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June 28, 2011
It's an Epidemic
This is an odd little coincidence. Check out Paul Krugman's blog for June 26th on bad reading comprehension. It seems to be an epidemic.
I sense a startup opportunity.
Suppose you start a company that administers a basic reading comprehension test and issues a password to people who pass it online. Then imagine that the password would be needed to sign up for commenting on blogs and other online forums. The startup would sell its password services to websites looking to filter out people with bad reading comprehension.
As a consumer, if you pass the test once, your password is yours forever. You can use it as many times as you like for as many blogs and forums as you sign up for. You would be a certified "good reader."
I suppose you could extend the concept to include tests for history, politics and economics. Each time you pass a new test module, your lifetime password is given new rights that match the test you pass. Websites could determine what sort of test success they want to make a requirement for participation on their sites.
One problem with this idea is that it would severely limit the traffic for comments. But a website could allow everyone to comment and simply indicate which commenters are "good readers." That way you have the benefit of knowing who has a minimum set of qualifications to comment on a topic and who doesn't.
I sense a startup opportunity.
Suppose you start a company that administers a basic reading comprehension test and issues a password to people who pass it online. Then imagine that the password would be needed to sign up for commenting on blogs and other online forums. The startup would sell its password services to websites looking to filter out people with bad reading comprehension.
As a consumer, if you pass the test once, your password is yours forever. You can use it as many times as you like for as many blogs and forums as you sign up for. You would be a certified "good reader."
I suppose you could extend the concept to include tests for history, politics and economics. Each time you pass a new test module, your lifetime password is given new rights that match the test you pass. Websites could determine what sort of test success they want to make a requirement for participation on their sites.
One problem with this idea is that it would severely limit the traffic for comments. But a website could allow everyone to comment and simply indicate which commenters are "good readers." That way you have the benefit of knowing who has a minimum set of qualifications to comment on a topic and who doesn't.
June 26, 2011
Author by Relocation
Yesterday I was watching a comedian on HBO doing a routine that was both politically incorrect and hilarious. The audience seemed to enjoy it, which is not surprising, since they self-selected to be there. If any in the audience were offended, I'm guessing they blamed themselves for not doing their homework before buying tickets to the show.
Now imagine if someone recorded the comedian's act and decided to play it at the next church meeting. All hell would break loose because the x-rated material would be offensive in that context. My question is this: Who is the author of the material at the moment it is replayed at the church meeting? Is it the comedian who created it, or is it the person who moved it to a new context? I say it's the person who moved it to the wrong audience.
I believe authorship - at least in terms of responsibility, not copyright - should transfer when a person moves material from one context where it is appropriate to another where it is not. The same should be true whenever moving material from one context to another changes the message .
Tracey Morgan recently got in trouble for saying in his act that if his son announced he was gay, Tracey would stab him. If we presume that this was one of fifty outrageously inappropriate things Tracey said on stage that night, all within character as the absurdly ignorant and selfish guy he likes to portray for laughs, it means a comedian was trying to be outrageous and funny and missed the mark. That's all it means, since no reasonable person believes Tracey would stab his own son or love him less if he came out. But reported out of context, as it was, one has trouble seeing the statement as anything but the worst kind of hate speech.
I would argue that Tracey was 100% responsible for whatever psychological or social harm he caused to the audience that heard his remark live, and zero percent responsible for the harm that was caused when others spread the story. The spreaders became the authors (as far as responsibility) when they changed the context. They became the Authors by Relocation, a term I just made up.
Most people would agree that you shouldn't shoot the messenger. But that rule only applies if the messenger delivers the right message to the right person. If the king's messenger stops at the local inn to share the king's message before delivering it, someone is going to get beheaded.
Prior to the Internet, this transfer of authorship was a smallish problem. An unscrupulous or clumsy newspaper journalist could take out of context something from a book or a speech and write it up to make the original author seem ridiculous. But most professionals would be aware that moving material from one audience to another will change the message, and they would self-regulate to maintain the reputation of their publication.
Then along came the Internet. Now any idiot with a computer can move material from one context to another and totally change the meaning. Sometimes this is done by taking quotes out of context. Sometimes material is paraphrased incorrectly. Sometimes the person moving the material has low reading comprehension and makes an honest mistake. Sometimes a problem arises because an author has taken shortcuts with his regular audience, leaving out information that would be necessary for a new reader.
As a writer, you recognize that a huge part of your job is choosing your words to fit your intended audience. When a third party introduces a different audience to your writing, it destroys the audience-matching element of your craft. In a real sense, it changes the product.
An author has no legal recourse when his work is changed by the act of moving it. Libel laws are intentionally weak, and we're probably better off if they stay that way. But I recommend a solution that makes sense in the Internet age. I propose that responsibility for the impact of content (but not copyright or royalties) should be with the person who delivers material to an unintended audience.
