The Good Men Project has been a real sh*tshow lately. The site’s founder, Tom Matlack, found himself labeled an ALLY FAIL by radical feminists the other day. They’ve been feasting at his blog for months, but they didn’t hesitate to devour the hand that feeds them …I imagine that by now Matlack looks like he submerged his arms in a tank of piranhas.
Interesting “feedback.” I really thought the MRA guys were crazy until I engaged the wrath of the feminists. Insane.
Tom Matlack
I’ll dish up the dirt at the end of the post, but first I want to call your attention to Is Feminism to Blame for Hookup Culture?just published there by Neely Steinberg. It came out of this whole kerfuffle, and in it she offers a contrast of her views with the views of feminist Hugo Schwyzer.
I mentioned to Hugo that I was intrigued by our contrasting positions—his steadfast defense of feminism and critiquing of men versus my critiquing of feminism and steadfast defense of men—not because we disagree in the ideological sense, but because of our tendency to stray from defending our own gender.
Hugo went first. Choice bits:
…My views about pleasure-centered sex education are very much rooted in what I’ve lived through and what I’ve seen.I’ve been married to four women, been “in love” with twice that many, and for a brief but intense period in my 20s and early 30s, I was very promiscuous. I now live very happily in a monogamous marriage. I’m not haunted by what I did, nor did the tremendous variety of experiences I had when I was younger spoil any opportunity for fulfillment with just one partner in an enduring relationship. Without compromising her privacy, I can say that my current (and last) wife’s life prior to our marriage was not dissimilar to my own. The intimacy we have today is at least partly a consequence of our experiences with other people, not in spite of them.…Women in particular need reassurance that their worth is not linked to their number of sexual partners. They need to hear that pursuing pleasure for its own sake when they’re young will not make it more difficult to form enduring monogamous relationships (if they want them) when they’re older.…I do regret the pain I caused other people. Rightly so. But what my life has taught me is that insight and compassion are rooted in experience; you can’t advise about what you don’t understand. My own ability to be a patient father, a faithful husband, a decent teacher and mentor isn’t in spite of my wild sexual choices when I was younger—it’s in large part because of them, and the lessons I learned.…I want to equip young people to discover their own sexuality and to make informed, pleasure-centered, empathy-centered decisions based on what they discover. I want them to know that they have the inner resilience to recover from the “silly” and “vapid” decisions they may make.
Here’s Neely:
I happen to think most women aren’t all that interested in having a lot of [casual sex] for purely sexual reasons, with multiple partners no less. And I’ve come to believe that feminism’s inability, and at times refusal, to acknowledge differences between the sexes has been disingenuous and has gravely backfired on women, leaving them ill-equipped to discover what really feels good and right to them.…I was told, by the 10% of women who are capable of effectively and consistently compartmentalizing their emotions when it comes to no-strings attached sex, that emotions were overrated, anathema even, and could easily be separated from sexual acts with another human being, to unapologetically unleash my inner slut (there’s that word again). It was our right (rite?) as women, our responsibility as sexual creatures, to show the world we can fuck like men do, have instantaneous orgasms, and feel faaaabulous while doing it in our 4-inch Manolo Blahniks. Countless women bought into this lie, only to realize years later that it doesn’t, in fact, feel so great most of the time, and that actually, there’s nothing all that empowering and liberating about spreading your legs with wild abandon.
On her years in the hook-up scene:
It’s as if I needed the crutch of Vodka to tell me what I was doing was an awesome idea, because without it I’d know better. I wasn’t alone. It was happening all around me. My friends, female acquaintances, countless women I’d met briefly over the years—we were all in the same boat. Post-college, we could pursue our careers and hobbies and passions full-force but were unable to form lasting attachments, to believe that a man wanted us for anything more than a quick hook-up, to understand what real intimacy was about.…If feminism’s goal was to eradicate the falsehood that a woman’s worth is tied to her sexuality, it has failed on many accounts. All I learned from drunken, fleeting hook-ups over the course of a decade was how much I was being viewed as a sexual object by men, as a vagina who happens to think and feel, rather than a thinking, feeling human being who also happens to have a vagina.
And finally on the feminist movement itself:
I understand everyone’s journey is unique, but I think young women today are looking for different, more tempered voices other than the I-am-woman-hear-me-roar variety, for tangible, strategic dating advice (such as, if you want a relationship try developing emotional, spiritual, and mental bonds with a man you like or just started dating by delaying sexual gratification—yours and his).
The always insightful Stuart Schneiderman had this to say about the article:
Very few men openly identify themselves as feminists. Still, many men happily mouth the basic tenets of the feminist credo. They may not understand what they are saying, but they support the cause because they feel grateful for what feminism has done for them.Take Hugo Schwyzer. He has been married four times. He has had countless casual sexual encounters and no small number of relationships. Manifestly, he feels grateful and perhaps endebted to feminism for having provided him with so much free love.So, he defends the feminist party line.In debating Neely Steinberg Schwyzer does not dispute that feminism, especially sex-positive feminism, has helped create the hookup culture.Yet, Schwyzer thinks it’s a good thing, for him, for his fourth wife, and for everyone who wants to learn from experience. Being anything but a gentleman Schwyzer lets on that his fourth wife can match him hookup for hookup.
…As it happens, Steinberg is far more cogent and thoughtful than Schwyzer. In truth, Schwyzer doesn’t seem to be thinking at all.
He wants young women to see their hookups as learning experiences. It’s amusing to see an ideological zealot defending the value of experience. What would Schwyzer say if experience taught people that feminism is exploiting young women to advance its ideological agenda?
I thank Neely for bringing these opposing views into the open where they may be examined and discussed. Neely’s post came out of a furious Twitter squabble when Tom Matlack pissed off the radfems by objecting to Schwyzer’s post In Rape Culture, All Men Are Guilty Until Proven Innocent, and then by daring to suggest this:
Men and women are different. Quite different in fact. But women would really like men to be more like them.
I can’t imagine Neely’s article is going to help Matlack get back into the Piranhas’ good graces, but if he continues to speak out against man hating and female supremacy the Good Men Project will be a much better blog. Voices like Neely Steinberg’s need and deserve to be heard.
By the way, for my view on whether feminism is to blame for hookup culture, see How Feminism Got Drunk and Hooked Up With a Loser. Shoot, does the title give it away?
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@ Richard
Haha I remember the Duke Sex List. Over at Jezebel they LOVED it! But then it came out that all of the guys were douchebag dude-bro jocks who had girlfriends. …and then Roissy pointed out that she basically gave points based on whether or not they were willing to cuddle with her. (Some of them finished in minutes, and then walked right out.)
How empowering.
@Doug1
Jess has shared that her own number is north of 25, and that she cheated on her first partner (husband? can’t remember), ending the relationship.
@olive:
I’m not going to email you about it, it’s really not that serious.
Or in other words I really don’t care enough about it to write more than I write here.
@ Malia
Awww, I thought we were close after agreeing a lot on the thread that shall not be named. I must have been mistaken.
My appraisal of my SMV probably seems annoying to you and a few other people because I am one of the few women on here that doesn’t subscribe to self-deprecating tactics. I know a good chuck of women in real life who go around saying “I’m not pretty”, “I’m a 6″, or “I’m fat”, hoping that other women will chime in with the obligatory “You are pretty” or “Don’t say that, you aren’t fat”.
Fishing for compliments is not attractive and I have never fished for a compliment on here. A woman could say she is intelligent until she is blue in the face and not catch any flack for it. What’s the difference with looks.
@Yohami
No, that study was about college students, aged 18-22.
Here’s the post –
http://www.hookingupsmart.com/2011/04/28/hookinguprealities/whos-really-having-sex-in-college/
Is that a bad thing?
Oh I misread me for him somehow.
Susan—
This was penned by rather your kind of feminist, Cathy Young (she’s probably about your age too):
http://www.mindingthecampus.com/originals/2011/04/_by_cathy_young_1.html
@Jess
The researchers had a high response rate of females. You’re talking nonsense again….
Sex was specified to include oral, anal and vaginal sex. I love how you lumped the high numbers in with those women who had one partner, lol. The percentage of women who had 11-25 partners? 2.3% 25+ partners? 0.3%
Keep in mind, this is all sex, including relationship sex. This is not about casual sex per se, though it’s obviously implied at the upper end of the scale.
Doug has gone on and on about being an alpha of a certain caliber and after a while, a couple commenters here went in on his “alpha status”. You go on and on about being attractive and frankly, it was only a matter of time before someone started doing that. I just do not think it is a factor of you being black, that’s all.
In general, to be perfectly honest with you, it’s widely not considered a likable quality in women (regardless of the accuracy of it), just like it’s not considered a likable quality in men to go on and on about being “alpha”.
I just don’t think the negative response to it was because of race.
Doesn’t mean you have to be self-deprecating, there’s many shades of gray between self-deprecating and arrogant, with humble being one of them.
Not at all.
@dragnet
Thanks, I saw your comment, both yesterday and a few weeks ago as well. I appreciate your honesty and don’t disagree with your characterization of me or HUS. That’s what I’m about. I am an ally to men, I have a plan, a strategy, and I’m not going to let these very unpleasant people derail it. Interestingly, it was the Kate Bolick article, and my mention of the apex fallacy that got people really riled up. Rmaxd started a thread at Roosh’s accusing me of stealing game concepts for my own benefit. I’d like to think I’m sharing real information about the SMP to break the feminist narrative, thereby benefiting both men and women.
It is true that I am no particular friend to men who eschew relationships in favor of casual sex. Nor to women who do so.
