43 Comments
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This Is An Adventure's avatar

Ben Shapiro absolutely needs to pivot to musical theater reviews. His take was so fascinating

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Alex's avatar

The "frustrated artist to right-wing agitator" is a well-established pipeline. Steve Banon tried his hand at a hip-hop Coriolanus, for example.

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Lindsey's avatar

His sister (also a right influencer) also had a genuinely interesting take on her Substack that included insight from her as a professionally trained singer! I don’t get this family!

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John Smith's avatar

In my book, flowers are absolutely, without question, too much on a first date. It could easily read as creepy/"lovebombing" and the woman could worry that she needs to manage a guy who thinks they are way, way further along in the relationship than they are. (Also, from a strictly utilitarian perspective, I'm fairly adamant that gestures like that will not ever make up for a lack of connection otherwise, so there's a lot of downside and not much upside.) That's not saying it will always go poorly--seems to have worked in this case--but save the flowers for the third date.

I agree that this feels like something we should all just skip, but any guy who actually thinks Sweeney's bikini body (a 10 in any normal person's book, if I must lower myself to such a juvenile and dehumanizing ranking system) is anything other than that watches way too much porn and hates actual women way too much to function in society.

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Tonyhams's avatar

It's really interesting that some people think flowers are this grand gesture when I just think it's a nice simple thing--it's not like he sent a singing telegram or something. I'm a happily married woman who would have been delighted to get flowers from my husband on our first date. Admittedly it's an old fashioned gesture so it might make me think "this guy doesn't date a lot" and proceed from there but there are far worse things than that.

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Toiler On the Sea's avatar

To me it's just so obvious the whole "pick up artist" shtick comes from massive insecurity and inherent misogyny stemming from getting dumped/heartbroken in the past. I'd almost feel sorry for them if they weren't exuding so much toxicity publicly.

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Alex S's avatar

It's too much for a new person, but if you had a long messaging stage first it could be okay.

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fiddletwix's avatar

This. Context matters. If you both just swiped right immediately setup a meet and know nearly nothing about someone, flowers are likely a bad move. If you’ve been chatting a little bit and there has been some build up, flowers are reasonable. Though, I always check if someone is a flowers person or not. Many women love flowers but in my experience a non-trivial amount actively dislike flowers.

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David Abbott's avatar

I think the flowers are a nice touch because they basically say “I’m trying to impress you in a sweet way.”. I haven’t dated in 23 years and I paired off within three months of leaving law school, but the impression I get is many young people give ambiguous signals about dating. “This is important and I want to put my best foot forward” is a great way to start things.

I didn’t like the dude’s implication that he only recently summoned the “mental health” to go on a date. If a date goes poorly, you go home and jerk off. This is what you would do anyway if you didn’t go on a date. There’s very little downside to dating for men and no reason to be scared.

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Ben Supnik's avatar

I think what the twitter poster said and what you are saying are not incompatible.

- "Rationally" there's very little down-side for men to date, it's low risk, the winning movie is to try.

- If someone is struggling with various mental health issues (depression, anxiety, etc.) then that might make going on a date seem insurmountable to the person who is anxious, depressed, etc.

So I read this as the poster had things going on in his own brain that were holding him back and now he has overcome them.

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Kayla's avatar

People can be nervous even if there's "no reason" for it. That's very expected when mental health is imperfect.

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Not-Toby's avatar

If you’re mentally ill there is generally more to be nervous about (even if it is definitionally all in your head), which is I assume is what people are dealing with when they’re talking about mental health.

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David Abbott's avatar

maybe i’m showing my age, but publicly talking about how your mental health issues keep you from dating seems pretty beta

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Martin Mertens's avatar

Is it the talking that's beta, or is having those issues in the first place beta?

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David Abbott's avatar

both

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Not-Toby's avatar

Well I'd be curious about both your age and whether or not you have mental health issues, lol. If one isn't actually undergoing anything serious it seems strange, but it seems like a totally normal thing to say to me if it's true... but then I'm 30 and have plenty of mental health issues.