By this model, you can blame the author for anything objectionable if you see the work in the channel he or she intended. But as soon as that work appears on some other website, including a link to the original, any anger it sparks should be directed at the person who invited an audience that the original author did not intend.
On the Internet, anything written for a particular audience is instantly available to the entire world. That's a wonderful thing, but it makes it too easy for the author and the audience to become accidentally mismatched. Pay walls would be a solution, but they aren't generally economical. And we don't want authors writing to the least common denominator, trying to please everyone while offending no one. We want writing that is appropriate for the intended audience.
My proposal is that we leave things exactly as they are, technology-wise and business model-wise. We need no new laws. All we need is a name for the phenomenon: Author by Relocation. It's the literary version of "You break it, you bought it." If a piece of writing causes little or no harm for its intended audience, we can assume the original author did his job. But if the work is relocated, and/or carved into quotes out of context, that becomes a case of Author by Relocation, and the carver/mover takes on responsibility for the message at that point.
This model maintains complete freedom of expression, including freedom to quote material and to criticize. It simply recognizes that moving and changing a message makes you the Author by Relocation.
Now imagine if someone recorded the comedian's act and decided to play it at the next church meeting. All hell would break loose because the x-rated material would be offensive in that context. My question is this: Who is the author of the material at the moment it is replayed at the church meeting? Is it the comedian who created it, or is it the person who moved it to a new context? I say it's the person who moved it to the wrong audience.
I believe authorship - at least in terms of responsibility, not copyright - should transfer when a person moves material from one context where it is appropriate to another where it is not. The same should be true whenever moving material from one context to another changes the message .
Tracey Morgan recently got in trouble for saying in his act that if his son announced he was gay, Tracey would stab him. If we presume that this was one of fifty outrageously inappropriate things Tracey said on stage that night, all within character as the absurdly ignorant and selfish guy he likes to portray for laughs, it means a comedian was trying to be outrageous and funny and missed the mark. That's all it means, since no reasonable person believes Tracey would stab his own son or love him less if he came out. But reported out of context, as it was, one has trouble seeing the statement as anything but the worst kind of hate speech.
I would argue that Tracey was 100% responsible for whatever psychological or social harm he caused to the audience that heard his remark live, and zero percent responsible for the harm that was caused when others spread the story. The spreaders became the authors (as far as responsibility) when they changed the context. They became the Authors by Relocation, a term I just made up.
Most people would agree that you shouldn't shoot the messenger. But that rule only applies if the messenger delivers the right message to the right person. If the king's messenger stops at the local inn to share the king's message before delivering it, someone is going to get beheaded.
Prior to the Internet, this transfer of authorship was a smallish problem. An unscrupulous or clumsy newspaper journalist could take out of context something from a book or a speech and write it up to make the original author seem ridiculous. But most professionals would be aware that moving material from one audience to another will change the message, and they would self-regulate to maintain the reputation of their publication.
Then along came the Internet. Now any idiot with a computer can move material from one context to another and totally change the meaning. Sometimes this is done by taking quotes out of context. Sometimes material is paraphrased incorrectly. Sometimes the person moving the material has low reading comprehension and makes an honest mistake. Sometimes a problem arises because an author has taken shortcuts with his regular audience, leaving out information that would be necessary for a new reader.
As a writer, you recognize that a huge part of your job is choosing your words to fit your intended audience. When a third party introduces a different audience to your writing, it destroys the audience-matching element of your craft. In a real sense, it changes the product.
An author has no legal recourse when his work is changed by the act of moving it. Libel laws are intentionally weak, and we're probably better off if they stay that way. But I recommend a solution that makes sense in the Internet age. I propose that responsibility for the impact of content (but not copyright or royalties) should be with the person who delivers material to an unintended audience.
By this model, you can blame the author for anything objectionable if you see the work in the channel he or she intended. But as soon as that work appears on some other website, including a link to the original, any anger it sparks should be directed at the person who invited an audience that the original author did not intend.
On the Internet, anything written for a particular audience is instantly available to the entire world. That's a wonderful thing, but it makes it too easy for the author and the audience to become accidentally mismatched. Pay walls would be a solution, but they aren't generally economical. And we don't want authors writing to the least common denominator, trying to please everyone while offending no one. We want writing that is appropriate for the intended audience.
My proposal is that we leave things exactly as they are, technology-wise and business model-wise. We need no new laws. All we need is a name for the phenomenon: Author by Relocation. It's the literary version of "You break it, you bought it." If a piece of writing causes little or no harm for its intended audience, we can assume the original author did his job. But if the work is relocated, and/or carved into quotes out of context, that becomes a case of Author by Relocation, and the carver/mover takes on responsibility for the message at that point.
This model maintains complete freedom of expression, including freedom to quote material and to criticize. It simply recognizes that moving and changing a message makes you the Author by Relocation.
