J.D. Moyer

sci-fi author, beatmaker

Category: Culture Rants/Shares Page 7 of 21

Charles Koch: When Good Intentions Produce Evil Results

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On August 14

In Alternative Economics, Culture Rants/Shares, Utopian Speculations

Tim Ferriss recently interviewed Charles Koch on his podcast. At first I found it difficult to reconcile the obviously principled, kindly man, a person concerned with the state of the world and hoping to contribute as much as he can, with some of his deeds, which include:

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Why I Like Fights (Consensual Violence)

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On November 13

In Culture Rants/Shares

I’ve been thinking about why I love to watch people fight. Especially if both combatants are skilled and each has a good chance of winning. A big part of it is the vicarious thrill–imagining myself in the ring. But sometimes I wonder…am I just bloodthirsty?

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Emotional Labor and Invisible Household Work – A Male Perspective

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On October 9

In Culture Rants/Shares, Getting Organized

I recently read Gemma Hartley’s piece Stop Calling Women Nags–We’re Just Fed Up in Bazaar. Hartley’s article about emotional labor and the unacknowledged work many women do in terms of managing household relationships, logistics, and schedules has been widely read and shared in recent weeks, with many couples reporting breakthrough conversations with their partners regarding the division of labor and responsibilities.

In short, many women end up managing a household by default, and are frustrated when men offer to “help” because why is it their job to manage the household in the first place? While some couples consciously choose to divide labor into “earner” and “household manager,” in many cases women end up getting stuck with both earning and primary household management roles, and that can lead to a great deal of resentment.

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How Do We Reduce Young White Male Entitlement?

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On September 29

In Culture Rants/Shares, Politics

Recently I listened to an episode of This American Life entitled “White Haze” about various Alt-Right and Alt-Lite movements, and the Venn diagrams of belief systems that may or may not include men’s rights, reclaiming traditional masculinity, abstaining from masturbation, anti-PC/SJW, keeping women out of the workforce, opposing non-white immigration, drinking beer together, anti-Semitism, white nationalism, casual racism, and full-blown white supremacy.

My impression was that for many members of these white male conservative groups, the main emotional issue was a sense of entitlement, manifesting as resentment and finger-pointing if such things as girlfriend, job, wealth, and status didn’t easily materialize. That, and an imagined sense of cultural oppression by liberals and feminists (though specific examples of how exactly white men are oppressed are elusive).

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Eyes On The Prize: My Current Vision for a Messy Utopia

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On August 26

In Alternative Economics, Culture Rants/Shares, Politics, Problem Solving, Utopian Speculations

These days, reading the national news is like watching a whirlwind of shit in high definition.

Emboldened white supremacists, the orange racist-in-chief, plans for an expensive useless wall, a government actively working to roll back environmental protections of every kind. Not to mention the very real possibility of nuclear war.

So I’m writing this post to remind myself what kind of world I’d like to live in. What kind of policies I’d like to see in place, in a more sane world.

I don’t believe in the pursuit of perfect utopias. Reaching that high is like flying too close to the sun. You have to start with a clean slate to build a perfect society, which means destroying everyone and everything and starting over. Which has been tried, several times in history, and generally ends in mass starvation and/or genocide. So no thanks.

The alternative is a messy utopia, one that builds on pretty good systems that already exists, one that takes a more-or-less empirical approach to solving problems, and one that doesn’t require perfect moral behavior on the part of its citizens. I’ve written in more detail about this idea here.

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