Tag Archives: feminism

May 6, 2017 · 7:47 am

Virtue Signaling: How It Creates Beta Males And Bitchy Girls

They’re weak, pathetic, gullible, whiny, sullen, and boring. They lack confidence, charisma, and any meaningful personality trait that might help them stand out and accomplish something of value. They do nothing to excite the opposite sex and make only the most asinine of efforts to do so. They are the beta males, an inane segment of the male population that I’ve protested before.

Now, allow me to describe a different crop of annoying people whose presence pollutes the collective gene pool. They’re loud, obnoxious, arrogant, impolite, dense, unreasonable, vindictive, and crass. They are unflinching, unfeeling, and utterly devoid of empathy to anyone who isn’t like them. Their disdain of others and perpetual victimhood complex is the only thing that gets them up in the morning.

I’m talking, of course, about bitchy girls. If beta males are a bane to all those with a Y-chromosome, then bitchy girls are repugnant stain on the feminine mystique. I call them girls because there’s a difference between women and girls. Being a woman, just like being a man, requires some measure of maturity. Girls, like their beta male boys, have none of that. As such, they don’t deserve to be called women.

I bring up these two case studies of festering warts within the human condition to help make another point about virtue signaling. I know some people are probably tired of this topic. Believe me, I feel your pain. However, this last point is more relevant because it affects our personal lives, as well as my efforts as an erotica/romance writer.

Beta males and bitchy girls are sometimes a necessary component of a story, especially one that relies on major antagonistic characters. You need a male or female character that is easy to hate and easy to root against. That’s why we have characters like Biff Tannen and Regina George from “Mean Girls.”

It used to be that we needed those characters to be alpha males or alpha females. They had to be tough, mean-spirited jocks or cruel, cold-hearted bitches that nobody rooted for when they got gutted by a crazed killer in a hockey mask. It’s crude, but it did the trick. Unfortunately, new trends in character development, as well as real life, are tweaking that script and not for the better.

Beta males and bitchy girls may not be natural allies on paper, but they occupy the same space in terms of being utterly contemptible on multiple levels. They just take different routes and virtue signaling is how they get there.

The best contemporary example are certain breeds of those who call themselves “male feminists.” By the way, anyone who actually has to preface feminism like that should raise a few red flags. That’s usually a sign that they’re already retreating into beta male mode and there’s nothing you can do to stop them.

These types of men are habitual virtue signalers, routinely bashing their own gender and agreeing with the bitchy girls about everything involving some “cisgendered white male patriarchy” conspiracy. They essentially emasculate themselves, shunning any male traits, and associating every masculine trait with being Biff Tannen.

It’s a form of self-flagellation, an effort to alleviate the sheer guilt they feel with being male and trying to earn attention and/or pity from others. That’s how they seek their validation and when they interact in groups, they can’t help but reinforce those efforts. Virtue signaling is just the proverbial gasoline they use to keep the fire going.

For bitchy women, the virtue signaling is much more overt. Unlike the beta males, they’re exceedingly vocal with their efforts. They don’t discuss, debate, or rationalize. They just yell, whine, and groan. Virtue signaling is just how they stay on topic.

Bitchy women don’t care about anyone’s voices, except their own. They loudly whine and bemoan about everyone who doesn’t buy into their view of the world. They will yell about the oppressive white male patriarchy at the top of their lungs. Then, when someone calls them out on their bullshit, they dare to play the victim.

In the mind of a beta male and a bitchy girl, they are the underdog hero of their own story and everyone else is an evil demon-possessed Nazi working on behalf of reincarnated slave-holders from the 1850s. Virtue signaling allows them to prop up this inner narrative, as though they have to keep it going in order to ensure they get the same ending they’ve seen in every Rocky movie.

It isn’t just that this inner narrative is utterly false and devoid of substance. It isn’t just that it gives them too many excuses to cling to these annoying tendencies, which constitutes excuse banking of the worst kind. The biggest tragedy here, beyond the people they annoy, is that with their virtue signaling, they champion traits that naturally drive people apart.

Beta males and bitchy women do not conduct themselves in ways that inspires intimacy, progression, and growth. They present themselves as heroes of their own story, an ideal for what a man and woman should be, but they cannot and will not realize that the picture they’re paintings is both flawed and repugnant.

