.

Natural, fuck being a fake.

Worst case scenario I pick the one that looks like it'll have the most interesting outcome, at the very least I'll have a fun story to tell after all's said and done.

I really want to learn all the maths behind this so I can say with some confidence whether or not this is amazing or bullshit. Fascinating regardless though.

Next year I'll be heading to university on the other side of the country, studying maths and physics, I'm incredibly excited about it even though complex analysis and differential geometry don't get taught until a few years in.
At the same time I'm terribly afraid about making friends - recently just before I graduated the college had a mini festival and I realised just how many people I had spent the past half decade with, but had never once talked to; It's like I saw all the possible future pathways where I could've been a part of their lives and they could've been a part of mine, but I wasn't able to make them a reality. I never want that mistake to happen again and I intend to be the best person I possibly can next year, I want to know the names of everyone I come across.

After that I really want to have my own house with my own land and animals and equipment, and most importantly a loving wife and kids. I still dream about one day walking on the moon but I know for certain that starting my own family and passing on my experiences is something that I can achieve, while the moon is up in the air so to speak. Being a failure as a father is my biggest fear in life but I know I have to take the risk, and try my hardest to succeed.

If there are good muslims out there then they really should be working to make their Muslim countries better places to live. I'd hardly have a problem with them if they stayed amongst their own people. The fact that they choose to come into non-muslim countries instead puts me on edge.

Quote from: Cadenza on October 29, 2015, 11:09:05 PM

There is nothing wrong with any given person not being interested in any given field; I don't think most women's lack of interest in maths is bad per se, though It really limits how many people I can share it with.

It's just that maths is a field of study made by men to answer questions asked by them; any woman with access to the people/books/education institutes could join in, but most don't, and this trend goes back at least to ancient Greece. And when I think about it, it's not the maths itself that's masculine, but the applications of it - just studying algebra for the sake of it has nothing to do with humans of any kind, but solving an engineering problem is definitely masculine, and for that you need algebra.

But there's nothing inherently masculine about math, nor does math have any sort of reason, biologically, to develop in men and not women. It's not as though higher levels of testosterone make a person great in math.

The point you're making is cyclical, in a sense. Yes, men have historically devoted more time to the maths than women, but women have also been treated as weaker and less intelligent throughout most of history by the cultures which made bounds and leaps in mathematics.

Well I did say it's not the maths itself but the applications of it that would drive a person to learn maths, that are masculine. Pure maths could've just as easily been discovered by aliens without any concept of male or female.

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I agree and have nothing against the contributions of the women who do choose to contribute, but I am concerned that their contributions may come at a cost to them having their own families.

Women are biological caretakers, but that means next to nothing in the present day. Men are entirely as capable as women are of taking care of children and raising a family - unless you count breastfeeding as the absolute end-all-be-all to raising a kid.

Added onto that, we're no longer at a point in history where continued reproduction is vital to the success of our families, communities, or race. We've got problems with OVERpopulation. It hardly matters if a man or women doesn't want to have children in this day and age.

Men are undeniably needed in raising children, it's just that I can sympathize more with the man that spends more time working to provide for his family than a woman that does the same.

And overpopulation where? Africa, India, China, but what about my country New Zealand? or my ancestral homeland of Ireland and England? We're not overpopulated at all, we're in decline, I don't want my people going extinct.

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You're not coming off as a cunt.

And I thought I stated my point, men's business clothes carry a level of respect with them due to the qualifications required to wear one, and I forgot to mention but also the financial implications of being able to afford one. Casual clothes of men and women carry no such connotations, so when someone wears the casual clothes of the opposite sex it isn't for respect; the only reason I can think of is that it's for sexual reasons.

As Egg pointed out, the level of female clothing worn by a man is not looked at any differently. You're arguing this point based on class whilst I'm doing it based on the gendered nature of the clothes themselves - a women can wear anything from boxer briefs and a loose men's t-shirt and nobody bats an eye, but if a man were to wear a highly professional blouse and pencil skirt or a flowing gown, it'd be looked at as strange or an abomination.

But I'm saying we do bat an eye at women like that, I see a women wearing a man's casual clothes and think that she's sleeping with that man and could've chosen better clothes to wear in public. A man wearing a woman's proffesional clothes is pointless since professional clothes for him already exist.