June 24, 2011
Reading Comprehension Test
Here's a reading comprehension test for readers of Salon, Jezebel, and Change.org. (I borrowed this idea from a comment.)
Reading Comprehension Test:
If I say all men have a natural urge to eat, and some men are cannibals, have I implied that all men are natural cannibals? Did I condone the practice of eating people?
Discuss
[Note: Readers of The Huffington Post are exempted from the test because most have already passed it.]
Update: I'm adding two more questions.
If I say Dutch men are the tallest in the world, which of the following facts have I implied?
1. I'm a racist.
2. Every Dutch man is taller than every other man.
3. I have a low opinion of women because I didn't even mention them.
4. None of the above
If I say I invented a robot that can be used to help feed babies, quadriplegics, and some mentally handicapped people, what else have I implied?
1. Quadriplegics are mentally handicapped.
2. Babies are quadriplegics
3. Mentally handicapped people are a bunch of babies
4. I'm a socialist
5. None of the above
June 23, 2011
Maybe it's Me
The fascinating thing about being batshit crazy is that often you're the only one who isn't aware of it. That's why I sometimes like to take a step back and seriously consider the hypothesis that the reason people disagree with me is that I'm an idiot and I don't realize it.
To that end, I would like to invite some experts to render their opinions of my sanity, based on my interviews with my detractors, below. Any of the following professionals would qualify:
Judge
Lawyer
Debate coach/teacher
Logic professor
Psychologist (professional)
Scientist
If you have an expertise that seems relevant, please read my original offending blog post, Pegs and Holes, and the interviews directly below with Irin Carmon and MaryElizabeth Williams. Give each of us an overall grade that is relevant to your particular expertise. If you're a judge, issue a verdict. If you're a scientist, let me know who had the best grasp of the objective facts. If you're a debate expert, let me know who "won" the debate. If you're a psychologist, let me know who is suffering from cognitive issues.
Please describe your qualifications and your (brief) evaluation in the comments below. Please also specify your gender, since we would expect some bias in that regard.
To that end, I would like to invite some experts to render their opinions of my sanity, based on my interviews with my detractors, below. Any of the following professionals would qualify:
Judge
Lawyer
Debate coach/teacher
Logic professor
Psychologist (professional)
Scientist
If you have an expertise that seems relevant, please read my original offending blog post, Pegs and Holes, and the interviews directly below with Irin Carmon and MaryElizabeth Williams. Give each of us an overall grade that is relevant to your particular expertise. If you're a judge, issue a verdict. If you're a scientist, let me know who had the best grasp of the objective facts. If you're a debate expert, let me know who "won" the debate. If you're a psychologist, let me know who is suffering from cognitive issues.
Please describe your qualifications and your (brief) evaluation in the comments below. Please also specify your gender, since we would expect some bias in that regard.
June 22, 2011
Interview with Salon.com Writer MaryElizabeth Williams
In round two I interview Salon writer MaryElizabeth Williams on the topic of what was so objectionable about my blog post Pegs and Holes. (See prior posts for more background.)
MaryElizabeth Williams is a senior staff writer for Salon.com, an author, and has written for The New York Times and other publications. She recently wrote this about me.
Let's jump right in.
MaryElizabeth: Why did I object to your post? Perhaps you meant it humorously, but let's start with the way you lump "behaving badly, e.g. tweeting, raping, cheating, and being offensive to just about everyone in the entire world" together. Cheating is "behaving badly." Raping is a crime. Right off the bat, you're working off fuzzy logic, in which a consensual affair and an act of violence are somehow on the same plane. You do so again later when you suggest that if men were to "lose the urge for sex," there'd be "no rape, fewer divorces," as if rape was all about the "urge for sex."
You state that "society is organized in such a way that the natural instincts of men are shameful and criminal while the natural instincts of women are mostly legal and acceptable...society has evolved to keep males in a state of continuous unfulfilled urges, more commonly known as unhappiness. No one planned it that way." Your presumptuousness over the natural instincts of men is surpassed only by your wild second-guessing regarding those of women. And society, by the way, is plenty planned. Ours here in America, in fact, was planned by, and its government and businesses are still largely run by, men. So instead of going on about the "instincts" of men and women, consider what our culture deems acceptable behavior from all its members, of both sexes. I would furthermore submit that if our society is "a virtual prison for men's natural desires," you've never been to Vegas.
Now let me ask you - do you believe that rape is a "natural" instinct, or that our culture doesn't differentiate between the "urge for sex" and forcible violation?
Scott: I'll start by answering you closing question. I think sex is a natural instinct, and it manifests differently in different people. A person who is simultaneously horny, prone to violence, and has sociopath tendencies might act in the worst possible way. That person would be abnormal, and I favor the death penalty for rape. Violent behavior is natural in the same sense that cancer and hurricanes are natural. Natural doesn't mean good. Everything I just explained was obvious to many if not most readers of my Pegs and Holes post. You can verify that claim by reading the comments on this blog and on Huffington Post.