A beta male, in his meek ineptitude, barely qualifies as a pet to a bitchy girl. A bitchy girl, in her immature arrogance, is just another bully that a beta male tolerates. Together, they reinforce a brutal cycle of bitterness, self-loathing, and arrogance that ensures isolation, apathy, and loneliness.

For an aspiring erotica/romance writer, that’s a triple dose of narrative kryptonite. For characters like the ones in “Passion Relapse” or “Skin Deep,” it’s important I strike a particular balance. I can’t have characters being too much like Biff Tannen or Regina George. I can’t have them be like the entire cast of the “Big Bang Theory” either. If I want those characters to be more than mere foils, they need to have some complexity.

I’m not saying there isn’t a place for characters like this. Someone needs to be Freddy Kruger’s first victim in a horror story. However, virtue signaling and those who abuse send a toxic message about what makes a man or a woman moral within the context of a story.

Beta males and bitchy girls don’t deserve to be heroes, ideals, or examples. More than anything else, they are cautionary tales of what happens when virtue signaling goes too far and infects someone’s mind. They should not be encouraged, nor should they be ignored either.

There are many different dynamics that go into making a character, real or fictional, into who they are. If they need something like virtue signaling to function, then that’s a sign there’s something inherently flawed. People have enough excuses to be mean to one another, some of which they can’t do a damn thing about. It’s better for society, our live lives, and erotica/romance novels if we don’t provide them with more.

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Tagged as alpha male, beta male, feminism, human society, love, masculinity, men's health, psychology, Radical Feminism, relationships, sex in society, society, the human mind, toxic masculinity, virtue signaling, women's health

May 5, 2017 · 6:47 am

Virtue Signaling: Why We Are NOT The Hero Of Our Own Story

Think back to any movie that ever involved a lovable underdog. For anyone who has been to a movie theater more than once since 1978, this shouldn’t be that hard. Hell, think about a popular TV show involving a lovable underdog, going all the way back to the “Leave It To Beaver” days. What do they all have in common?

The similarities aren’t exactly subtle. The lovable underdog isn’t someone who is big, strong, handsome, cocky, arrogant, or dumb. They’re often unremarkable, so much so that others don’t acknowledge their existence. They do little to stand out and even less to distinguish themselves, but the same story usually plays out for them.

Whether they’re John McClane from “Die Hard,” Peter Parker from “Spider-Man,” or the entire cast of “The Big Bang Theory,” they embody the traits of all that is good and right with the world. They overcome obstacles, bullies, and a world where pretty girls aren’t lining up to touch their dicks to become heroes in their own right.

In the end, everything works out for them. In the end, they get what they want. The world comes to love them. Everybody, male and female alike, loves them. They are respected and admired for their thoughts, actions, and ideas at every turn. They have every reason to feel good about themselves.

What I just described is both the standard narrative for no less than 95 percent of every underdog story ever told and the primary reason why virtue signaling is getting out of hand. If that sounds like a bit of a stretch, then please bear with me. There is a logic behind it and, unlike my previous post on virtue signaling, it has a major implications.

As with other topics, like sex robots and body shaming, it’s impossible to cover every aspect of a certain topic. Virtue signaling, having only recently become a major buzzword, definitely qualifies. It is very much an emerging trend that is finding its way into politics, gender issues, media, and even erotica/romance. Since I’m trying to make a living writing erotica/romance, that deeply concerns me.

For this particular post, I want to highlight the more direct impacts of virtue signaling that I’ve observed in recent years. Specifically, I want to focus on how it affects the way people see themselves and the way they relate to one another. There’s a lot of material to cover and I can only handle so much coffee before my brain starts to short out.

I’ll table my concerns about brain function for the moment because this is something that I haven’t just observed. I’ve experienced it as well. As a man, trends that affect how men and women relate to one another don’t just affect the kinds of sexy stories I tell. They effect me personally and how I conduct myself in my day-to-day life. They effect all of us, often in ways we don’t see or acknowledge.