And you really can't think of any other reasons that a person might wear certain clothes? Maybe, I dunno, he thinks he looks good in them?

It honestly hadn't crossed my mind at all

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I don't like anal, I do not understand the appeal at all; a tube full of shit is just as disgusting to me regardless of who or what it is attached to; going further and sticking your dick in it, especially when if it's a women then there is a perfectly good vagina right there, makes no sense to me. I can handle perverted things but not anal.

Uh...okay? That still has nothing to do with the hatred of gay men - unless you dislike gay people purely because you don't find what they do to be attractive, in which case that proves the point that I was trying to make on said issue and...kinda makes you shitty.

Hatred and disgust are two different things. I find their displays of affection offputting and their methods of having sex repulsive, but even I think it's ridiculous to hate them for that, and I effectively never see them doing what they do anyway. You could say I tolerate them.

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I don't see anything wrong with women being effeminate, that's how they evolved to be and it's how i find myself attracted to them. Likewise I do have a problem with men being effeminate because that isn't how they evolved to be and as a result it leaves me deeply confused about them - the only times when I would ever act like that, or any of my friends would act like that, is as a joke.

Neither men nor women "evolved" like that, western standards of society have simply become the norm across the world and that's what become the norm across the world. The concept of gender and sex is (rightfully) held to much more variable and fluid standards by hundreds of cultures across the world - it's just that those have died out and/or become much smaller and less influential with the westernization of the world in the last few hundred years.

Societal standards can evolve, but there's no "biological" reason for masculine and feminine traits being assigned so rigidly. Pink was considered a masculine color until 60 or so years ago, after all.

Behavioral patterns specific to one sex can evolve like any other sex specific part of the body; they are certainly more malleable but I don't believe they exist without purpose. I think they haven't died out precisely because they're beneficial and because they work.

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I'm finding this quite helpful typing out these ideas to someone like you, I don't get this kind of confrontation of my opinions from anyone I know and I'm getting the feeling that I wouldn't have as much of a problem with you LGBT if all discussions on it were better informed.

Once again, I appreciate your willingness to learn on the subjects and am happy to discuss things with you, but you...might wanna find better ways to phrase that. It's coming off as the whole, "wow you sure are well spoken for a black guy" thing.

I'm not going to lie, I did hold a low opinion of you people before this conversation, and now I feel that I need to reserve my judgement until I know more.

Moby Dick tbh

The Prestige.

Quote from: Cadenza on October 29, 2015, 11:09:05 PM

I agree and have nothing against the contributions of the women who do choose to contribute, but I am concerned that their contributions may come at a cost to them having their own families.

Are you trying to say it's impossible for a father to be the primary caretaker? Most are built up by societal pressures to be career oriented, but nothing about being male makes you a worse parent.

Not impossible, it's just something that I have no experience with and so I don't understand it. I was raised primarily by my mum while my dad spent most of his time working, and this was the case for everyone I know (provided their dad's were still in their life), so this is the kind of setup that I can relate to, whereas one in which the roles of the mother and father are reversed is not.

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And I thought I stated my point, men's business clothes carry a level of respect with them due to the qualifications required to wear one, and I forgot to mention but also the financial implications of being able to afford one. Casual clothes of men and women carry no such connotations, so when someone wears the casual clothes of the opposite sex it isn't for respect; the only reason I can think of is that it's for sexual reasons.

Doesn't really hold up. A guy wearing a skirt and a guy wearing a regal wedding dress are both going to get mocked. And there's a lot of reasons to wear clothes other than sexual reasons. Skirts solve sweaty balls.

I hadn't considered a wedding dress, but to paraphrase an earlier post of mine about marriage, it's entire purpose is to unite a man and a woman (for the purpose of raising kids, not mindlessly fucking eachother), where tradition states that the woman wears the dress. I think it's understandable that if you're going to go through with marriage then you follow the traditions of it.

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I don't see anything wrong with women being effeminate, that's how they evolved to be and it's how i find myself attracted to them. Likewise I do have a problem with men being effeminate because that isn't how they evolved to be and as a result it leaves me deeply confused about them - the only times when I would ever act like that, or any of my friends would act like that, is as a joke.