On your other points, let me see if I can break them down to bullet points and get your agreement on what you are saying before I respond to them individually. I believe you are saying...
1. Men who have no sexual desire and no erections will still rape because it's not about the sexual urge.
2. If an author lists three things that are bad, he means all three things are equal to each other. For example, if I say blizzards, ulcers, and head lice are bad, I am implying that they should be treated the same way.
3. Society didn't evolve as the result of millions of people making millions of independent decisions. It is mostly the result of planning by men who successfully designed society to meet their needs.
4. Men can get their natural urges satisfied by, for example, traveling to Las Vegas. Their wives and girlfriends won't mind. There's no real downside.
5. You can't tell when I'm trying to be humorous.
Did I accurately summarize your points?
MaryElizabeth Williams is a senior staff writer for Salon.com, an author, and has written for The New York Times and other publications. She recently wrote this about me.
Let's jump right in.
MaryElizabeth: Why did I object to your post? Perhaps you meant it humorously, but let's start with the way you lump "behaving badly, e.g. tweeting, raping, cheating, and being offensive to just about everyone in the entire world" together. Cheating is "behaving badly." Raping is a crime. Right off the bat, you're working off fuzzy logic, in which a consensual affair and an act of violence are somehow on the same plane. You do so again later when you suggest that if men were to "lose the urge for sex," there'd be "no rape, fewer divorces," as if rape was all about the "urge for sex."
You state that "society is organized in such a way that the natural instincts of men are shameful and criminal while the natural instincts of women are mostly legal and acceptable...society has evolved to keep males in a state of continuous unfulfilled urges, more commonly known as unhappiness. No one planned it that way." Your presumptuousness over the natural instincts of men is surpassed only by your wild second-guessing regarding those of women. And society, by the way, is plenty planned. Ours here in America, in fact, was planned by, and its government and businesses are still largely run by, men. So instead of going on about the "instincts" of men and women, consider what our culture deems acceptable behavior from all its members, of both sexes. I would furthermore submit that if our society is "a virtual prison for men's natural desires," you've never been to Vegas.
Now let me ask you - do you believe that rape is a "natural" instinct, or that our culture doesn't differentiate between the "urge for sex" and forcible violation?
Scott: I'll start by answering you closing question. I think sex is a natural instinct, and it manifests differently in different people. A person who is simultaneously horny, prone to violence, and has sociopath tendencies might act in the worst possible way. That person would be abnormal, and I favor the death penalty for rape. Violent behavior is natural in the same sense that cancer and hurricanes are natural. Natural doesn't mean good. Everything I just explained was obvious to many if not most readers of my Pegs and Holes post. You can verify that claim by reading the comments on this blog and on Huffington Post.
On your other points, let me see if I can break them down to bullet points and get your agreement on what you are saying before I respond to them individually. I believe you are saying...
1. Men who have no sexual desire and no erections will still rape because it's not about the sexual urge.
2. If an author lists three things that are bad, he means all three things are equal to each other. For example, if I say blizzards, ulcers, and head lice are bad, I am implying that they should be treated the same way.
3. Society didn't evolve as the result of millions of people making millions of independent decisions. It is mostly the result of planning by men who successfully designed society to meet their needs.
4. Men can get their natural urges satisfied by, for example, traveling to Las Vegas. Their wives and girlfriends won't mind. There's no real downside.
5. You can't tell when I'm trying to be humorous.
Did I accurately summarize your points?
June 21, 2011
Interview with Jezebel.com Writer Irin Carmon
My recent blog post titled Pegs and Holes caused quite a stir on the Internet. One of my harshest critics, feminist website Jezebel.com, accepted my offer to be interviewed about whatever it is that they find so objectionable about me. Jezebel's Editor-in-Chief, Jessica Coen, asked writer Irin Carmon to represent the common viewpoint at Jezebel.
Let's start with some background on the participants to give you some perspective on the bias that each brings to the table. I've been a long-time financial supporter of women's causes, particularly in the abuse realm. I have a long history of promoting and mentoring women in my own businesses. And I'm pro-choice.
My mother was a strong woman who raised three kids, worked most of her life, taught me to play baseball, and was the first member of the family to get a motorcycle license. She kept a loaded rifle in the kitchen and often used it to gun down rabbits and other assailants to her vegetable garden. And she didn't take shit from anyone.
My first career, in banking, came to an end when my boss told me there was no potential for a white male to get a promotion until the company did a lot of catching up in the diversity department. My second career, at the phone company, ended the same way, although I stayed around while I worked on my cartooning career on the side.
Irin Carmon has been a staff writer for Jezebel for about two years, during which time she has been covering politics, reproductive rights and health, sexual assault, workplace discrimination, and more. Irin is a 28-year old woman who reminds me that she does not deign to speak for all women.