With respect to virtue signaling, these effects have only recently become more pronounced to the growth of social media. Unlike every other point in human history, we no longer need a million people to march through a capital city or a massive rebellion to send a message. We just need a smartphone, an internet connection, and a willingness to castigate ourselves in a public sphere.

As a result, virtue signaling has become a popular pastime of sorts. Political leaders, media figures, and ordinary people with too much free time on their hands go out of their way to make these elaborate gestures to prove that they’re virtuous or pious or tolerant or not a Nazi.

More often than not, these gestures just aren’t enough and people end up doing more and more, thus creating a brutal cycle of sorts. Sometimes the gesture is misinterpreted, as often happens with poorly-worded Tweets. Sometimes it’s just part of a larger agenda, one that requires constant reaffirmation in light of incessant criticism. Video game critics found out just how bad this could get back in August 2014.

It’s a stressful endeavor, trying to loudly proclaim to the masses that you’re as virtuous, heroic, and understanding as any protagonist from a John Hughes movie. It’s also tearing us apart and making us despise one another.

So how exactly does it work and why is it so toxic? Well, to answer that, think back to lovable underdogs that I mentioned earlier. We, as a culture, love those characters for a reason. They live in a world where they do what they do, but come out on top. They win in every way they want to win, becoming the heroes of their own stories.

The problem with that world is that it’s a total fantasy and too many people try to make that fantasy fit into their reality. Unfortunately, reality is notoriously uncompromising. Just ask anyone who tried to make a romantic gesture that backfired horribly.

It’s not that they’re insincere or inept, though. They’re just part of an entire generation that has grown up seeing this narrative of the lovable underdog overcoming the odds and they’ve been led to believe that this is how you succeed. This is how you become the hero of your own story.

We, being the egotistical creatures we are, want to be that hero. We want to be the lovable underdog we see in the movies who can say they overcame the odds, succeeded, and got laid in the process. However, the tactics we see in movies and TV shows just don’t work in the real world or require an obscene amount of luck.

Since all the success, adulation, and sex doesn’t just immediately happen like it does over the course of a two-hour movie, those wanting to be the hero try to force it. That’s where virtue signaling comes in.

Since being a hero often requires hard work, sacrifice, talent, training, and the ability to be in the right place at the right time, virtue signaling offers a much easier alternative. It’s not solely about laziness. It’s just often the path of least resistance and the most readily available path. Can you blame anyone for taking it?

Rather than actually doing something meaningful, virtue signaling allows people to feel like they’re the hero of their own story, even if they accomplish nothing heroic. To their caveman brain, it doesn’t matter. It already has a hard time processing what gets it aroused. How the hell is it going to determine whether someone qualifies as a hero?

The short answer is that it can’t. The longer answer is that our caveman brains still urge us to seek validation from our tribe and security in our identity. Virtue signaling allows us to do both, even when there’s nothing of substance behind it.

This can lead to a real identity crisis for some people. There are people who define themselves as members of a particular tribe, be they radical feminists, conservative Christians, or Twilight fans. When they feel as though they aren’t slaying the necessary dragons, s to speak, they become distressed and look for any way to alleviate it. Virtue signaling allows them to at least feel it’s alleviate, which is close enough.

That laughably low standard ensures that virtue signaling is almost always an empty, shallow gesture at most. It only ever functions as a means to help certain individuals feel better about themselves, alleviate the mental stresses that come with seeking validation, and ensure they can be the hero of their own story, even if they do nothing heroic.

In a real world full of unflinching, unyielding circumstances that keep most people from ever doing anything remotely heroic, virtue signaling offers empty promises that only feel real enough to keep our brains and tribes functioning. Even when there’s no substance whatsoever, it gives people an illusion to buy into and that can be dangerous because it gives people an excuse to not do something greater.

As I’ve pointed out before, people will cling to any excuse that allows them to justify their actions or lack thereof. Now that doesn’t make those who virtue signal bad. If anything, their desire to be the lovable underdog hero of their own story proves to me that such people are good at heart. They’re just misguided, clinging to the feelings and validation that virtue signaling earns them.

Since I like to be a bit more optimistic about people in general, I believe that the lack of substance that inherently comes with virtue signaling will eventually catch up with most people. There will be those who can never escape it. For most people, though, I believe they’ll learn that there are better ways to be the lovable underdog hero of your own story.

