Just for the record

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Bill Glasheen
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Re: Just for the record

Post by Bill Glasheen »

Glenn wrote:Oh we got it...it's not what you said but the way you said it, in particular setting yourself up for an out-of-context quote as Valkenar demonstrated.
Out of context indeed!

This comes to mind.

Rorschach test

In engineering we think of it this way.

Impulse response

I mock the elitist attitude of certain insufferable Hollywood type. In this case we're talking wealthy liberals who drive $100K+ electric vehicles that the average consumer cannot afford, and then promote impractical "green" agendas that will devastate 3rd world economies. Justin sees *me* to be *his* version of a political boogeyman. His response says less about me, and more about how Justin perceives me irrespective of reality.

You got punked as well!

It reminds me of a birthday card in the shop downstairs at my company HQ. It shows a picture of a large-breasted woman. On the inside it says that if you know what color her purse is, then you're getting old. Now... if you want to speculate on which one of us more likely to leer at mammary glands, well... :lol:

Image

- Bill
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Glenn
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Re: Just for the record

Post by Glenn »

Hey, you're still older than I am, that card is meant for you! And while you leer, I prefer zanshin. 8)
Glenn
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Re: Just for the record

Post by Valkenar »

Bill Glasheen wrote:Justin sees *me* to be *his* version of a political boogeyman.
I don't really, though. I just thought it was funny. You're usually quite articulate, but in that particular paragraph you stumbled and wrote something that came out sounding wrong. I definitely get that your goal was to rail against this "hollywood elite" boogeyman you've started talking about.

I think you sincerely believe that your vision of social structure is ultimately better for the poor than mine. I also think you sincerely don't care much about people you judge to be (emotionally) stupid (as we've already discussed). Finally, I think you don't consider wealth disparity to represent a significant problem because of the pareto principle, and because of a philosophy you would likely describe as Jeffersonian. While you would like to see poverty lessened, it's not a major concern right now and you think a free market would make things turn out about as well for the poor as they can. Am I doing you disservice here?

P.S. I think that birthday card does a disservice to both men and women.
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: Just for the record

Post by Bill Glasheen »

Not bad, Justin.

Good people with different political points of view ultimately want the same thing. They want success and happiness for as many people as possible. Wealth disparity happens. The biggest difference from one fiscal point of view to the next is whether to view disparities as the glass half empty or the glass half full.
Valkenar wrote: I think that birthday card does a disservice to both men and women.
Context and perspective are everything.

No... we don't want mating rituals to muck up the corporate environment. Men and women deserve equal opportunity in their work lives. Companies such as mine have yearly 3-day required courses (complete with tests) on ethics and compliance that deal with such matters. It goes beyond that though. We don't ignore our differences; we celebrate our diversity. I have a multi-colored band I wear on my wrist most days - supplied by my company - to acknowledge that mindset. I'm one of the few who do. If you walked onto my work floor and opened your eyes, you'd immediately get it. In my high-math, high-tech, health services world, I swim with very different fish.

It's ridiculous not to acknowledge the obvious. Liberal academic types have spent decades trying to prove men and women are equal in almost every way, only to show that... wait for it... men and women are often different. We use our brains differently (e.g. to find our way from point A to point B). Our learning styles are different. The amount of words per day we use is different. The way we visualize a problem is different. The way we interact with each other is different. The way we respond to marketing is different. Our purchasing habits are different. The way we seek health care services is different. And our roles and habits in the whole mating rituals thing are different.

Speaking of martial arts... the way aggression manifests itself is different.

Thanks to books like Raising Cain, I'm now able to understand why my boys struggled in today's school environment when they hit puberty. Knowledge is power. Understanding what makes us tick helps us be our best.

Not to acknowledge that men are more visually oriented is ignoring findings from peer-reviewed research, never mind the school of any-fool-knows-that. Not to acknowledge that women know how they affect men - and sometimes work with it - is naive. This is sociobiology. It explains how homo sapiens DNA gets an opportunity to replicate.