You’re a tough customer – your support means a lot to me.
Watching Sassy try to respond to Jess is like watching someone trying to catch a fish with their bare hands.
Malia,
Alright cool. Then I’m asking you to not bring it up again. I’m the type of girl who appreciates honesty, and I’ve dealt with too many people who make snide comments to the side about me when I’m not looking, which is kind of what you did the other day, then ignored my response. Don’t feel like putting up with it on a blog, for goodness sakes. My offer stands. I will gladly discuss it with you elsewhere, but here it’s just going to piss me off, and I will make that very clear in my responses.
Susan,
Yeah that was hilarious lol. I mean I definitely don’t have a low sex drive, but I’d much prefer 4 20-minute sessions to 1 2-hour session. My vagina cringes at the thought.
The press and people in college of both sexes wouldn’t be going on and on about the hookup culture there if only 9% of of graduating seniors had more than 5 lifetime sex partners.
First of all girls lie down their numbers, that polygraph study I linked demonstrated by a factor of 2. I think it’s more like a factor of 3, since girls genuinely forget a certain number of cases that weren’t good or emotionally significant to them, particularly if they have fairly high numbers. Second of all it was probably done on freshman, and at the end of that year either. Third of all it’s one study – are there no others or does Susan not want to tell us about others?
And finally college guys and girls wouldn’t talk about it so much to themselves and the media if only 9% of girls have more than 5 lifetime partners by the time the graduate college.
I flat out don’t believe that 9% is even close to accurate. At all.
@ Susan Walsh
It felt that way for sure.
@Jesus
Haha, yeah, we needed a major break from that. When Neely wrote such a good piece, I had to share it. Funny how after all this time Jess and Tom are here as if they’d never left.
@ olive
There are HUNDREDS of comments on these posts I don’t read them all and as far as you not looking, its on the Internet.
And no I’m not going to discuss it via email because I do not care about it. The hell I look like going back and forth with you over email?
I want to apologize for Xcess’ remarks. What a disgusting man. I thought I had banned him, but he must have used a new IP. Why does the spam filter always catch the wrong people?
Writing this blog has shown me that my notions that we were beyond race in this country were terribly naive.
Malia,
Am I an outlier?- the data below says I am in a minority as I have had 22 sexual partners.
Bear in mind that I count sexual touching and snogging someone as them being a sexual partner.
If I used the American definition my number is I dunno, about 15 I guess?
So I am either 8 or 9% respectively. I think mathematically Sassy and I represent a small minority rather than being ‘outliers’.
Perhaps I’m splitting hairs here- anyhow- I reckon most uk girls have say 8 flings and 2 LTRs by the time they consider marriage.
Some of my peers had more experience than me, but most a little less.
But for work and personal reasons I deliberately put off having a major LTR- so that has to be factored in. If I had met my guy at 18 my number would be ’1′.
“Observer sex poll 2002 (2000 people surveyed)
How would you define your sexuality?
Heterosexual: 93%
Homosexual: 3%
Bisexual: 3%
Don’t know: 1%
At what age did you lose your virginity?
Under 12 1%
12-13 8%
14-15 23%
16-18 40%
19-20 13%
21-24 10%
25-30 2%
Never had sex 3%
How many sexual partners have you had?
None 3%
1 15%
2 11%
3 10%
4 9%
5 9%
6-10 20%
11-15 8%
16-20 6%
20+ 9%
The average Briton has had 10 sexual partners”
That’s it in a nutshell. Why would she stop liking it?
You must have a poor imagination and no Hitachi wand.
Yeah Susan, this thread is a major deja vu from early HUS days. I don’t have the energy for it, but it’s quite funny in many ways.
From the Cathy Young piece I drew the long quote from—
I’ve pinned the arms above her head against a wall who I was first picking up and getting lots of IOI’s from more than a few times. Tends to really turn girls on all the more, if they’re already attracted to you.
Yet that would count as “attempted sexual assault” in that bogus survey behind the meme that one in four or five college women are raped or sexually assaulted or that was attempted against them.
The study is garbage but the Obama administration has made every college in the country use a 50.1% standard of proof for date rape accusations.
@Sassy
It is not about your looks, it is entirely about your being black. There are parts of the manosphere – the HBD crowd – where some real racists hang out. I don’t want them here, and I’m just sorry I was away for several hours this afternoon while that comment sat here.
If it’s any consolation, he wasn’t very nice about me either..Carousel Rider Walsh, haha.
Yeah, you’re splitting hairs.
Listen, you make two points and let me separate them:
1- you’re not a dried up hoebag if you’ve engaged in whatever. Despite what a lot of the online guys want to dictate as the new reality, you are right, there are men who don’t agree, enough for women to mate with.
HOWEVER
I wouldn’t advise that strategy because it’s like rolling a rock uphill. It’s not a winning strategy because you’re stacking the deck against you.
Having said that, being a low number girl is also not necessarily stacking the deck in your favor, to the extent these guys would have women believe.While theoretically, it SHOULD, when you read the accounts of women here, it’s clear that it doesn’t necessarily produce the results one would expect.
Having said that, it still makes sense for MOST people to play the odds that are in their favor, therefore, me personally, I don’t find it sensible to advocate the “do whatever” lifestyle because of the two, that is the one with the least likelihood of success.
@Doug1
Stop discrediting the study, you don’t know what you’re talking about. Read the damn post.
The researchers felt that a limitation of the study was a low response rate among males. N = 6,800; 5,466F, 1,375M
They cited the anonymity of the survey as a strength which provided more accurate reporting of sensitive behavior.
The subjects were distributed roughly equally across grades, with slightly higher representation among freshmen and seniors.
The anonymity was granted with an online survey, access granted with a randomly generated one-time PIN.
I believe your anecdotal evidence is coming from a rather narrowly defined group.
“The researchers had a high response rate of females. You’re talking nonsense again….”
no Susan, the researchers themselves said their findings were limited due to lower response rates. its true that its males that had lower response rates. i said nothing wrong though (again)
plus others have mentioned why underreporting could have occurred- for the females. i.e. did some ‘delete’ certain acts- regardless of the researchers criteria.
it is also rather at odds with the STD stats others have mentioned- dont you think? unless these girls are getting their viruses from their computers?
One thing that I really like about HUS is that people are surprisingly up front about their looks. Some say they’re hot, and they have experiences that back it up. They also have their own share of issues. Others say they’re not gorgeous, yet they have found love. The truth is that the SMP affects all of us, regardless of looks. We all struggle to find love. That was true in my day and it’s even truer now. The key thing is to be realistic about what you have to offer, just so that you don’t waste a lot of time trying to score out of your league.
The great thing about discussing this stuff online is that Beauty and the Beast get the same level of attention. What distinguishes people here is the quality of their commentary.
British women sound really slutty! Just kidding.
Fingering is not sex. Seriously, that is ridiculous.
Malia,
I meant don’t bring it up on a post where I haven’t been commenting in the last few hours, not citing my name, and hoping I don’t read it. Something like that. If you want to take digs at me, then do it directly, in a place where I will definitely see it, or don’t do it at all. If you can’t do that, then you’re no better, in my book, than the bitchy women I write about who have stabbed me in the back numerous times when I wasn’t looking. I don’t pretend to know about your life situation, and you don’t know anything about my life situation either. So please know that from now on, if you antagonize me, I will deliberately antagonize you too.
@Doug1
The polygraph study is interesting and it doesn’t surprise me at all. We all know that women are likely to fudge the number, owing to the sexual double standard.
However, it only included 100 women, a very small sample. The number of reported partners went from 3.4 when women thought it was anonymous to 4.4 when they thought they were hooked up to a polygraph. Oddly, women who were told their answers might be read gave an even lower number than the anonymous one, 2.6. I think the relevant comparison is between anonymous and polygraph.
Yet it’s relevant.
Which is better: fingered by 20 sex with none
Sex with 2?
I’m sorry but this anything but P in V sexuality is just distorting everything.
Fingering counts. That’s how you get “vaginal penetration virgins” that have done oral, anal, and everything in between. Sometimes I wish people would say “I haven’t had vaginal intercourse” because that’s really different than someone who has had no genital interaction .
If you’re going to judge people’s mate-worthiness based on sexual encounters, their ENTIRE sexual behavior is relevant.
Susan,
I love this. I often wonder what would happen if you held some sort of conference and invited all your regular commenters. It would be fascinating to see the social dynamic, to see if online alliances hold, or new ones form based on appearances. One of the main reasons I’ve been drawn to online communities, lately and in the past, is that as a short average-looking girl, I don’t hold a lot of sway in social situations. People don’t listen to me when I walk in a room. I’m definitely not an alpha male.
It’s fun to have people “get to know me” based on what I say, not on my tone of voice or body language or strange mannerisms that I’m not even aware of. I have great conversations here that I could not possibly have in real life.
@Malia
The truth is, we’ve known since Kinsey that sexual data is never “clean.” And no one has found a way around that. In the DOJ study, anonymity was guaranteed, that was not considered a limitation of the study. 5000+ women participated, it was not a small sample at all.
Interestingly, the prevalence of hookup culture has probably made women less ashamed re the number of partners. We’re probably getting better data today than ever before. When Kate Bolick asked the women in my focus group for their number, they didn’t hesitate to give it, and I knew they were honest. Their numbers ranged from 2-35. The only one who was self-conscious was the girl with 2, as she was clearly an outlier.
ok susan,
forgive the explicitness….
a girl gives a hand job to a guy for 10 mins resulting in ejaculation.
a girl has a guys unit in her mouth for 3 seconds before they are interrupted. they hurriedly dress and part company.
a girl is fingered by a guy for 15 mins resulting in orgasm.
now which counts as sex? a,b or c?
which is more intimate a, b or c?
seriously, after seeing Clinton’s behaviour I have no idea how Americans gauge these things…
also susan,
how many women were in your focus group and how many had over 15 partners?