We begin...
Scott: Irin, your editor volunteered you to discuss your objections to my recent blog post titled Pegs and Holes. What in particular did you find objectionable?
Irin: Even seen as hyperbole or intentionally incendiary rhetoric, the piece does a disservice to men above all, and to women too. You start out by referring to men in the public eye who are "tweeting, raping, cheating, and being offensive to just about everyone in the entire world," and suggest that this happened because "society is organized in such a way that the natural instincts of men are shameful and criminal while the natural instincts of women are mostly legal and acceptable." Leaving aside for a minute the implied equivalence of that laundry list (breaking your marriage vows versus raping someone), this is a bleak perversion of biological determinism. By that reading, the presumed majority of men who don't rape (or cheat, or tweet) are simply better at managing their innate desires to violate someone else, which I'd wager isn't true to the lived experience of most non-raping men. What you deem the "natural instincts of women" isn't defined, but I'm going to assume you mean stereotypes about nurturing and nesting. In fact, history, recent and otherwise, is full of examples of women who were treated as "shameful and criminal" for following their own natural instincts for how to live their lives, whether it was whom to sleep with and when and how often, what jobs women "should" do, how many children to have and when, etc. etc. Until very recently, those strictures were on the books and enforced by men, full stop. Men and women are both better off that all that's no longer official, at least in this country.
You write, "Society has evolved to keep males in a state of continuous unfulfilled urges, more commonly known as unhappiness." In fact, what's evolved is that women are now politically and, to a greater extent, socially recognized as full human beings. In contexts where women were seen as men's property, rape, or any non-sanctioned sex was (or is) punished as such, and often the women were punished too. We now have a legal and social model that formally recognizes women as people. That changed because some men and women didn't see the world as, in your words, "a zero sum game. If men get everything they want, women lose, and vice versa," and who saw the harm and dehumanization implicit in that model. Incidentally, though women were historically told they are too volatile or emotional to run the world's affairs, you suggest it's men who are unable to cope.
You cite Hugh Hefner as an example of a man who has "lost," or implicitly, been societally shamed. ("Society didn't offer him a round hole for his round peg.") But by every possible measure, Hefner's no victim. He is a very rich man. He has a robust sex life with women who look like the ideal upon which he made his fortune. He's an icon. I'd say society has offered him quite the round hole. It's hard to think of a woman who has experienced anything comparable, but then, I don't agree this is a zero sum game.
My question to you: What do you get out of posting these incendiary commentaries on gender? And why accuse others of misrepresentation when they've mostly stuck to directly quoting you?
Scott: Phew! Wordy.
As for your question, I write what I think will be interesting and thought-provoking. I stake out positions that I haven't seen - whether I believe everything I write or not - because unique viewpoints interest me most. My blog is about inviting readers to wrestle with unique points of view strictly for fun. My regular readers understand that. When my writing is taken out of context, the way Jezebel and others did, it sometimes looks like a crazy rant and it pisses people off. That's more of a bonus than a main goal.
I don't understand most of what you wrote in response to my question. Can you try it again without the history lessons? I agree that women had it worse in the past. My offending blog post was about today and the future.
I think we can skip the question of whether I offended men, since that is not what is bothering Jezebel or Salon, just to name two. And most men correctly interpreted the post as saying that male sexual urges manifest differently in different men. The men who complained imagined I was saying all men are repressed rapists. That's a simple case of bad reading comprehension, or maybe it is because the post was carved up by bottom-feeding websites until the meaning was distorted to fit an agenda. At Huffington Post, where the average reading comprehension is high, you can see that most commenters can't understand how anyone would be offended by the post.
You say that the natural instincts of women can lead them to shameful and criminal behavior. I have a higher opinion of women than you do, in the sense that I think men are genetically more prone to bad behavior. If your point is that women suck just as much as men, I'll take your word for it. But you'll need to explain why our jails have so many more men than women.
I'm still confused why my blog is more offensive than what you just wrote. Can you try again, in simpler terms, and without the history lesson, to explain your objection to my post?
Continued...
Let's start with some background on the participants to give you some perspective on the bias that each brings to the table. I've been a long-time financial supporter of women's causes, particularly in the abuse realm. I have a long history of promoting and mentoring women in my own businesses. And I'm pro-choice.
My mother was a strong woman who raised three kids, worked most of her life, taught me to play baseball, and was the first member of the family to get a motorcycle license. She kept a loaded rifle in the kitchen and often used it to gun down rabbits and other assailants to her vegetable garden. And she didn't take shit from anyone.
My first career, in banking, came to an end when my boss told me there was no potential for a white male to get a promotion until the company did a lot of catching up in the diversity department. My second career, at the phone company, ended the same way, although I stayed around while I worked on my cartooning career on the side.