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Tagged as alpha male, beta male, feminism, Heroes, identity politics, intimacy, liberalism, love, masculinity, political correctness, Radical Feminism, romance, toxic masculinity, underdog story, underdogs, virtue signaling

May 4, 2017 · 6:57 am

Virtue Signaling: What It Is, Why It Matters, And Why You Should Hate It

There are certain topics and issues that I generally avoid talking about on this blog, but know I can’t entirely avoid. Given the sheer multitudes things I discuss, from sex robots to Wonder Woman’s BDSM origins, it’s only a matter of time before a few particular concepts enter the conversation.

In general, I try not to be too divisive and dogmatic, but when you talk about issues like feminism, abortion, and religious extremism, you’re bound to rub a few people in ways that won’t make them horny. One such concept can apply to many of the social issues I’ve discussed on this blog, some more directly than others.

That concept has become somewhat of a buzzword among discussions of hot-button issues and not always for the right reasons. It’s especially popular among discussions surrounding political correctness and religious extremism, two topics that turn people off faster than a bucket of dead kittens. It’s called virtue signaling and it is, by far, one of the most frustrating manifestations of our faulty caveman brain.

Our brains might be remarkable marvels of nature, but they have a lot of flaws. Why else would Elon Musk be looking to upgrade it with his latest billion-dollar venture? Some of its features had practical uses in the old days before social media made everyone a wannabe guru on current affairs. Virtue signaling exploits nearly every one of those flaws and does it with a goddamn smile.

Unlike some of the other concepts I’ve explored, the definition of virtue signaling is still evolving. It’s a relatively new concept in terms of being something that people mention in a conversation, but the idea isn’t new. According to Wikipedia, which is usually fairly up-to-date, the definition is as follows:

The conspicuous expression of moral values by an individual done primarily with the intent of enhancing that person’s social standing within a social group.

There are other dynamics to virtue signaling, but this definition covers the basics. It is, essentially, a method people use to save face or prove their loyalty to their respective tribe.

Think back to movies like “Animal House.” Remember those initiation rituals that fraternity pledges had to do? They have been known to seriously hurt and kill people, which is why they’ve become more infamous in recent years.

Now, imaging always having to do these rituals to continually prove your allegiance to whatever group or tribe you’re part of. Anyone who ever survived college hazing should be shuddering violently right now. I’ll give you a minute to recover. For those who haven’t, it’s actually worse than it sounds.

Sometimes it’s subtle. Sometimes it’s so minor that it’s not even a factor in how we see ourselves or the groups we belong to. However, in the era of social media and professional trolls, it has become increasingly egregious. To illustrate how insidious virtue signaling can get, here’s a quick scenario.

Picture, for a moment, that you’re walking down the street in a typical city or town. There are a lot of people moving in different directions. Some are heading to parts of the neighborhood you prefer to avoid. Others are heading towards parts you like. You stick with them, for the most part, and are content keep it that way.

Then, as you’re walking towards your preferred destination, you come up alongside someone whose walking the same direction as you. However, they’re not content. They are very agitated.

They keep looking at the people going towards parts of the neighborhood they don’t like. They then start yelling at them with remarks like:

“HOW DARE YOU GO THERE!”

“HOW DARE YOU DO THAT!”

“YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED!”

“YOU DESERVE NOTHING BUT SCORN AND HATE UNTIL THE DAY YOU DIE AND BEYOND!”

Their yelling is unnerving to some, but others show their approval. Some even join in. They create a flash mob of sorts, going out of their way to find the people going in the direction they don’t like and berate them at the top of their lungs.

You choose not to join in. If anything, you’re someone embarrassed by someone heading in the direction you prefer acting so obnoxious. You’re content to keep walking in that direction and just ignore the loud, confrontational flash mobs.

Then, without warning, that same agitated person turns their attention back towards you. They actually walk up alongside you, try to get your attention, and start yelling at you with remarks like:

“LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT HOW VIRTUOUS I’M BEING!”

“I’M DOING GOOD! I’M MAKING A DIFFERENCE WITH MINIMAL EFFORT!”

“I AM A MORAL PERSON! I’M MORE MORAL THAN YOU!”