@Doug1
I got into a big argument re false rape claims over lunch today, with my friend who is the Doc at Tufts Student Health Services. My argument is that if you’re going to say a woman cannot consent when drunk because she has lost her ability to reason, then you can’t hold men responsible for their inability to reason under the same condition. Most of these rape claims never involve the use of the word no. It’s all very murky. The worst thing, true at Tufts, and Duke, and probably lots of other schools, is that a third party can file a rape accusation. So let’s say a woman returns to her room, telling her Gender Studies major roommate that she had sex but doesn’t remember it. That third party can go to the disciplinary board of the university to file a rape charge against the man who participated, even if her roommate does not want to press charges. It’s outrageous.
The Duke 88 was led by Women’s Studies professors. They should have all gotten fired.
I don’t know if this DOJ study was the same one or not. I will have to look into that.
@ Susan Walsh
It’s no problem. As soon as he made the comment about the blonde wig and colored contacts, I knew his issue was that he doesn’t find black women attractive as a whole, not just me. I wouldn’t be able to change his opinion of that no matter how much I tried.
@Abbot December 19, 2011 at 8:33 pm
“it continues to blame the patriarchy for ills of the world”
Lately, the main focus of feminism is an obsession with how men universally place women in wife and non-wife piles if just one of the criteria for doing so is past sexual behavior. It drives feminists bat shit crazy.
Why is that?”
Thought provoking question – FWIW consider the following:
Accepting the assertion that – Women have the same right as men to engage in NSA encounters – fair enough. Two consenting individuals – not a problem. Rad/rabid feminists assert that they enjoy exercising this right; because it feels good – it is empowering – it is liberating.
Ok fine taking that at face value it would seem that these women would be other than angry; about what other people think or how other people react. Exercising free will and freely making personal choices – feels good if they are consistent with what is of value to the person making the choice.
This is most likely why feminists go bat$&)^ crazy when it turns out that exercising that right comes with responses that they did not anticipate and or dislike. Some of these empowered women are exercising a right that may not resonate with what they want internally, did not produce the feelings or response they wanted. So they feel cheated because the promised empowerment of exercising their rights did not come. Instead of feeling good they feel conflicted, used, betrayed by their own emotions, the movement that told them almost ordered/forced/coerced them to exercise their right and by society that does not approve. They are confused as to why men did not follow the established pattern of marrying them. They did not expect the rules to change- other than their gaining the right to assert their free will to engage in NSA encounters.
Funny thing about free will – just like they have the right to change other people do to. People are not static. Given that some women in order to exercise this right have to imbibe sometimes large amounts of controlled substances it does not appear to be an informed choice, intellectually, psychologically or emotionally honest clear eyed choice that is made freely. Given all of this the women who react badly when the reality check comes due the morning after have a lot to deal with.
It appears that some of these same women have self esteem issues i.e. are 1) seeking acceptance and engage in NSA encounters as a way to be a part of something bigger then themselves – the feminist movement the sisterhood as it were 2) need external approval to make themselves feel better 3) are not willing to think for themselves and own the choices that make sense for them from start to finish including the consequences that come as part of the outcome and risk not having everyone’s approval and or acceptance for the choices they make.
It would seem that if a person made a choice they honestly believed was in their best interest consistent with what matters to them if they were happy the approval of others would not matter. Conversely if the outcome was not as they expected – they would accept that they are mature individuals who did what they believed was best at the time. The outcome was not as expected – people lied, they underestimated their ability to engage in NSA encounters – accept they have value and worth as a person – learn from the choice and evaluate the process used to make decisions and how to alter their course in the future to change the outcome and move on rather than lashing out.
NSA encounters have never held any appeal personally because engaging in intimate behavior with someone who is not wanted as a friend or actually a respected and trusted friend seems empty and pointless. A choice based on personal truths, based on personal hopes, dreams and what personally matters.
You take yourself way too seriously. I don’t give a damn when your last comment was and when you read or when you didn’t. I don’t even consider stuff like that when I write because, check this out, I.DON’T.CARE. I didn’t hope you didn’t read it, IDGAF.
the ones who talk about you behind your back then you come online and talk about them. Girl please. You wanna get buck? Go confront those chicks in real life.
And lastly, nothing you write is going to change my posting behavior. I’ll write what I want, when I want, how I want. Don’t like it, I don’t care.
I don’t GAD about your life situation, boo. Seriously, you think I care? You write, I respond. That’s about it.
This sh!t really isn’t all that serious.
@peace
That’s a really important distinction. There are things that are true of all human beings, including the way we desire respect, trust, empathy, love. Every person wants these things, whether they pursue them or not.
I really am naive. I hardly know who is what race, who’s dating what race, who is attracted to what race, or anything! Some commenters, like Jhane Sez and PVW have been open about their racial identity. Bellita and Sassy share their photos. Furthermore, I don’t see why it matters.
One of my favorite films, Bulworth, featured this quote by Warren Beatty:
That’s my philosophy about race. It won’t happen in my lifetime, but if the species lives another 500 years, I bet that’s what we’ll look like.
Because Doug made a comment about white people being bad judges of what black men find attractive (i.e. no ability to rate the SMV of black women because he doesn’t know what black men find attractive) and I pointed out that Sassy doesn’t date black men exclusively (meaning, that what black men find attractive isn’t all that matters).
That’s my point.
I don’t think that many black women who date black men exclusively would find this to be the environment within which to discuss details of the SMP, therefore, I would think that a lot of people would deduce that non-white people who engage here are either more involved in, or interested in, interracial relationships since the demo of this site is more oriented towards caucasians.
THAT is the point that I was making.
http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/3027198.html
this link says that by age 20, 31% of girls have had sex with 6+ partners
but i still say my student survey link was more plausible (and recent)
something has to explain the STD issue here (uk) and in the usa.
“All we need is a voluntary, free-spirited, open-ended program of procreative racial deconstruction. Everybody just gotta keep fuckin’ everybody ’til they’re all the same color.
That’s my philosophy about race. It won’t happen in my lifetime, but if the species lives another 500 years, I bet that’s what we’ll look like.”
—-
accept the gingers of course……. surely no-one else is gonna fuck them?
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I’m totally joking! I stole an old Frank Boyle joke- and I have the ginger gene in my own beloved family!
(we keep them hidden in a remote farm-house- Joking! joking!)
Susan Walsh–
Perhaps with respect to surveys. Not with respect to what girls tell others, and in the case the other wasn’t a part of her social group, there was no rational fear of word getting round, only of being judged. So in her social circle that would be way more lied down most likely that 2x.
As well even on surveys there’s still the girls not remembering guys because the don’t want to subconscious factor.
It’s still a 30%
Malia,
This is exactly what I’m talking about. You pretending to know shit about my life. In case you were wondering, I already did. Not that you care, since you claim to not care about my life, even though you make inferences about it (like clearly you think I’m whining about my personal life online when I could do something about it IRL. Heh).
Anyway, it’s cool. You have now made it clear you will continue to antagonize me when you want to. I try to be nice to people around here, but I’m done trying to be nice to you. Have a nice day!
Susan—
Yeah that is really bad.
Hell people get tipsy in order to have their inhibitions lower, girls as well as guys. I think the legal standard should be the campus standard. If she’s not too drunk to be able to say no, basically if she can walk and talk, it’s not date rape. Just because she’s tipsy enough to not WANT to say no, when she probably would have (says her) had she not be tipsy, that’s on her, and not date rape.
I saw over at the False Rape Society that some guy who was kicked out of college for having dunken/tipsy sex with a girl when he was also tipsy, has filed suit against the uni on the following proposition. If he’s guilty of date rape because she was drunk, then why isn’t she guilty of it too because he was as well? Why don’t the two cancel each other out, or why wasn’t she kicked out too. Sex discrimination. I like it.
What I really want though is to drop this drunk sex business when she’s not passed out or incoherent.
-sex assault-
on the face of it the usa courts are guilty of straight forward sexual discrimination – I just don’t get it.
and why do some women (the professors as Susan mentioned) wish to support this culture?
Do they not see that it undermines genuine victims of actual rape?
This gives feminism a bad name in my view and i speak as someone who has worked with the uk police and rape victims in a prior career.
Susan—
Yeah that is one the worst things and it is outrageous. All in all though I think we’ll find the 50.1% standard combined with tipsy being campus date rape if she say it is, while she might have any number of reasons.
Also at Stanford to my chagrin they instruct the student disciplinary panel with stuff that tells them to regard him innocent until proven guilty with high prejudicial stuff about date rapists “almost never look the type” , and being very careful about believing him saying he’s been falsely accused because most, though not all, such accusations are true.
There are too many posts, but is Jesus Mahoney implying that Susan Walsh was a formerly promiscuous woman?
As for the person who said that girls don’t count oral/anal/fingering encounters, most of the guys on here and elsewhere agree that it DOES count. You’re still sharing intimate parts of your body with someone.