Irin Carmon has been a staff writer for Jezebel for about two years, during which time she has been covering politics, reproductive rights and health, sexual assault, workplace discrimination, and more. Irin is a 28-year old woman who reminds me that she does not deign to speak for all women.
We begin...
Scott: Irin, your editor volunteered you to discuss your objections to my recent blog post titled Pegs and Holes. What in particular did you find objectionable?
Irin: Even seen as hyperbole or intentionally incendiary rhetoric, the piece does a disservice to men above all, and to women too. You start out by referring to men in the public eye who are "tweeting, raping, cheating, and being offensive to just about everyone in the entire world," and suggest that this happened because "society is organized in such a way that the natural instincts of men are shameful and criminal while the natural instincts of women are mostly legal and acceptable." Leaving aside for a minute the implied equivalence of that laundry list (breaking your marriage vows versus raping someone), this is a bleak perversion of biological determinism. By that reading, the presumed majority of men who don't rape (or cheat, or tweet) are simply better at managing their innate desires to violate someone else, which I'd wager isn't true to the lived experience of most non-raping men. What you deem the "natural instincts of women" isn't defined, but I'm going to assume you mean stereotypes about nurturing and nesting. In fact, history, recent and otherwise, is full of examples of women who were treated as "shameful and criminal" for following their own natural instincts for how to live their lives, whether it was whom to sleep with and when and how often, what jobs women "should" do, how many children to have and when, etc. etc. Until very recently, those strictures were on the books and enforced by men, full stop. Men and women are both better off that all that's no longer official, at least in this country.
You write, "Society has evolved to keep males in a state of continuous unfulfilled urges, more commonly known as unhappiness." In fact, what's evolved is that women are now politically and, to a greater extent, socially recognized as full human beings. In contexts where women were seen as men's property, rape, or any non-sanctioned sex was (or is) punished as such, and often the women were punished too. We now have a legal and social model that formally recognizes women as people. That changed because some men and women didn't see the world as, in your words, "a zero sum game. If men get everything they want, women lose, and vice versa," and who saw the harm and dehumanization implicit in that model. Incidentally, though women were historically told they are too volatile or emotional to run the world's affairs, you suggest it's men who are unable to cope.
You cite Hugh Hefner as an example of a man who has "lost," or implicitly, been societally shamed. ("Society didn't offer him a round hole for his round peg.") But by every possible measure, Hefner's no victim. He is a very rich man. He has a robust sex life with women who look like the ideal upon which he made his fortune. He's an icon. I'd say society has offered him quite the round hole. It's hard to think of a woman who has experienced anything comparable, but then, I don't agree this is a zero sum game.
My question to you: What do you get out of posting these incendiary commentaries on gender? And why accuse others of misrepresentation when they've mostly stuck to directly quoting you?
Scott: Phew! Wordy.
As for your question, I write what I think will be interesting and thought-provoking. I stake out positions that I haven't seen - whether I believe everything I write or not - because unique viewpoints interest me most. My blog is about inviting readers to wrestle with unique points of view strictly for fun. My regular readers understand that. When my writing is taken out of context, the way Jezebel and others did, it sometimes looks like a crazy rant and it pisses people off. That's more of a bonus than a main goal.
I don't understand most of what you wrote in response to my question. Can you try it again without the history lessons? I agree that women had it worse in the past. My offending blog post was about today and the future.
I think we can skip the question of whether I offended men, since that is not what is bothering Jezebel or Salon, just to name two. And most men correctly interpreted the post as saying that male sexual urges manifest differently in different men. The men who complained imagined I was saying all men are repressed rapists. That's a simple case of bad reading comprehension, or maybe it is because the post was carved up by bottom-feeding websites until the meaning was distorted to fit an agenda. At Huffington Post, where the average reading comprehension is high, you can see that most commenters can't understand how anyone would be offended by the post.
You say that the natural instincts of women can lead them to shameful and criminal behavior. I have a higher opinion of women than you do, in the sense that I think men are genetically more prone to bad behavior. If your point is that women suck just as much as men, I'll take your word for it. But you'll need to explain why our jails have so many more men than women.
I'm still confused why my blog is more offensive than what you just wrote. Can you try again, in simpler terms, and without the history lesson, to explain your objection to my post?
Continued...
June 20, 2011
Open Letter to the LRC Community
Update: A writer for Jezebel has accepted my offer. Look for updates as they happen.
Lately I have been getting many complaints about this blog from the LRC (Low Reading Comprehension) Community, mostly on my Pegs and Holes post from last week. Here's a sampling.
Huffington Post
Salon
Mediabistro
Mediate
Jezebel
I'd like to offer an opportunity to one of the writers at Salon, Huffington Post, Jezebel, Mediate, or Mediabistro. Allow me to interview you, by email, for this blog, on the topic of why you so vehemently disagree with your hallucination of my opinion. (Fair warning: It won't work out well for you.)