“ACKNOWLEDGE MY MORAL SUPERIORITY! IF YOU DON’T, THEN YOU’RE A GODDAMN NAZI!”

The scenario I described is a gross exaggeration, but one that highlights the major components of virtue signaling. It’s both a method for seeking validation from a group and alleviating mental stress. In that sense, it hijacks some of the wiring in our brains that’s meant to help us cooperate and survive.

The past few years, however, have gone beyond merely hijacking our collective psyche. They’ve effectively attached rockets to the plane and flown it into the side of a mountain. Some of this has to do with social media and professional trolling, but a lot more of it has to do with that painfully divisive and innately infuriating concept of identity politics.

These days, it’s too easy to be labeled a bully, a tyrant, a fascist, or whatever other word you want to use to describe Kanye West. Unlike past years, that label is much harder to avoid. Social media, smartphones, and the 24/7 news cycle that will make way too big a deal about the latest Kardashian drama ensure that once you have that label, it follows you like a festering rectal wart.

As a result, more and more people are resorting to virtue signaling to escape or avoid these negative labels. They’ll go to great lengths, yelling at random strangers and being exceedingly obnoxious, to be anything else. Naturally, that means things like facts, reason, and understanding often get lost in the mix. You just can’t be that particular when you’re trying so hard to avoid being labeled a Nazi.

It happens in gender issues. Feminists, especially the male variety, will go to great lengths to prove they’re not misogynistic, even if it means saying demonstrably stupid things.

It happens in religion. A certain adherent, especially in religions that demand a lot of sacrifice, will make any excuse and fight any battle in order to maintain their allegiance and prove they’re a better adherent. There’s little, if any, sincere belief. There’s just a desire to be part of the community. That can often lead to some truly horrific extremes, from suicide bombings to televangelism.

It happens in race issues. A certain race, especially the ones with a nasty legacy that the internet has preserved forever, will say and do anything to avoid being called a racist. They’ll even resort to favoring other kinds of racism to balance out past racist crimes. It’s as inane as it sounds.

At the end of the day, however, the problem remains. Virtue signaling is, by definition, a selfish endeavor that’s meant to make someone feel better. Either they want to feel more moral than those they consider bullies or they want to cling to a certain group affiliation, be it a particular race or a My Little Pony fan club.

There’s never any actual substance behind virtue signaling. In fact, substance cannot be part of virtue signaling in any meaningful capacity because its goals are entirely personal. Unless it makes someone feel better about themselves or keeps them in good standing with a group, it doesn’t matter in the slightest how true, honest, or valid the actions are.

It is a very troubling, if not tragic manifestation of our caveman brains. We’re a social species. We’re also a species that tries to keep itself balanced amidst a chaotic, ever-changing world that tries to kill us in so many ways. We’re wired to form groups, cooperate, and do whatever we can to alleviate the everyday stresses of life. Virtue signaling is the emptiest form of this effort and is ultimately counterproductive.

If someone needs that kind of validation, either for themselves or others, then there are likely other factors at play. I cannot begin to speculate what those factors might be, but the growing prevalence of such efforts says to me that the world is becoming more stressful and we, as a society, aren’t doing a good job of handling it.

In the end, I see virtue signaling the same way I see an empty gesture. It’s a poor attempt to force a desired reaction without actually going through the process of earning that reaction. Those who don’t end up earning something often end up neglecting it as well.

Think of it in terms of a lover. If someone just pretended to feel a certain way so that you would love them, what would that say about his view of love in general? It wouldn’t bode well for the honesty of your lover and the depths of your love.

There’s a lot more to virtue signaling. I know I’m painting a pretty bleak picture right now, but it’s an increasingly-relevant concept that’s sure to show up in many different forms in the coming years. I’ll definitely mention it again in future posts. I’ll make a concerted effort not to bash my head on my desk.

For now, the best advice I can give those who are just as frustrated with virtue signaling is twofold. Be cynical, but be understanding. Those seeking validation are human, like you and me. Understand that, but try and help them understand that as well.