“Some commenters, like Jhane Sez and PVW have been open about their racial identity. ”
I’m East Indian, and when I talk about casual sex or perceived promiscuity..I’m talking about the perspective from the Indian community. Most non-Indian men see my sexual past as normal, whereas an Indian man might be judgmental.
yikes
@Munson
I wore that Ben & Jerry suit. You forgot the shoes for the commute: white Nikes, into which we slipped our L’eggs pantyhose-clad feet and walked to work on Wall St. Do you recall the William Agee – Mary Cunningham romance? It was such a scandal! She wore that suit perfectly. Once I was sitting in a conference room, a junior strategist nevertheless sitting in on a meeting with the CFO. Something moved in my peripheral vision – I looked down, and under the boardroom table he had his shoes off and was playing footsie with the L’eggs clad new hire of the HBS class of 1984.
You know what? You remind me a bit of Tom Wolfe. Your description of Women’s Studies profs was right out of Charlotte Simmons.
@Jesus again
“I don’t really care for statistics. What I do know is that I have many male friends, and none of them would knowingly commit to a formerly promiscuous woman. Unless that woman had undergone some serious changes. SERIOUS changes.”
I hope I’m not being too personal or making you uncomfortable, but you saying that you’re also a child abuse survivor…What’s your opinion on female abuse survivors that become promiscuous ,but then completely change after healing past trauma?
Malia, you’re being kinda bitchy right now. What’s the problem?
“Jess has shared that her own number is north of 25, and that she cheated on her first partner (husband? can’t remember), ending the relationship.”
…..
excuse me, you tried this kind of misinformation before on a thread about 3 months ago.
I corrected you then and its tiresome to have to correct you once again- lets make it the last time shall we?
After a proper audit my number is 22. This includes ANYTHING that could be construed as sexual contact.
I was not married to my 1st partner and we had no children. I had a single act of unfaithfulness LONG AFTER (years in fact) the relationship had died. I broke up with him officially immediately after.
It was the 1st and last act of unfaithfulness I have ever committed or will commit- I treat trust and faithfulness as very important.
Now is there any further clarity you would wish for? lest there be any more mischievous repetitions of semi-falsehoods…
@Doug
Thanks for the Cathy Young link. You’re right, she is my kind of feminist – I love her. She was once a local columnist at the Boston Globe, and I loved her then. Must be 15 years ago now.
“There are too many posts, but is Jesus Mahoney implying that Susan Walsh was a formerly promiscuous woman?”
Most of these debates are pointless as jess and tom create strawmen – few, if anyone here ever suggests that women with ANY casual sex in their history are somehow tainted.
I think you two need to try to grok the type of personality we’re talking about. The impulsive, insecure, validation-seeking girl that is neither introspective nor truly independent no matter how much she tries to tell everyone she is. These girls are considered a joke by the guys they want, destroy the guys they can get, and end up with a slew of emotional issues by the time they’re in their mid-late twenties.
You may say that these types of people aren’t that prevalent in the SMP, and I’d tell you that based on my own experience, you’re wrong. There’s more and more being created every day because of our fucked-up society.
@Doug1
I think it’s really important to get at the real number of people having NSA sex in college, if possible. Because if, as I claim, it’s a minority of about 20% of each sex, then that means massive pluralistic ignorance. The culture is the script that dominates, setting expectations, when in fact, a majority of both sexes is on the sidelines.
I remain open-minded about this. I do not ignore any data or study. At the same time, I recognize that any one study is just one point of data. Many more are needed.
“After a proper audit my number is 22. This includes ANYTHING that could be construed as sexual contact.”
Jess, like I said before, I really don’t even think 22′s a lot. That’s getting to be fairly common among girls in their 20′s now. I know some here will disagree, and I wonder if it’s just different circumstances or what. I’ve lived in a lot of places and hung out with all kinds of people, and as far as your average attractive American girl is concerned, I’d say 20 by 25-28 would be possible for say, 30-35% (just my opinion).
@Malia
Obviously, it depends on the circumstances.
I keep saying this:
Today we have an average of 17 years between menses onset and marriage. That is unprecedented in history. Fingering has been a way that people have gotten intimate and gotten off before they were ready for intercourse. Because intercourse is special. Do I think women should get fingered by strangers? No. But I think it’s a good way for teenage couples to be sexy before they’re ready for full-on sex. And when a man asks a woman of 25 how many sexual partners she’s had, I don’t think he’s wondering how many men have fingered her. He wants to know how many penises she’s had inside her. That’s what “the number” means.
As far as I can tell, she thinks I’m a world class bitch for coming here and using examples from real life to illustrate the SMP. And she’s pissed I called her out for being catty to Sassy, even though the other day, she called me out for being a world class bitch, except she didn’t use my name, she just said “some female commenters on here.”
She also thinks I’m hypocritical because I talk about other girls here online, when really she has no idea what kinds of interactions I’ve had with them IRL, and she has no idea whether or not I’ve confronted them, nor does she know about the outcomes of the confrontations. Basically she’s pretending to know shit about my life when really she’s never met me.
Sorry kids. My inner bitch has been unleashed. I don’t take kindly to personal attacks that don’t point to specific instances in which I was at fault.
Susan–
I simply don’t believe it’s an accurate reflection of how many senior college have had more than 5 partners in college and high school. 9%. Nahh. The whole country is talking about college hook up culture and almost no college girls have hooked up more than three of four times, allowing for LTR’s.
Not.Credible.
@Olive
I’ll confess something. I fantasize about writing a screenplay, a sort of HUS Big Chill. We all meet up for a weekend, and explore exactly what you describe. I think it would be absolutely fascinating. This group of commenters is amazing – getting all these brilliant people in one place would be a dream for me. I know people are protective of their identities – it could probably never work. But I love the idea.
Susan–
That too suggests the the only 9% of college girls have had more than 5 partners is bogus as well.
If it ever happened, I would totally attend a HUS bonanza. Meeting everyone here in person would be fun. That’s how I imagine it would be anyway.
@Olive,
I’m more than capable of writing exactly what I want to say.
I’m strongly disagree with this and state the following:
any guy that finds it important to ask a woman’s number is looking for a more holistic view of her sexual experience and would consider fingering, oral, and other non penis in vagina interaction, even if they wouldn’t necessarily count that towards “her number”.
It is my opinion, even stronger after my interactions on this site, that the guys who are hung up on “the number” are more likely to be more judgmental of female sexuality, therefore her other interactions are important TO HIM.
The way guys talk about it, on this site (and others), you’d think it’s on the “getting to know you checklist”. When I kept reading it, I had to do a quick survey of my friends to see who had this experience and they all looked at me crazy when I asked about it. In no way is my anecdotal experience indicative of the norm, except to say that a lot of conversations about sex are NOT being had, the way these guys make it seem.
And as a result, that has been added to my list of red flags.
@Malia
Huh. OK. I guess it makes sense that women dating interracially are here. Now that you mention it, I think Jhane Sez said her partner is white, and PVW may also have said the same about her husband.
I assume, based on your being here, that you also date men outside your race?
I like having a blog where people cross over!
Warm Woman,
I wasn’t trying to insult Sue or cast aspersions on her at all. I was pointing out that a girl can participate in casual, promiscuous sex and still go on to be a terrific wife and mother–but, that it’s still a riskier proposition for men than a woman who hasn’t participated in casual, promiscuous sex.
Sue’s number is, in fact, lower than my own at the moment, but it’s because I’ve spent the summer being promiscuous. Poor choice on my part, but what’s done is done. Anyway, I love Sue and what she’s doing, and I have a lot of respect for her. Was just using her history as an example.
As for a woman who acted promiscuously after abuse, I think she would need to fall into the group of women who’ve made major changes. In order for me to be willing to take the risk on such a woman, I’d have to feel comfortable that she wouldn’t fall back into those destructive patterns. If I were, then she would fall into the category of women who’ve made serious changes.
I think that sex should happen between people who care about each other. I want a woman who feels the same.
I still disagree.
Even if I flipped this up: A guy saying he has had no sexual interaction in 7 months is entirely different (t0 most women) than a guy who has not had sexual intercourse but gets BJs weekly. Furthermore, a guy who has had sex with 2 women in 7 months is entirely different than a guy getting a BJ every week by a different chick and you know it.
@Sox
haha, are you pressed for time? I want to tell you something – I LOVE it that you make the time to visit now and then. I know you’re super busy being a navy pilot and all.
Dear Sox,
Thanks- I would agree I’ve never really considered myself an unusually promiscuous person at all. I only felt to be in the minority when I was the ‘lowest numbers’ girl in my peer group. This was the case till I was 30!
Anyhow- the numbers are difficult. Susan may have a point about the culture- maybe usa TV and film suggest everyone is bed hopping when in fact only a minority are.
But the std figures and the other links I have seen do suggest that there is more sex going on in colleges than that one survey says. (and has anyone noticed the figures dont add up for the f/m N numbers?)
As to straw men there have been some (not all) coming out with some really extreme statements – and not all by Abbot either- so there was no need to misrepresent anyone- its all here in the threads.
I do agree that a women or guy on a completely hedonistic road of continuous sex and/or drugs is gonna come to sticky end.
and yes, i know some extremely promiscuous women who indeed are ‘train wrecks’.
and i am totally opposed to the over sexualised media- have you seen the latest GAGa videos. I feel dirty just watching them.
@Sox
I think this sounds about right.
Susan–
I don’t even think oral sex counts in her number to tell you the truth. A little bit maybe. I mean if she’s willing to give out oral sex to lots and lots of guys that’s being pretty slutty. Probably in an approval and attention seeking sort of way. I don’t know, this is kinda conceptual to me. I wasn’t a teenager at a time when very many girls would give you oral sex but not full on sex. I had only one girl willing to go oral but not further. She was a gf for a little while in high school, then I got sick of that. Rather beautiful though.