If you would like to be the chosen one, leave a comment below describing your qualifications. Or email me directly at dilbertcartoonist@gmail.com.
Lately I have been getting many complaints about this blog from the LRC (Low Reading Comprehension) Community, mostly on my Pegs and Holes post from last week. Here's a sampling.
Huffington Post
Salon
Mediabistro
Mediate
Jezebel
I'd like to offer an opportunity to one of the writers at Salon, Huffington Post, Jezebel, Mediate, or Mediabistro. Allow me to interview you, by email, for this blog, on the topic of why you so vehemently disagree with your hallucination of my opinion. (Fair warning: It won't work out well for you.)
If you would like to be the chosen one, leave a comment below describing your qualifications. Or email me directly at dilbertcartoonist@gmail.com.
June 19, 2011
A Stupidity Tax
Tax policy has two purposes. One goal is to collect money to operate the government. The other goal is to promote public policy. For example, mortgage deductions are meant to encourage home ownership. Tax incentives are a proven way to change behavior. This makes me wonder if we could have a tax on stupidity and thereby reduce its prevalence over time. Seriously. The nation has a great interest in reducing stupidity.
Arguably, we already tax stupidity. When the government subsidizes student loans and helps fund colleges - that's a transfer of wealth from non-students to students. Okay, it's not exactly a tax on stupidity, but it's certainly a proof of concept.
One big obstacle to taxing stupidity is identifying it. We generally believe that anyone who has an opposing opinion is stupid. So we'd have to ignore politics and religion when designing our test for stupidity. That still leaves plenty of practical knowledge that can be tested for.
Suppose we developed a general knowledge test that had clear and indisputable answers. The questions could range from parenting skills, to healthy living, to how to apply for a job, to basic science, and perhaps some other school skills. The test could run thousands of questions long. And it would be entirely optional. If you choose to not take the test, you can simply pay a stupidity tax instead. If you take the test, and score 100%, you pay no stupidity taxes at all. And if you take the test and miss a few questions, you pay a stupidity tax that is prorated by your test score. You can take the test as many times as you like to improve your score.
I know that you libertarians object to government activism. I get that. I'm just curious as to whether tax policy could make a huge difference in the effectiveness of society by directly taxing stupidity. Suppose science is applied to the task of identifying the most important knowledge that an adult should possess. Could you find a few thousand bits of knowledge that successful people generally understand and unsuccessful people do not? If so, that could be the basis of the stupidity test. You might also want to include any information about science or economics that an involved citizen needs to make informed voting decisions. That might help the government become more effective over time.
As with most of my ideas, this one is thoroughly impractical. No elected official could support a tax on stupidity. And you'd create a cumbersome bureaucracy if you tried to implement such a thing. I'm just thinking ahead to the day I create my own principality, perhaps on some island, and design the tax system from scratch. I'd have to give some serious thought to a tax on stupidity. I think it might help to keep the nation out of a death spiral.
Arguably, we already tax stupidity. When the government subsidizes student loans and helps fund colleges - that's a transfer of wealth from non-students to students. Okay, it's not exactly a tax on stupidity, but it's certainly a proof of concept.
One big obstacle to taxing stupidity is identifying it. We generally believe that anyone who has an opposing opinion is stupid. So we'd have to ignore politics and religion when designing our test for stupidity. That still leaves plenty of practical knowledge that can be tested for.
Suppose we developed a general knowledge test that had clear and indisputable answers. The questions could range from parenting skills, to healthy living, to how to apply for a job, to basic science, and perhaps some other school skills. The test could run thousands of questions long. And it would be entirely optional. If you choose to not take the test, you can simply pay a stupidity tax instead. If you take the test, and score 100%, you pay no stupidity taxes at all. And if you take the test and miss a few questions, you pay a stupidity tax that is prorated by your test score. You can take the test as many times as you like to improve your score.
I know that you libertarians object to government activism. I get that. I'm just curious as to whether tax policy could make a huge difference in the effectiveness of society by directly taxing stupidity. Suppose science is applied to the task of identifying the most important knowledge that an adult should possess. Could you find a few thousand bits of knowledge that successful people generally understand and unsuccessful people do not? If so, that could be the basis of the stupidity test. You might also want to include any information about science or economics that an involved citizen needs to make informed voting decisions. That might help the government become more effective over time.
As with most of my ideas, this one is thoroughly impractical. No elected official could support a tax on stupidity. And you'd create a cumbersome bureaucracy if you tried to implement such a thing. I'm just thinking ahead to the day I create my own principality, perhaps on some island, and design the tax system from scratch. I'd have to give some serious thought to a tax on stupidity. I think it might help to keep the nation out of a death spiral.