What significance does "evolve to be" have?

I guess I really just don't understand this mindset. What does it matter if on aggregate males evolved to act masculine? The aggregate doesn't apply to individuals. What about them not fulfilling this archaic and outdated social role is so upsetting? Don't you think this is you letting your sexuality make judgements?

Because the scientist in me believes that our biology is the fundamental starting point of who we are. It's why one chemical is chosen for the use in synthesizing another (eating food to physically grow) and why one set of interactions is chosen over another (co-operating with your family instead of antagonizing them). Evolution is like a sieve, anything that doesn't work dies, so whatever is left over has to either be good for survival, or not detrimental enough to be removed; and I see the masculinity in men and femininity in women as behavioral patterns that have evolved like anything else. I don't see them as outdated ways of living anymore than I see eating or drinking or breathing as outdated ways of living.

No offense, but a personal anecdote doesn't have much sway - I'm not saying that you're wrong, just that you can't apply your personal experience to the world.

What's more, you're simply proving my point - associating mathematics and the like with masculine qualities and stating that women inherently find them less interesting. I won't go so far as to say that you're specifically implying that they're negatives, but I will say that the way it's worded sort of hints in that direction when reading between the lines.

There is nothing wrong with any given person not being interested in any given field; I don't think most women's lack of interest in maths is bad per se, though It really limits how many people I can share it with.

It's just that maths is a field of study made by men to answer questions asked by them; any woman with access to the people/books/education institutes could join in, but most don't, and this trend goes back at least to ancient Greece. And when I think about it, it's not the maths itself that's masculine, but the applications of it - just studying algebra for the sake of it has nothing to do with humans of any kind, but solving an engineering problem is definitely masculine, and for that you need algebra.

Correlation does not equal causation, and the fact that men go into primarily technical fields and have overall shown more lean towards those types of things does not mean that women are not important to the field or should be discredited. Women have played major roles in the establishment of programming, DNA mapping, computing, and many more areas of science and mathematics.

What's more, a culture that describes these "necessary" things as "masculine" inherently discourages women from the fields.

I agree and have nothing against the contributions of the women who do choose to contribute, but I am concerned that their contributions may come at a cost to them having their own families.

I don't mean to come off as a cunt here, but...you've just completely misread my entire argument on this factor. I'm questioning WHY males wearing feminine clothes is only regarded as a fetish whilst women in masculine clothes is regarded as normal and possibly even more normal than more outwardly feminine clothes in this day and age.

And clothes aren't inherently gendered - they're only labeled as such because of the notions that society has given them. Plenty of cultures had dress or skirt-like clothing for men and women alike.

You're not coming off as a cunt.

And I thought I stated my point, men's business clothes carry a level of respect with them due to the qualifications required to wear one, and I forgot to mention but also the financial implications of being able to afford one. Casual clothes of men and women carry no such connotations, so when someone wears the casual clothes of the opposite sex it isn't for respect; the only reason I can think of is that it's for sexual reasons.

Yeah, that's why anal is such a huge kink among straight men, right? Because who would find the idea of fucking butts to be attractive or anything?

And once again, you've only been reinforcing my point. Why is it not "respectable" to act more effeminate? This is exactly the sort of thing I'm referring to when I say that society has an inherently negative view of femininity.

I don't like anal, I do not understand the appeal at all; a tube full of shit is just as disgusting to me regardless of who or what it is attached to; going further and sticking your dick in it, especially when if it's a women then there is a perfectly good vagina right there, makes no sense to me. I can handle perverted things but not anal.

I don't see anything wrong with women being effeminate, that's how they evolved to be and it's how i find myself attracted to them. Likewise I do have a problem with men being effeminate because that isn't how they evolved to be and as a result it leaves me deeply confused about them - the only times when I would ever act like that, or any of my friends would act like that, is as a joke.

I appreciate your willingness to learn more on these issues.

I'm finding this quite helpful typing out these ideas to someone like you, I don't get this kind of confrontation of my opinions from anyone I know and I'm getting the feeling that I wouldn't have as much of a problem with you LGBT if all discussions on it were better informed.