I sort of think of the number count as involving bonding opportunities – though not necessarily bonding. I think bonding only happens from good p in v sex. Possibly it might through him giving oral only but again I really wouldn’t know cause I can’t think of a single girl I’ve give oral to and not had intercourse with her as well. No Hugo Swayzer here. If it’s only that that feels rather supplicating to me and that it couldn’t cause her bonding. If girls have many p in v bonding opportunities that don’t turn into bonding cause he doesn’t stick around, or do bond but he breaks her heart by not sticking around long, and either or both happen repeatedly, I think it tends to cause girls to be rather inured to deep bonding from good sex after awhile.
@Olive
Isn’t that what we all do? Isn’t that what we should do to understand it better? It’s the only alternative to studies, and we know that data is iffy in many cases.
I love it when people come here and share their hopes, dreams, vulnerabilities, and failures in the SMP. And when a good thing happens, we can all cheer one another.
I don’t like infighting. I feel like I’m telling my kids to knock it off.
@Olive
For what it’s worth, I always assumed you look pretty much like Popeye’s girlfriend.
@Cheerful Sadist
You forget; I live in Boise. I not only heard of Agee/Cunningham,but my dad was on a local tv show with him (she was off camera; she told my mom that Bill and Ted (my dad) got along so well because they thought alike (probably not good). I never met him, but knew plenty about him MK was one of our big success stories; took him around 4 years to destroy it. Pretty clear she was the reason Bendix(?) went to a white knight-everyone hated her. He had his middle name changed to Joseph so they could be Mary and Joseph. She tried to have the Boise River blocked off because she didn’t like floaters portaging across her riparian area. They actually started the project-one of the contractors looked into a permit and that closed it down. This is appropriate: MK announced this massive, hurtful layoff-and then threw a Christmas party for the survivors less than a week later!(it was also a miserably cheap affair and our local tv station made damn sure everyone knew it).
As for commute shoes, I don’t recall seeing them, but I’m a guy-we don’t do shoes. I vaguely vaguely recall seeing some in Nikes, but women here don’t have that far so this was not you new First Wave Fems on the Line, it was secretaries. Law associates and various climbers didn’t do that here.
HBS? Not sure who that is. Enlighten the provincial. Also-clarify-he wasn’t playing footsies with Mary? BTW she was not even remotely hot. Oh BTW II get this. She started this “charity” for upper middle-class women who get knocked up. I shit thee not. I forgot what it was called and the details, but it was basically for someone like Mary who found themselves pregs. Again, the media here had a field day although needed to be somewhat cool as the deal was it was supposed to be away to avoid abortion, and you don’t make light of that too much (I guess they were Catholics).
I remember the Forbes article about them that showed him on his knees looking up to her-they were sick. He didn’t even attend his own mother’s funeral because it conflicted with Mary’s agenda. Flew their kids every week to private school somewhere in California on the company jet. She and an office for her charity downtown, had 100 surveillance cameras installed. Met this lawyer I know, and the next thing you know he’s MK’s spokesman on the company payroll mid-six figures (this is Boise; that’s serious jing). Of course you know his qualifications involved his appendages. I ‘ve forgotten most of it; but not how badly people got hurt. Lawyer I was partnered with at the time father had worked for MK his whole life, every nickel in that stock-all gone.
Charlotte Simmons-not a success IMO. But some of those themes are ones you’ve got here. Plus Wolfe-you know how to flatter a man (is that flirting?). I hope you meant it sounded like it, not that I copped it. DNR him talking womens studies, but do recall his description of the prof with little man tits-I know one or 2 little arrogant pricks like that, and I wish to God they had the remotest set of balls so they’d do something that’d justify me (ok excessive ref John Travolta “Pulp Fiction”) breaking my arm off in their mouth.Post pubescent women, in fact women at all-Tom can’t write well from that perspective. I read it and little has stayed with me which is unusual for a Tom book for me. What has stayed are how do all the chicks know about brazilians? Do they talk about them?
Oh, and did Harrison get it right? In the day were you thinking, even a little bit, I’m going to try to take the guy look and incorporate it into this “thing”? At least that’s improved; most women I see know how to look authoritative w/o coming across like what you would expect to get if a man and woman got into that machine that messed up Jeff Goldblum in “The Fly”.
BTW you subconsciously cribbed a line from “High Frequency” (?) where Cusak says you’ve got to punch your weight (old boxing lore; means stay in your division, work off the weight, don’t move up ‘cuz you’re unlikely to take your punch i e power with you). I don’t mean literally cribbed-score out of your league is your own. But surprise your next group with the boxing analogy-tell them you’ve got the hots for Klinscko!
Finally, and again your movie refs are “spot on” (I know limeys sound smart, but their attempt at exuberance always sounds limp). The only line from “Bulworth” I remember is that racial one-let’s mix it up. And it’s true-look at Brazil. or Tiger Woods. Once no one knows what the fuck racial identity one has it’ll be over. BTW did you know no less a personage than Adolph Hitler admitted “there’s no such thing as race”? True I’ll look it up if you want me to. Plus there’s a beautiful quote on the soul attributed to him-that one I’ve earmarked because it surprised me so much.
“I’ll confess something. I fantasize about writing a screenplay, a sort of HUS Big Chill. We all meet up for a weekend, and explore exactly what you describe. I think it would be absolutely fascinating. This group of commenters is amazing – getting all these brilliant people in one place would be a dream for me. I know people are protective of their identities – it could probably never work. But I love the idea.”
@Susan…
If I get an invite I am so there… I have an outfit already… it involves a cape, very wide brim hat and Jackie O sunglasses.
I do have a few small menu request and I have my own guy for lighting…
but you can discuss that with my agent ~JS
Not me. I had an Aunt Olive that used to chase me around the house with a wooden spoon. She never caught me because she used to do everything including cooking in heels. I picture a young Aunt Olive.
@Doug
Like I said, I’m not wedded to the idea. I’m always on the lookout for more information. This is very, very hard to get a handle on, I’ve found. I’ve been trying for three years.
I will say, of the two dozen or so women in my focus groups, way more than 9% have had more than five partners.
I don’t see how oral sex could not count. If a man is concerned about how many dicks have been inside a woman’s coochie, then wouldn’t he also be concerned about how many have been in her mouth?
“And if you do fancy it, then go for it. Don’t let anybody stop you. Just don’t complain that a lot of men aren’t into marrying that type of woman.”
But as you can see in this post, the complaints about this universal male truism
Will. Not. Stop.
I agree that it’s common. I just don’t think common necessarily equals attractive, or even acceptable.
A HUS meetup would be amazing! It’s too bad that most of us are probably too poor to travel anywhere. (…or maybe that’s just me haha.)
right susan and doug and sox,
Are we pretty much agreeing with the figure of say roughly 1/3 of women having 20 partners at age 25?
And would we further agree, that for the sake of the following question, that of these 20 guys: 15 were NSA and 5 were LTRs??….
If so would these women be a fair bet for marriage?
j mahoney,
would you mind if i asked your new number?
and are you a safe bet for marriage?
Jess,
I wouldn’t think they’d be a fair bet for marriage. 15 casual partners is a lot. Of course, people can change. But 15 casual partners…. idk, at that point, the odds are that this is a person who enjoys and approves of casual sex. That’s totally cool. I know people like that. I just don’t want to marry them.
11, and I think I’m a fair bet for marriage. But… I’ve made changes. I stopped having casual sex. I decided it wasn’t for me. I decided that sex should be something that happens between people who care about each other.
If I met a woman with a similar history, with the same beliefs, then I’d be willing to take the risk.
@Munson
Harvard Business School
No, another woman. Hold on, I’ll google her.
OMG!
Reader, he married her!
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/18/business/privatesector-healing-from-executive-trauma.html?pagewanted=all
Rick Thoman and Lynn Bendheim. Wow. They married in 1989. I saw them playing footsie while he was married in 1984.
I part ways with you re Charlotte Simmons. I loved it, and it was a major inspiration for my starting the blog.
As for Brazilians, I don’t think women necessarily talk about them, but they do get them. In my focus groups, 100% of the women go totally bare. I know one young woman who refuses to trim the bush, and it has been a factor in at least one breakup, and many more “no thank you’s” re Round 2.
Re dressing like men, no it was not conscious. There was this guy John Molloy who wrote Dress for Success, and we all obeyed. If you recall my sexual harrassment post, you know that a large silk bow under one’s neck was no deterrent to men in the workplace.
Wow, you freaked me out with the reference to Hitler. Tell me you’re not some kind of neo Nazi. Sorry, but I can’t entertain any notions that Hitler was anything other than the manifestation of pure evil.
@Malia and Olive
Speaking as guy with a fairly long history in the SMP, (and asking the other gentlemen posting to chime in), I’m not so bothered by a woman’s absolute “number” as what it probably represents. Generally speaking, the higher the number the more likely a guy will start to wonder “What sexual shenanigans has she performed for former lovers that she’s now refusing to perform with me?” This is what sours Beta’s on women who have been riding the carousel and decide to exit when the baby alarm goes off.
My ex-wife and I met when when we were about 25. I was a virgin who had maybe 3 semi-serious gfs. She had been married and had several other relationships. Her experience didn’t really put me off because it became evident pretty quickly in our relationship that she wasn’t holding anything back in the bedroom.
Current FWB girl is a bit of a different story. We’re both older and both had more partners. She’s let some hints drop and I’ve had to deal with some nagging thoughts about what I might be missing. I’m a big boy and can deal with it but that doesn’t make the thoughts go away.
Susan,
IRT college hook ups, I think 80/20 is too extreme of a starting point, and could potentially limit conclusions.