June 17, 2011
June 16, 2011
Technology Caves
I think the future is technology caves. You can get the advantages of a large home in a small space if you make clever use of technology and you design the space to fit the way modern families live.
For privacy in a small home, you'd want to soundproof the bedrooms and bathrooms. Much of the benefit of a big house is being out of hearing range of other people. Soundproofing probably adds 30% to the cost of the room, but it saves money if it allows you to make the home half as big and just as livable.
You'd want to locate these technology caves in towers or wherever you can find dramatic views. You won't feel claustrophobic if you have wall-sized views of the great outdoors. Add a large flat screen TVs to a bedroom wall, doubling as a computer monitor, and you'll have a technology cave that no kid will want to leave. With the right equipment, you'll be able to stream movies, play video games, Skype, text, and access the Internet, all with one big screen and a wireless keyboard. Put surround sound speakers in the walls, and a microphone in the keyboard, and you have it all. I'd also design the sound system to automatically mute (as a preference option) whenever the door is opened, so the sound doesn't blast into the other spaces.
The technology cave would have an oversized kitchen at its core, with a center island that seats six or more. There was a time when you needed a formal dining room for entertaining. But that level of formality is heading toward extinction. So delete the dining room and make the kitchen oversized. Everyone loves being in the kitchen with the action and the food.
Just off the kitchen, and open to it, would be what I'll call a general utility room. It's a combination of a home theater, a living room, and a family room. Normally you wouldn't see a high end home theater system in a small home, but for $25K or so, wrapped into the mortgage, you could double the enjoyment your family gets from the common space.
Every home in the future should have some sort of office workstation setup, perhaps with two computer workstations. You could design the office to double as a guest room and a second gathering space. I can imagine the desk area being located on a raised floor a few feet above the rest of the room so you can store a bed beneath it. When guests come, just wheel it out. Office hours are generally different from sleeping hours, so one space could handle most needs.
Garages might be unnecessary in the future, except for storage. If you design a city from scratch, public transportation will get the job done.
In the past, the square footage of a home was probably the single biggest factor in determining its level of comfort and livability. Today, technology and a growing trend toward informality make the size of the home less important. You can get to the same level of livability at lower cost by putting your money into room design, sound proofing, and technology. My best guess is that a technology cave could achieve the same level of livability as a McMansion, at a quarter of the price.
I predict that someday you'll see a technology company such as Apple or Google get into the residential technology cave business. The traditional residential construction industry will never embrace smaller homes with better technology. The change will have to come from another industry.
For privacy in a small home, you'd want to soundproof the bedrooms and bathrooms. Much of the benefit of a big house is being out of hearing range of other people. Soundproofing probably adds 30% to the cost of the room, but it saves money if it allows you to make the home half as big and just as livable.
You'd want to locate these technology caves in towers or wherever you can find dramatic views. You won't feel claustrophobic if you have wall-sized views of the great outdoors. Add a large flat screen TVs to a bedroom wall, doubling as a computer monitor, and you'll have a technology cave that no kid will want to leave. With the right equipment, you'll be able to stream movies, play video games, Skype, text, and access the Internet, all with one big screen and a wireless keyboard. Put surround sound speakers in the walls, and a microphone in the keyboard, and you have it all. I'd also design the sound system to automatically mute (as a preference option) whenever the door is opened, so the sound doesn't blast into the other spaces.
The technology cave would have an oversized kitchen at its core, with a center island that seats six or more. There was a time when you needed a formal dining room for entertaining. But that level of formality is heading toward extinction. So delete the dining room and make the kitchen oversized. Everyone loves being in the kitchen with the action and the food.
Just off the kitchen, and open to it, would be what I'll call a general utility room. It's a combination of a home theater, a living room, and a family room. Normally you wouldn't see a high end home theater system in a small home, but for $25K or so, wrapped into the mortgage, you could double the enjoyment your family gets from the common space.
Every home in the future should have some sort of office workstation setup, perhaps with two computer workstations. You could design the office to double as a guest room and a second gathering space. I can imagine the desk area being located on a raised floor a few feet above the rest of the room so you can store a bed beneath it. When guests come, just wheel it out. Office hours are generally different from sleeping hours, so one space could handle most needs.
Garages might be unnecessary in the future, except for storage. If you design a city from scratch, public transportation will get the job done.
In the past, the square footage of a home was probably the single biggest factor in determining its level of comfort and livability. Today, technology and a growing trend toward informality make the size of the home less important. You can get to the same level of livability at lower cost by putting your money into room design, sound proofing, and technology. My best guess is that a technology cave could achieve the same level of livability as a McMansion, at a quarter of the price.
I predict that someday you'll see a technology company such as Apple or Google get into the residential technology cave business. The traditional residential construction industry will never embrace smaller homes with better technology. The change will have to come from another industry.
Scott Adams's Blog
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Scott Adams isn't a Goodreads Author
(yet),
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