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Tagged as conservatism, feminism, human psychology, identity politics, liberalism, psychology, Radical Feminism, religion, religious extremism, social justice, social justice warriors, social science, virtue signaling

April 28, 2017 · 8:07 am

Why Bigotry And Prejudice Can NEVER Be Resolved (For Now)

It’s all around us. It generates protests, outrage, and angry rants of every variety on cable news. It floods social media, infects college campuses, and drowns out any and all meaningful dialog that might actually lead to productive change. I don’t even have to reveal it at this point. Everybody knows what I’m talking about on some level or they at least have a vaguely accurate idea.

It goes by many names. Call it racism, reverse racism, sexism, man-hating, homophobia, islamophobia, or transphobia. It all falls under the same overly-divisive rhetoric that is bigotry and prejudice. It always seems to be in the news. It always makes a conversation awkward and unsexy. It seems to get better some days and regress the others.

Now I know I’m making everybody’s panties very dry by bringing this up, but bear with me. This post is not going to get as bleak or depressing as it would if it were a Michael Moore documentary. I prefer to convey a more optimistic spirit to my audience. It puts them in a better mood, which is important if you’re trying to sell erotica/romance novels.

On the surface, though, there’s no way around it. This is as ugly a topic as it gets these days, the concepts of bigotry and prejudice. If it isn’t the stereotypical white male patriarchal types bemoaning how lazy and violent minorities are, it’s the radical left-wing hippies who call everyone who doesn’t support interracial gay couples kissing in the streets Nazi supporters.

It really is a strange, distressing state in which we find ourselves in. There used to be just one extreme in terms of prejudice, namely that which tried to preserve the overtly-unequal status quo that favored one particular group, be it white men or one particular religious group. Now, the extremes are all over the place.

I’ve talked about a few of them, like radical feminism. They’re just one of the many extremes that have emerged in recent years, often in conjunction with trends in identity politics. It’s not peace-loving hippies who put flowers in guns anymore. It’s angry, entitled, hashtag-starting narcissists who go into a Hulk-like rage whenever someone dares contest their utopian worldview.

There’s an extreme for women, who want men to suffer for their historical crimes against gender. There’s an extreme for race, some of which favor completely disenfranchising all white men for their historical crimes. There’s even an extreme for those who dare to use the wrong pronouns when describing boys and girls. Yes, it really has gotten that crazy.

That says nothing about the craziness that has emerged from extremes within religious groups, but we’re all kind of used to that. We expect extremes in religion, whether they’re favoring the execution of cartoonists or demanding that their particular religion be given a right to discriminate. It’s just the same bigotry and prejudice, but with holy decrees and a convenient excuse to not pay taxes.

No matter the extreme, the outcome is the same. It divides people. It makes them angry, unruly, and hateful. It makes the comments section in every YouTube video about feminism and race relations a raging tire fire that undermines whatever faith in humanity you might have had at this point.

It’s as frustrating as it is tragic. It often leads us to ask the same question Rodney King once asked. Can’t we all just get along? Well, with all due respect to Mr. King, I’m sorry to say that there’s a wholly valid answer to that question.

Unfortunately, the answer is a definitive no. We cannot.

That’s not the solemn musings of cynical man who has read one too many BuzzFeed articles. It’s a cold, inescapable fact. However, there is a context here and a fluid context, which means we shouldn’t be too cynical. If anything, we should be even more hopeful.

The reason why prejudice and bigotry exist is simple and it has nothing to do with some vast, elaborate conspiracy by cisgendered white heterosexual males. Any conspiracy involving that many straight men probably involves fantasy sports or a “My Little Pony” marathon. Once again, this immutable problem in our society has roots in our biology.

It’s another byproduct of caveman logic. Those same settings in our brains that haven’t been updated in 200,000 years essentially guarantee that there will always be some level of prejudice and bigotry. The fact we’re able to function as well as we do as a global society is nothing short of miraculous.

To understand why this is, you need to recall the circumstances of our distant ancestors. They did not live in big cities full of a diverse mix of people from various cultures and ethnicities. They didn’t even live on farms in rural towns where cow-tipping counts as entertainment. They were hunter/gatherers, roaming and foraging in small, close-knit tribes.

For most of the history of our species, that’s how we lived. As such, that’s how our brains are wired and that wiring has not changed much. Due to the slow, clunky processes within our biology, it really can’t and that’s the crux of the problem.