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David Abbott's avatar

i guess my question is why would any woman want to partner with a guy who was too triggered by the thought of rejection to date. if he gets triggered by work, does he get to quit? if he gets triggered by changing diapers, does he get a pass on that? a man should want to date

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Not-Toby's avatar

I think he's probably writing to an audience of people which does not include you

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David Abbott's avatar

i’m 47 and self identify as mentally strong.

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Tonyhams's avatar

I agree with this (about the flowers) but then I've never been the "attracted to assholes who will fuck you and then refuse to give you the time of day" kind of woman that the culture tells me is so common.

I suppose there is such a thing as being too eager but flowers aren't that. I've generally been attracted to sweet guys who seem to like me and from there it seems straightforward that I would like when they do something nice and well meaning ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. If I'm unusual and women really do like jerks or men who seem ambivalent towards them I'm not sure how to give advice.

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David Abbott's avatar

I’m not sure women like jerks. I think women like high status men enough to put up with a degree of assholery. High status men with some assholish tendencies can still find partners just like pretty women can be higher maintenance than ugly ones.

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Kathleen Sykes's avatar

The thing I take offense to in the Sydney Sweeney thing is that busty ladies can't seem to get a swimsuit top that fits. DESIGNERS: If you're going to do a bra-style top, please make it in standard bra sizing!!

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Pam B's avatar

Watching Toy Story 2, with Jessie's song "When She Loved Me" was devastating about feeling bad for toys. Having Sarah McLaughlin sing it just added to the pathos. When the little girl finds Jessie under her bed and Jessie is so excited to be played with, only to be abandoned in a box at a Goodwill? I was like, that's it, won't be donating toys now.

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alguna rubia's avatar

My question about flowers is always: what am I supposed to do with them? I guess they're nice, but if I'm not at home with a vase available when they're given to me, am I just stuck carrying them around until I get home? Admittedly I'm not really a plant person.

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Not-Toby's avatar

Noted, probably a good idea to err on the size of a small bouquet 😅

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Not-Toby's avatar

Reading Arendt at the moment, just was taking notes on her concept of "speechless horror" in "Some Questions of Moral Philosophy," "in which one learns nothing other than what can be directly communicated," as opposed to usual situations in which moral discussion is useful. She constructs this category to talk about genocide, so I don't want to make... moral equivalence here, because for her it also entails an impossibility of judicial resolution. But I feel like I understand the *feeling* when I read Pelicot's case, or other severe sexual crimes (Frizl comes to mind). It's not dissimilar to vertigo.

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Tonyhams's avatar

This is a really interesting train of thought. I will say though: usually when people debate the "harm" done by sex work or promiscuity, I can see this "speechless horror" thing applying, because we're usually talking about some psychological or spiritual cost that is hard to describe (and which I'm not certain is real, genuinely ambivalent about that).

In THIS case, for me, the physical effect of that much penetration is pretty unambiguous and easy to imagine. I cannot possibly imagine enjoying that and it's clear she did not. It sounds like such a horrible thing to endure that I feel like her consent is sort of irrelevant. Why is she doing this to herself and why are men signing up to help her? I can't help but pass some judgment.

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Not-Toby's avatar

Tbh, I straight up haven't engaged with the case in the piece bc it seems like engagement bait. Whether that's because some aspect of it is faked or dramatized, or because it's a case of someone turning themselves into engagement bait for online success, I just don't want to involve myself with that stuff, not to sound callous re: any harm that may have been done to this woman. I don't have the wherewithal for the discussion anymore.

I'd be interested in elaboration on what you mean by hard to describe costs - it sounds like your issue is more a sort of uncertainty that something is clearly criminal in the first place, rather than an inability to respond because it's *so* criminal?

Reflecting on it, I think the element that creates my reaction is just sadism, which Arendt also calls out as weirdly difficult to fit under traditional moral frameworks (e.g., it's not in the ten commandments).

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Tonyhams's avatar

Yeah honestly I was just misapplying your concept entirely. In my mind where I saw the connection was...it can be hard for people to explain with logic or reason why they think being very promiscuous or engaging in sex work is not a wonderful thing, even assuming everything is consensual and you're using protection etc. But seeing it in practice can make people really uncomfortable and maybe that speaks to viscerally sensing a psychic harm from it that just doesn't fit the logical frame we put on it. Or maybe it's just cultural bias and some of us need to get over that. I genuinely am not sure.