20/60/20 might be a better starting point, based on my experiences at my school and others in the same state. A conservative state, at that.
Yes, 20% of both men and women are having sex a lot, but there is that 60% that is also having sex, just not as frequently. (the other 20% plays Halo/CoD/WoW in the dorms on Friday and Saturday nights) The 60% are the average men & women, and they’re having 1-2 different chicks/dudes per semester. Some want bfs/gfs, others don’t want commitment. Either way, there isn’t some overwhelming amount of grinding celebacy going on for a large amount of student populations, just varying degrees of promiscuity.
Jess is deliberately exaggerating and trying to provoke, but she isn’t that far off the mark. I went to a not too big/not too small school, a place where over my 4 years I got to know a vast amount of people and their stories, and I would peg the average girl as leaving with 6-7 partners for her time there.
Heh. For what it’s worth Olive, I imagine you as a shorter and slightly different looking Lisa Loeb.
@ Jesus Mahoney
11 partners isn’t a lot at all for a guy. When I first heard from you of your casual sex escapades, I imagined you had 30+ partners. I’m glad to find out that I was wrong about that.
You are perfectly suitable for marriage. Don’t worry at all about that.
j mahony,
so you are a safe bet because you have changed?
but dont most people change?
i was fundamentally different at 11, 18, 25, 30, 35, 41
a girl looking to settle at age 27 is NOT the same as when she was 19.
values and focus are totally different.
i may have looked as cute as a button when 20 but I was a DICK and had plenty of mouth on me. (over compensating for my shy youth and strict religious schooling) i shudder at both the photos and the memories. my poor parents.
the girls is in my example haven’t had all that much more sex than you yet you are safe and they aint? gosh you are strict!
fresh and young-
I really try hard not to exaggerate- in fact the figures Susan is now agreeing on are above my original estimates (that I deliberately made conservative to avoid the charge of exaggeration!)
i admit my awful ginger joke was provocative…. but alas no takers.
totally cosign your 20/60/20 claim- i said a near identical thing here about a year ago.
He wants to know how many penises she’s had inside her. That’s what “the number” means.
Um, no: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpQqH4H_SUQ
Personally, I can’t imagine one without the other, but I know that’s not the way youngsters roll. I’ve heard of bar mitzvahs where the boy got blown by two dozen girls as congratulations. (By the way, I’ve always wondered about this – I assume the guy only came, like, with the 24th chick?)
I do know that women do not count anything but P in V when they report their number. If you want more information than that, you’re going to have to ask for it specifically.
That’s not what it’s like for me.
Have you ever had a best friend, someone you share everything with? When I was 14, my best friend was Eddie. I knew I was his best friend one night when he asked me to hang around after everyone left because he wanted to show me something. We went to his backyard and through the sliding glass door that led into the kitchen, we saw his father, drunk, storming around, banging the table and punching the wall and occasionally taking a shot at his mother while lecturing her about why his life sucked. We sat there for hours, sitting on the grass against the fence of his back yard, smoking cigarettes, watching his dad abuse his mom.
It was a strange thing to do, but I knew that in his way, he was sharing a part of himself that he couldn’t share with anyone else. He was sharing a deep, very deep secret. And there was a bond between us because of that.
Now, imagine you had a best friend like that and he shared his deep secret with you. Then, imagine he shared that same deep secret with his Shop teacher, his drug dealer, a guy he met playing basketball, and some dude walking down the street some lonely night. What does that do to the bond you thought you had?
That’s what it’s like for me, finding out that the woman I’m with has had a lot of casual sex.
Jess,
I just said that I would be willing to take the risk on a woman in the same situation as me. Don’t be obtuse.
I think you’ve mentioned that story before. It turned my stomach both times.
Nah. The whole PUA lifestyle lasted from, like, the beginning of July to the end of September, pretty much. It’s not what I want with my life.
‘obtuse’- how dare you!- i keep a very trim figure
‘turning stomachs’- not unless you were one of the ‘congratulators’
24th girl- Susan, barmitzah aged boys have, how shall we say, remarkable powers of rejuvenation. thing is- dont the Rabbis have anything to say about this? and is there a name for this conduct? “congratulate with ejaculate?” “cumming of age” “white of passage”
and do they do this right after he’s finished his lines?
OMG! Seriously?! Maybe my friends and I are just exceptionally prudish?
me = virgin, with some hooking up (making out)
at least 3 other close friends who are virgins
1 close friend with some hooking up and only 1 LTR with sex
at least 4 other acquaintances who I think are virgins
1 acquaintance with partner count of 2, from LTRs
my sluttiest friends:
-1 with ‘official’ partner count of I think probably 9 by now, with more BJs given
-1 with a number of 10+ by senior year of college. suffered from abuse as a child and used promiscuity as a tool to cope, much like Jaclyn Friedmann, but since graduation, has gotten her shit together and is dealing with her demons.
-1 with a number of at least 4, 2 in LTR’s, 1 in a lame ‘relationship,’ 1 in a rather embarrassing ONS. lots more dancefloor/make-out/more hook-ups and other poor lapses in judgment. This is the one I’m most judgmental of actually. I guess because I’m of Indian descent (which may be why my social circle seems so full of prudes? as WarmWoman mentioned) and she’s the one of these three who is also Indian.
hooking up=sex
Holy shit, the Jess and Tom show has come back to town. And we got Abbott as well. Could get this one to 1000+
OK, for you newer folks who recently joined HUS the past few months, couple of notations:
1. Tom isn’t a guy. The smart money still bets that “Tom” is really the significant other of the real Tom who has no idea of her past activity.
2. Regarding Jess, and make a note of this Olive, debating/discussing with Jess is like wrestling a snake you pull out of the pool of crude oil. So slippery and slimy, you’ll never get a grip on it. All the discussions are in bad faith with no genuine attempt to understand your position, and then deliberate obfuscation of what you said. She is the master of passive-aggressive ad hominem, and her position is ever-shifting from one comment to the next.
Also forgot to mention – I suppose another part of the reason I’m more judgmental of the third girl mentioned than the other two is that she comes from an intact, well-off, nuclear family. The other two grew up with messed up family situations, so in a sense, I can ‘understand’ their promiscuity more.
not where I’m from… people like the ambiguity of it, girls because they don’t have to say that they had sex or maybe just gave the guy a BJ (even more demeaning IMO), and guys because they can say a make-out was a ‘hook-up’
Hi Jesus,
I didn’t mean that you were insulting Sue. Thanks for responding to my post though. I agree with the rest of all what you said.
To the rest of the blog regarding Sassy talking about her SMV, I’m going to stand up for her here too. She’s simply being honest about what it’s like for pretty girls. We women get hated on for not being confident, and then we get hated on for being self-assured..sheesh.
@purp
Kinda waters it down. I doubt Susan would be concerned if everyone was just making out all the time.
I’ll take those dudes man cards, btw
@Susan,
I don’t have the time to go back through the comments today referencing the statistics on typical sexual activity and sex partner count, but it seems like this question keeps resurfacing over and over. I thought I caught something in here about 90% under 5 or something like that.
You had your focus group of I think 20-40 right? Is that even remotely close? Best I can remember, you had a handful that were 20+ and bunch pushing 5-10 but I could be misremembering. I’m just skeptical of some of these surveys because they don’t seem consistent with many people’s on the ground reality.
OTC, hat tip on that one. Does a great job of pretty much nailing every guy’s visceral reaction when he finds something like that out.
I bet a case of Sam Adams the bar mitzvah thing is an urban legend.
@OTC
It’s not technically true. It was my friend’s bar mitzvah, and I’m not Jewish.
LOL you guys are hilarious. I dunno which is better, Olive Oil or Aunt Olive running around with a wooden spoon. Hmm. Gonna say Lisa Loeb is the closest, though I don’t look like her either lol. Tempted to do what Dogsquat did and put my pic up for a few hours, then change it before some employer can find me.
Will consider it…
When I’m out at a club I always get approached, usually by very goodlooking men who could approach anyone. It’s so terrible to be so goodlooking, I don’t know how I handle it. Really Sassy you must give me some hints. (cue sarcasm) I mean I know I’m in the top 10% but it’s such a burden to be this awesome and goodlooking.
Eh. I stopped arguing with Jess awhile ago. She didn’t bug me that much.
@Mike C
I would generalize my focus groups as being in the 10-20 range in terms of sexual partners. There are a couple of dozen women. A few are <5 and a few are >40. The numbers don’t tell the whole story though. For example, one woman took a guy home from a bar, then proceeded to hook up with him, mostly booty calls, for six months. She got chlamydia from him. So she feels good about adding only one to her number, but he’s a disgusting slut. This number thing is complicated – if you’re really interested in someone you need to talk about it. The number alone may not really tell you what you want to know.
@OTC
Probably. It doesn’t really sound plausible. Each of my kids went to a bunch of them, and I never heard of anything like that.
Yeah, sorry Susan. It’s over now.
olive- hey well i guess i must be losing my touch then….
i didn’t think we did argue did we? i thought we exchanged some views and you thought you might poll some friends on the numbers issue?
susan- you think they would tell you?
i cannot see myself conveying that kinda info to my mum even now and I’m in my 40′s!
I would generalize my focus groups as being in the 10-20 range in terms of sexual partners. There are a couple of dozen women. A few are 40. The numbers don’t tell the whole story though.