Modern neuroscience has revealed a great deal about our brain’s capacity to form groups and cooperate. These groups become tribes and we, being the very social species that we are, come to tie our identity to those tribes. We work with them. We trust them. We rely on them. Most importantly, as it pertains to prejudice, we defend them and make endless excuses for them.

Picture, for a moment, how this works in our hunter/gatherer context. You’re an individual living 100,000 years ago. You have only a loin cloth, a spear, and functioning genitals. On your own, you’re not going to survive for very long. In a fight against a hungry lion, you’re basically a walking snack.

Then, you join a tribe. You ally yourself with other people who can help you, share resources, and give you an opportunity to use your genitals with others in a more enjoyable, intimate way. Suddenly, that hungry lion loses its appetite. One human is easy to maul. A hundred humans, each armed with spears and an incentive to impress fertile women, is much harder.

Being in that tribe, you come to rely on them and cherish them. Being around them gives you a sense of purpose and identity. You come to love and respect them. You form your own rituals and quirks. You sing certain songs. You do certain dances. You wear certain loin cloths that you think are stylish as hell. This tribe makes you feel complete.

Then, one day, you encounter another tribe. However, this tribe is not yours. They look different. They talk funny. They believe weird things. They wear weird clothes. They follow different rules. Everything about them is so strange and that freaks you out, so much so that you cling harder to your tribe.

Maybe there’s something about that other tribe that’s scary. Maybe they have weapons that are bigger. Maybe they have talents that your tribe can’t do. Maybe their food tastes better and their gods are more powerful. This is all causing you some serious stress and when your brain gets stressed, it does a lot of crazy things to mitigate it.

The next thing you know, your tribe goes to war with the other tribe. Your tribe loudly proclaims that theirs is the greatest tribe in the world. Their gods are better, their food is better, and their rituals are better. The other tribe is so wrong and misguided that they can’t be human. As such, killing them or demeaning them isn’t a big deal. It’s no more distressing than putting down a rabid dog.

Now, extrapolate this tribal mentality, carry it out a billion times in a billion ways within large multi-cultural societies, and apply the reaction to the comments section of a Justin Bieber video, and you now understand why prejudice and bigotry exists. You also understand why nothing can be done about it for now.

Remember those last two words though. I bolded them for a reason. This is where I offer readers a sliver of hope. Does racism, sexism, and homophobia truly disturb you? Do you wish that our society could move past it and forge a more peaceful existence? Well, you may live to see that day.

Keep in mind, these traits that make us so hateful and divisive all stem from our brains. It’s that flawed wiring that still thinks we’re hunter/gatherers picking nuts out of elephant shit on the African savanna that fosters so much bigotry and prejudice. We humans are capable of a great many technological and intellectual feats, but we cannot circumvent the wiring of our brains.

Thanks to companies like Neuralink and advances in human enhancement, like smart blood, we are very close to finally tweaking those outdated settings that make us mute certain people on Twitter. It may very well happen in our lifetime. We may see a new breed of humans whose brains can function beyond brutish tribalism.

We don’t know how these humans will think, how they’ll function with those still stuck in caveman mode, or how they’ll relate to one another. If they aren’t as hateful or petty as we are today, then perhaps they’ll find creative new ways to relate to one another, connect with one another, and make love to one another.

We can only imagine/fantasize for now, but I do take some comfort in the progress we’ve made as a species. We’ve done remarkably well, despite our caveman brains. It’s fun to imagine how much more we can do once we update the software. It may make for a more promising future and some very sexy stories, some of which I intend to write.

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Tagged as bigotry, family, feminism, hate crimes, hatred, human society, identity politics, love, political correctness, prejudice, Racism, relationships, religious intolerance, sexism, social division, social issues, social justice, social justice warriors, social psychology, tribalism

April 24, 2017 · 6:58 am

Bill O’Reilly: The Impact, Aftermath, And Implications

Last week was a good week for fans of workplace safety and opponents of old, cantankerous blowhards with their own TV show. Bill O’Reilly, the old, white, racially-insensitive troll, has been fired. I imagine feminists, hippies, and Michael Moore fans are still celebrating in the streets.