The specific picture I found online (the blonde with the white top above) was in a work environment, so blurred the line. Oops... my bad. The card I spoke of had a more endowed woman in a casual setting with a green purse slung over her shoulder. Never mind the fact that I never would have guessed the color of the purse; I didn't even know she had one slung over her shoulder until I opened the card and saw the punch line. IT'S A JOKE!!! We all need to lighten up and engage in some good, healthy self-deprecation. No matter how much an emotionally-hijacked misandrist wants to make someone feel otherwise, men are men.

We all should acknowledge our respective tendencies and, yes, shortcomings. Without a sense of humor about it all, we're less than the synergistic whole that we can be.

- Bill
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Re: Just for the record

Post by Valkenar »

Bill Glasheen wrote:No matter how much an emotionally-hijacked misandrist wants to make someone feel otherwise, men are men.
This is the part I think does a disservice to men. I don't think it's misandrist to argue that men aren more nuanced and complex than the stereotypes suggest. I heard an interesting piece on the radio by the author of this book http://www.amazon.com/Why-Men-Fake-It-U ... 0805094245 expressing some of these things. One part I agreed with is that the public face we're expected to put on is this single-minded, sex-obsessed facade, and the reality is much less simplistic. I'm not trying to disregard differences between men and women, which certainly do exist. My point is that jokes about how men can't see beyond a pair of breasts are about as funny as jokes about how women are bad drivers.

As far as humor in general goes, I think there's useful perspective that highlights the difference between jokes based on stereotypes versus jokes at the expensive of stereotypes. Louis C.K. is an example of a comic who is good at using stereotypes positively and not just reinforcing tired old themes for a cheap laugh.
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: Just for the record

Post by Bill Glasheen »

Valkenar wrote: One part I agreed with is that the public face we're expected to put on is this single-minded, sex-obsessed facade, and the reality is much less simplistic.
I think that's hyperbole to the point of being a strawman argument, Justin.

Nature loves variance. I deal with it EVERY SINGLE DAY in my work. And I also deal with the fact that the world we live in has a lot of drivers to the outcomes we witness. All that said, we find statistically significant differences in mean behavior between the genders. And those differences shouldn't be ignored because of this or that anecdote, or because it offends someone's politically correct sensibilities. Differences are there for a good reason, and truth really doesn't give a darn how people feel. The only incorrect part of it all is viewing any of these differences as shortcomings. That's just ignorant. The world needs all kinds of personalities and abilities to make things run.
Valkenar wrote: jokes about how men can't see beyond a pair of breasts are about as funny as jokes about how women are bad drivers.
Men *do* notice and get distracted by breasts, unless they are gay. The only question is the degree, and that depends a lot on things like hormone levels. And even then, gay men and a lot of women look.

The whole point of the original card, Justin, was to make us look as shallow as we *can* be. Most men are punked by it, which speaks for itself. Meanwhile as my female friend observing this thread asked me to post, "Most women would notice the boobs *and* the purse." And I could cite some research which would show just how correct she is.

As for driving, I believe the consensus is that women are *usually* better "every day" drivers. Don't believe me? Check out insurance rates. Competitive driving? That's another story. Female race car drivers are few and far between. That's where testosterone (extreme risk taking) comes into play.
Valkenar wrote: As far as humor in general goes, I think there's useful perspective that highlights the difference between jokes based on stereotypes versus jokes at the expensive of stereotypes. Louis C.K. is an example of a comic who is good at using stereotypes positively and not just reinforcing tired old themes for a cheap laugh.
If we're talking humor involving stereotypes, I'm a bit on the edgy side. I'm more of a Harold and Kumar or South Park fan, where stereotypes are taken to extreme levels of absurdity. As long as everyone is fair game, then I'm good with it. Humor starts and ends with being able to laugh at yourself.

I'm also a Totally Biased fan. It's my upbringing. I get things that others don't because of my life experiences.

Sikhs vs. Sheiks

- Bill
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