That’s true. A number has to be put in context. That said, my only point is data that seems to suggest some silent majority under 5 is suspect as it isn’t consistent with just about anyone’s reality of a smaller sample size. What you state above indicates under 5 is really a small minority with perhaps the middle of the bell curve being 10-20. Now I don’t know the average age of your group and obviously a 25-year old is going to be at a higher number on average than a 19-20 year old. It just doesn’t pass the smell test to talk of some large percentage under 5 unless you think your focus group is much, much more promiscuous than the larger population.
For example, one woman took a guy home from a bar, then proceeded to hook up with him, mostly booty calls, for six months. She got chlamydia from him. So she feels good about adding only one to her number, but he’s a disgusting slut.
FWIW, he might be, but you can’t draw that conclusion from just that. It might take just one time with an infected partner to get that, and guys can be asymptomatic for literally years. Truth be told, if I were single one thing that would scare the beejesus out of me in terms of casual sex, would be the magnitude of STDs floating out there. It is at epidemic levels.
This number thing is complicated – if you’re really interested in someone you need to talk about it. The number alone may not really tell you what you want to know.
Absolutely agree, but I’m just uncomfortable with these suspect statistics that seem to resurface every few months.
haha, they tell me everything. More than I ever wanted to know.
jess,
You know what’s odd? (I mean one of the many things). You’ve let perfect strangers fuck you, but yet you can’t understand people discussing sex with a parent.
Wait, purplesneakers and WarmWoman are both Indian??
I’m losing my monopoly here!
j mahoney
woah- unusually aggressive comment for you!
i have never let a ‘perfect stranger’ ‘f*ck’ me.
but even if i had can you not understand why many (sorry make that most) humans dont like to talk about sex with their mother?
i know brits can be reserved about that stuff but not that much more than other countries.
You know, I’ve been thinking a lot about Esau’s comment from yesterday and the most interesting thing about feminism and the beta-ization of men isn’t that women wanted to neuter men, but that men so willingly allowed themselves to be neutered.
So, my theories on this:
1. Men coming of age in the 60′s were just as unhappy about the rigid gender roles of their parents and women were.
2. The backlash against the American involvement in Vietnam led a lot of young men who weren’t willing to fight in the war to dissociate themselves from their “masculine” and “aggressive” sides and embrace their beta-tude with open arms.
3. Processed foods and refined carbs lower testosterone.
4. The invention of TV makes for a more sedentary lifestyle. This also inhibits testosterone.
Whatever the reasons, men embraced flower power and feminism at the price of their nuts.
Jess,
I was being blunt, not aggressive. It just seems odd to advocate for casual sex while being too inhibited to discuss sex with your mother.
I am probably too late again… I think numbers matter because men and women have so little to go on when they are considering one another. It’s an easy question that has a simple answer and yes, it does give *some* indication of a person’s stability, fidelity and fundamental beliefs. Generally speaking, the higher the number the more baggage, scarring and trust issues one must deal with. However, that’s true for both men and women.
This thread reminds me of a scene from the movie “Clerks” where Dante and his girlfriend Veronica are discussing this very thing. It was quite comical but I’ve always felt it was pretty accurate. In the scene Veronica wants to know how many girls Dante has slept with and Dante unabashedly reveals that he has slept with 12. Veronica is horrified, slaps him and calls him a ‘pig’, later declaring that ‘guys will sleep with anything that says yes’. I think those two were in their early twenties.
Most of the later part of this thread is discussing how men feel about women with high numbers. What I want to know is how do you ladies feel if you find out the guy you’re dating and/or considering is a high numbers guy? Do you immediately write him off? Do you lose respect for him? Do you feel insecure, unsure, jealous, afraid etc? Do you decide to date/continue to date despite your misgivings? Or perhaps, do you refrain from giving a rat’s ass?
That sounds about right. Will report back if the topic comes up, BTW. Can’t promise anything though, that’s an awkward subject to discuss with my bro’s friends.
Dunno how I missed this, I even quoted it! lol. Nah I barely wear heels. I embrace the shortness!
j mahoney
yeah but you don’t know what my mums like……
Hi Susan! I have been reading your posts for a couple of months now and have really enjoyed the content as well as the lively discussions that tend to follow. I am in my early 30′s and currently single after an LTR which ended earlier this year. I also had a short passionate fling, for lack of a better word and I struggle with using hook-up as it seems so ambiguous, which ended a couple of months ago. The end of that fling led me to your site and it has been an eye-opener.
I think you are doing a great job. I enjoy the SMP where I live (Australia). It seems pretty straighforward to me and is divided between those in the casual sex market and those in the relationship market. In terms of numbers, mine is 3 – though I do count P in V only. If I included making out, my number would be 4. In general, the men I have been in relationships with or made out with or went on a couple of dates with valued my low number. One ex even said something along the lines of not considering a woman he had picked up in a bar for a relationship because ‘who wants to go where so many have been before’. He had a high number, maybe 30+, when we met and I did point out his double standard. The majority of my female friends have had less than 5 and the few that have had more than 20 have admitted that it takes a lot of drinking as their number was mostly made up of ONS.
I do come from a conservative background (South East Asian and strict Christian parents) and my preferred number would have been 1. Alas that didn’t work out and I don’t want to get past 5 which isn’t that far away eek! I did struggle initially when I moved to Australia as the men I met seemed to be in such a hurry to get into my pants. I have no criteria in terms of race and have been on dates with men of many races/nationalities but somehow my LTRs and make outs have been with Caucasian men only. What I have learned though is that men will want the fast easy NSA option almost always and they can be flipped into wanting more. I totally support waiting until you know someone before sex, standing up for your beliefs (for me this is sex only in a monogomous relationship) and looking beyond the colour of a person’s skin and eyes. And, it isn’t a nice thing but it’s true, men do divide women into dateable/marryable (sorry i’m sure there is a better term) and fuckable only and this is partly based on a woman’s number so we should stop lying to ourselves that they don’t.
Thanks Susan for HUS and I look forward to more!
SayWhaat – we could even start an indian virgin club here at HUS!
JM,
That’s so funny, Athol Kay just did a post on MMSL about changes in society that led to Marriage 2.0, but these changes would totally fit in with your list of things leading to “betatude.” Did you read the post? He wrote specifically about the changed nature of war, the invention of birth control, and the invention of computers. You hit on number 1, and you hinted at 3 too, when you mentioned the invention of TV (he mentions computers because they changed the nature of traditionally male jobs). It’s a good post, you should check it out.
@Cheerful Sadist #391
Brazilians: In “Simmons”, one of the males talks about how they all have them.
Hitler: No, I live in Idaho, but I’m no Neo-Nazi. I can’t place my hands on the “race” quote, but that only showed he was a cynic, not a true believer (he shared this quality with Heydrich, probably Himmler and maybe most of them except idiots like Hess). But this is from “Hitler: A Study in Tyranny” by Alan Bulloch, one of the authoritative texts. It is quoting Hitler at a dinner:
By what would you have me replace the Christians’
picture of the Beyond? What comes naturally to man-
kind is the sense of eternity and that sense is at the
bottom of every man. The soul and mind migrate, just
as the body returns to nature. Thus life is eternally
reborn from life. As for the “why” of all that, I feel no
need to rack my brains on the subject. The soul is
unplumbable.
Ibid., p.390 I am not a Nazi, but I was surprised when I read this at the College of Idaho in 1971 and remain so. I find it beautiful, notwithstanding its author. I’m partial to well expressed thoughts. Recoil if you want to Susan, think of him as pure evil. I look at that, frankly, as escapist. He was no manifestation, he was a man, a human being ,and thus incapable of being “purely” anything, good or evil. His humanity, along with that of the literally millions who abetted his crimes, should terrify more than pretending he was some sort of dark ghost let loose upon mankind. The evil he represents still lives in us; like Karposis sarcoma, in the healthy body politic it is suppressed. But should it weaken, like the Weimar Republic, it will issue forth. Denying Hitler’s humanity, or Stalin’s, Mao’s, Pol Pot’s, Kim Il Jung or any of a dozen more I can name exhibits not strength, but weakness.
My point is that Hitler thought of a lot of things. He was evil, no question, argument, or debate. So is Hugo Chavez. But there is a reason that in the depiction of the “yin and the yang” the white contains a black dot, and the black a white; nothing is pure, ours is not an existence like that of the planets and stars, governed simply by the laws of physics. “There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” Wm. Shakespeare
Remember “Dress”-I get ya’ on that one.
Bush-I don’t mind coming through the rye but I’m old fashioned. I haven’t had a bald one (somehow that makes me think of spaghetti-remind me if we meet we are NOT going Italian).
Footsie man and woman married-love triumphs eternal (once 1st (?) marriage was out of the way-need to read that article; sounds like he fucked something up).
“Simmons”-Wolfe was probably writing for you in that one. I had been so knocked out by “Man” it isn’t a stretch to say it changed my life, definitely my view of it. I started reading stoicism and found in it the pure grain alcohol of a philosophy I could really understand and relate to, in contrast to the “bourbon” of Christianity, filtered and altered by years in barrels of dreary doctrinaire bullshit and then poured through the charcoal of unadulterated thieving self-interest. I may have been half expecting a similar experience. I do so how it informs the tenor of what goes on here.
TOTALLY agree. Chlamydia can be asymptomatic in women too, and it can lead to infertility if it isn’t treated. I read this crazy study about STDs in young people… it found that 67% of people who tested positive for chlamydia or gonorrhea didn’t even think they were at risk. Also almost half the people who tested positive had only had one partner in the last year.
When I read that shit about casual rawdogging in the ‘sphere, I go into major Public Health Student Mode and get worried about STDs. I know FFY said something about STDs being something “haters” brought up, but no really. It’s a serious concern. I hope he gets checked regularly.