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Not-Toby's avatar

Oh I see what you mean. Yeah, and I mean that touches on something I'm struggling with in the same reading which I hope is resolved as I better get my arms around her thinking - which is basically how one lauds individual judgement as driving morality while also disliking overly-emotional and thus confused thinking. I have a long history of just thinking anything emotional is per se incorrect, which is obviously wild (and actually borne of some deep seated irrational and emotional takes...)

I suppose as a sort of post-high school utilitarian, my attitude is that a lot of "no victim" thinking is really just "no immediately obvious victim to my eye" thinking. I think CHH's Aella example speaks to my intuitions that this is highly personal... it's obvious to me reading through examples that there are people who engage in sex work willingly and who come to really regret it and experience a lot of psychic harm, and equally obvious that there are those who don't have that experience and really do live the utilitarian dream. I speculate the difference is really not in the action themselves but in the security of the person engaging in them - things that you can do as a wholly self-confident and aware person can't be done as uncomplicatedly by a neurotic. On the other side, I think it is not obvious when one is engaging in cultural bias and when one is failing to articulate something they Know is Wrong but does not fit in the framework they have imposed on their morality, to the one doing the judging let alone to others... this implies, to me, a lot of necessary humility on the part of all of us. It's our first time living as moral agents after all.

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Boring Radical Centrism's avatar

>Anyway, I don’t even know what to say, but I feel like there’s at least somewhat of a chance that the 100-guy train wasn’t actually real?

I think the actual footage was posted on her OnlyFans? It'd have to be a pretty sizeable conspiracy to fake everything

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alguna rubia's avatar

I don't know, OnlyFans isn't live, right? She could edit them all together even if they were spaced over a few days.

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Boring Radical Centrism's avatar

Yeah but creating a conspiracy of 100 men plus her whole team plus the youtube documenter is a pretty crazy thing. And all to sleep with 100 men a few days instead of just a day?

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wjp's avatar

I'm interested in why she thinks anyone else would care that she "slept" with 100 guys in 24 hours. Is this something she would do whether anyone else knew about it or not? We imagine the 100 guys to be somehow prearranged, as if there was a signup sheet somewhere. If she wants to go Evil Knievel on us, it would be far more challenging, and, frankly, interesting, were she to try to do this without any prearranged train of guys in the waiting room. Did she enjoy any of this sex? Is she sore (as a guy, I sure would be)? At 15 minutes/encounter, that's just shy of 100 in 24 hours. 1000 guys would mean an encounter every 1.5 minutes. That's cutting it pretty close that I guy could even work up an erection and orgasm in that time. I'm guessing they have to be fkng her in more than one orifice at the same time. Sounds like fun. Who wouldn't want to do that for 24 hours straight?

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Boring Radical Centrism's avatar

>I'm interested in why she thinks anyone else would care that she "slept" with 100 guys in 24 hours

She has OnlyFans and made a fuck ton of money from it. A YouTuber asked her if he could follow her around for the month leading up to it so he could make a documentary on it, and it has over 4 million views now.

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Ben Supnik's avatar

What is a "click-up artist"? I tried to google it and just got a million ads and arguments about Click-Up vs Jira.

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anvlex's avatar

I think it’s a play on “pick-up artist”, but implying that they don’t actually attempt to pick up women, but instead just post misogynistic content on social media.

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zdk's avatar

It depends on the type of flowers, no?

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Fool’s Errand's avatar

It did surprise me just how *much* whining there was about the Sweeney comment. Millions of views for some no name! They must have hit some nerve?

And for the orgy: idk, ban porn or don’t. But it’s retarded to blame men for patronizing that is *apparently* this uplifting ‘work’

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Toiler On the Sea's avatar

Was the 100 guy thing not shown on her OF account? If not, definitely smells like a stunt.

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Kayla's avatar

If she faked this whole thing i would have so much respect

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David Abbott's avatar

1000 in a day is roughly 1.2 minutes per man. she might do well to hire foreplay specialists so the men are erect and half way there when their turn comes

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Fool’s Errand's avatar

…. We know just the gal

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