@Jesus
Your theories suck or at least 2 of them do. Were you a young male in the 60s? I was.
1) Gender roles? Are you nuts? We didn’t give 2 shits. We wanted to get laid. How times have changed.
2) Do you mean “disassociate”? It helps to spell correctly, even if what you say is still crap. Look, there was a draft, just like in WWII. Most of the guys who fought, bled and died in WWII were draftees, compelled to do what they did. But they had the whole nation behind them, a cause they believed in, and a clear if difficult path to victory (Germany:help the Russians take it over and gang rape all the women; Japan: blow the mother fuckers up).’Nam we had none of those, plus an enemy that starting in ’65 showed itself to be implacable, indefatigable and with a strategy to bleed us dry-which meant our (my) blood. We weren’t any less tough, there was just no clarity and by the late 60s it became obvious we COULD NOT WIN. No one wants to die or get fucked up under those circumstances. We did not disassociate, and had I been drafted I’d a gone and taken my chances. That’s what everyone did ‘cept a few who dodged or got in the Guard etc.
@Jesus again
Even the goddamned draft was unfair. In WWII everybody, and I mean everyfuckingbody, went in. You had to be seriously goofed not to go, and then be prepared to take endlesss shit for not being in. I knew a man who had that experience (his feet were fucked up-you couldn’t tell, so he was took a lot of shit). In ‘Nam, they had such a screwball scheme-finally they had to ditch it and go to a lottery ( I was #64)but by then things were dying down. Plus the chicks WOULD NOT FUCK ANY GUY IN UNIFORM. I used to see it as I was a bartender. Guys would come in with their military cut,but the look was long hair, chicks wouldn’t dance or even talk to them-by 11 I’d have a fight. Guys in uniform got no and I mean no action-and I’m talking Boise Idaho. You take San Fran, Seattle-chicks would probably slit their dicks.
Susan – how did you find the girls for your focus groups? I wonder if the kind to be eager to join a focus group about the hook-up culture are the ones who have been more involved and burned by it, and therefore there is some kind of selection bias toward the more promiscuous ones?
Also I’m not really sure what the relevance is of the looks of your former co-worker? Did she do/say anything fermane to the topic of this post that deserves ridicule for her appearance? Which she could easily find if she googled her name?
that was supposed to be “germane,” not “fermane”!
Susan: “As for Brazilians, I don’t think women necessarily talk about them, but they do get them. In my focus groups, 100% of the women go totally bare. I know one young woman who refuses to trim the bush, and it has been a factor in at least one breakup, and many more “no thank you’s” re Round 2.”
Aha! There ya go!
Another weapon for remaining chaste.
Keep a chia pet! (ch ch ch chia)
purplesneakers :
“Susan – how did you find the girls for your focus groups? I wonder if the kind to be eager to join a focus group about the hook-up culture are the ones who have been more involved and burned by it, and therefore there is some kind of selection bias toward the more promiscuous ones?”
My thoughts exactly!
Girl who were hookingup dumb who want to be hookingup smart.
I got called a “creep” by Amanda Marcotte in that post of Toms over at Good Men Project.
I’m proud.
@peace,
There are different biological triggers in men & women over partner numbers. With most men, there is a visceral revulsion which is hardwired into us at the thought of the woman we are with being with anyone else EVER (past almost as much as present). Men’s greater sexual jealousy most likely stems from the (now largely unconscious) fear of raising another man’s child, so a lower number (rightly or wrongly) is on an instinctive level taken to be an indication of trustworthy character & so only makes a woman more attractive.
For most women, on the other hand, at least SOME experience in a man (pre-selection) is an attractive quality – sex is much harder for men to ‘get’ so it confers an increase in status: the man is most likely not a complete loser as other women have vouched for him in the past.
Female virginity is prized the world over.
Male virginity is comical & essentially worthless.
Start your calculations from there.
“This thread reminds me of a scene from the movie “Clerks” where Dante and his girlfriend Veronica are discussing this very thing. It was quite comical but I’ve always felt it was pretty accurate. In the scene Veronica wants to know how many girls Dante has slept with and Dante unabashedly reveals that he has slept with 12. Veronica is horrified, slaps him and calls him a ‘pig’, later declaring that ‘guys will sleep with anything that says yes’. I think those two were in their early twenties.”
You forgot the best part…
She was giving him grief because she had intercourse with 3 guys (including him I believe) but had performed oral sex on 36. ~JS
“discussing this stuff online is that Beauty and the Beast get the same level of attention. What distinguishes people here is the quality of their commentary.
One of the main reasons I’ve been drawn to online communities, lately and in the past, is that as a short average-looking girl, I don’t hold a lot of sway in social situations. People don’t listen to me when I walk in a room. I’m definitely not an alpha male. ”
@Olive…
I hadn’t considered this… ~JS
I love you, too.
So I struck a nerve. Wasn’t talking about you personally, though interesting that you took it so personally.
All young men want to get laid. That’s true of any generation. My point was that boys were as dissatisfied with the 50′s ideal of Ward and June as girls.
lmao. Dissociate is a word, bro. Look it up.
There were more than a few who dodged. And many more who worked their asses off to go to college to avoid the draft. Look, I have more than one family member who fought in Vietnam. I’m not trying to skewer all the men coming of age in the 60′s. Not even the draft dodgers, tbh. I’m just trying to understand the acceptance of feminism. I think chalking it up to guys just wanting to get laid is a bit overly simplistic.
“it’s true, men do divide women into dateable/marryable (sorry i’m sure there is a better term) and fuckable only and this is partly based on a woman’s number so we should stop lying to ourselves that they don’t.”
Why do women lie to themselves about this? Why is it a topic at all? Why is there a “strategy” to denigrate and shame men into getting them to stop this? Why is there a “strategy” to get men to accept fucking-around for women as normal and “positive?” Why dont these fuck-around advocates just politely ask men to change? Why is the approach always so loaded with bitterness, anger and impatience? Men are the target…not people…not society…men!! And NOT a fringe group of throw backs, NO. The target is nearly all men because this manner of thinking is UNIVERSAL among men and these slimy fuck-around advocates know it or they would not be spewing out their campaign at all. Too bad for them. Their efforts are futile. Women who desire to be in the good graces of men must not fuck around and they know it and the inequality of it all is what really really grates on them. Shut up and deal with it.
I have asked people to furnish details of people they know who are childless and alone due to their sexual history – virtually none has been forthcoming.
@Susan…
There are 3 older (late 50’s early 60’s) women in my extended family who are not just spinsters but still virgins. They were 180 degrees from being sexually liberated, they just never participated in the social scene, nor did they become religious until they were much older… they always have candy corn and peanuts in crystal bowls on their coffee tables.
There are a couple of crazy aunts on both sides who have been married and divorced a bunch of times with no children who still have gentlemen friends and companions… I guess they were the riders for their generation… they tell great stories about the good times and the fun, but you can’t get them to talk about regrets
There are several of my contemporaries women in their 30’s and 40’s that were never carousel riders, nor were they really watchers… I don’t recall them doing much socially. These women in high school and college never went on dates hooked up or had boyfriends.
After they left school they started their careers and have been fairly successful but they still haven’t dated let alone married or had children.
The one thing this group has in common is they have cultivated a look and a way of being that isn’t a sexual or masculine, but it isn’t appealing or attractive to men… they are invisible to all men.
Those that I knew in college who rode the hardest are living the ‘fabulous life’… unburdened by any real human connections. Many are still riding dating married or involved men, they mainly share their affections with pets and they travel a lot…. they are still getting pumped and dumped just on their own terms, and claim that they are still considering marriage and children but just not yet.
I think it would be interesting to do something on this theme in a vignette form ~JS
Munson,
that Hitler quote is really quite haunting.
Yesterday I was reading about a letter Gandhi wrote to Hitler on Christmas Eve, 1940:
“On this occasion, Gandhi took the trouble of justifying his addressing Hitler as “my friend” and closing his letter with “your sincere friend”, in a brief statement of what exactly he stood for: “That I address you as a friend is no formality. I own no foes. My business in life has been for the past 33 years to enlist the friendship of the whole of humanity by befriending mankind, irrespective of race, colour or creed.” This very un-Hitlerian reason to befriend Hitler, what Gandhi goes on to call the “doctrine of universal friendship”, contrasts with the Hitler-like hatred of one’s enemy which is commonly thought to be the only correct attitude to Hitler.” (my italics).
http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/articles/fascism/gandhihitler.html
Thirty years ago, the German psychologist Alice Miller, whose life’s work deals with society’s institutionalized abuse of children, tried to write a book about the childhood of Adolf Hitler, to show how German methods of Victorian-era childrearing explained so much about his future actions. When she returned to Germany to try talk about these ideas, she found no-one would allow it. The only way the people there could deal with the aftermath of the war was to demonize & scapegoat this one man as being pure evil, not human at all.
But Hitler was human. And, given unlimited power, as he was through a series of thankfully largely unique events, he behaved no differently from how many, many, many ordinary people would behave in the same situation, depending on their personal biases. Recent revelations about current radical feminism bear this out:
http://triggeralert.blogspot.com/2011/12/term-feminazi-no-longer-seems-like.html
As mentioned before, the Hitler-like hatred of one’s enemy is – with little thought for the irony – commonly thought to be the only correct response a ‘good’ person should display in regard to Hitler (&, often, the German people at large: c.f. Inglourious Basterds).
Accepting hateful propaganda & refusing to deal with the human reality is the surest way we know of to make sure it happens all over again. It’s the easiest way to make lots more little Hitlers.
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