It turns out you can get away with being a raging dick to minorities, liberals, and anyone who ever protested a war. However, if you’re accused of sexual harassment by enough women over a long period of time, so much so that advertisers start ditching your show, you can only go for so long.

It’s not exactly tragic. Bill O’Reilly isn’t exactly stressed for money. He’s leaving Fox News with $25 million, which is on top of the boatloads of money he’s earned from various publishing and media contracts. He doesn’t have to work a day for the rest of his life. He has more than enough money to live in a mansion, eat caviar, and wipe his ass with hundred dollar bills until the day he dies.

Even so, it certainly doesn’t look good. Love him or hate him, Bill O’Reilly was the highest-rated show on Fox News. He regularly crushed far more likable personalities with minimal effort and he probably did it with a goddamn boner. The man, as arrogant a prick he was at times, had a sizable audience. His voice carried weight.

Fox News had so many reasons to keep him and let him spew his brand right-wing verbal diarrhea for as long as he wanted. The public might have been willing to overlook his unacceptable treatment of women in the past, but it’s just not as easy to hide that sort of thing anymore.

This isn’t the era of Don Draper and Mad Men where sexual harassment might as well have been professional equivalent of a paper cut. This is an era where one poorly-worded tweet can and will ruin your life. I’m sure O’Reilly misses the days of Don Draper and pretty female secretaries who didn’t mind a light tap on the ass every now and then, but those days are long gone.

Now I could spend multiple posts going over Bill O’Reilly’s downfall. It’s certainly a hell of a story, albeit not a very sexy one. The man ruffled a lot of feathers and pissed off a lot of people, which is to be expected. Like Michael Moore and Lena Dunham, he’s a professional troll. That’s what he does and, based on his net worth, he does it very well.

That said, I’m going to hold off on joining the hippies still dancing in the streets. I’m also going to hold off joining the chorus of right-wing apologists who would defend O’Reilly, even if he was caught choking a bald eagle with his bare hands. Those are losing arguments with no substance.

Instead, I want to focus on the impact and implications of O’Reilly’s downfall because it’s not just a non-tragedy. It’s actually part of a trend that started with Roger Ailes. Like O’Reilly, Ailes wasn’t brought down by his politics or his competence. He was brought down by charges of harassment by women.

That alone is pretty telling. These man can have some pretty disgusting politics. They can spit on minorities, shame women, and support policies that only serve to facilitate old white men getting their dicks sucked in every possible way. However, they have to become serial abusers of women in order to be taken down.

Don’t get me wrong. Men who abuse women, regardless of their position or politics, deserve to be punished. Abuse isn’t just wrong. It’s a crime. If O’Reilly and Ailes are guilty of this crime, then they should pay a price. If they don’t, then there’s no reason for them to stop. That’s just basic justice.

Unfortunately, this is where I know I’m going to piss off the dancing hippies. As bad as the allegations against O’Reilly are, it’s not clear just how true they are. Now many parts of it may actually be true. O’Reilly may be every bit as despicable as these women claim. However, without proof that can withstand scrutiny in a court of law, it’s unreasonable to just accept those claims outright.

I know. I can already hear angry feminists, beta males, and Rachel Maddow fans yelling at me. The very notion that O’Reilly didn’t do these horrible things, given the ugliness of his politics, seems downright offensive.

Let me make clear, though, that I’m not sticking up for O’Reilly or Ailes. I think both men are arrogant pieces of shit who trolled their way to fame and fortune. They’ve said and done things I don’t agree with, but you can say that about almost everyone in your life, be they a talking head on Fox News or a close family member. The difference is a matter of degree.

Now given the sheer number of claims, as well as the extent to which O’Reilly settled them, it’s reasonable to conclude that there’s something going on here. As we saw with the Duke Lacrosse case and the UVA rape case, false allegations tend to fall apart when subjected to scrutiny.

One or two women making an allegation with little evidence doesn’t prove much, especially when the allegation is against someone as rich and despised as Bill O’Reilly. There’s too much reason to suspect ulterior motives. It’s when multiple allegations emerge over time from multiple women who are not in contact with one another when a pattern emerges.

That’s still not to say that all the allegations against O’Reilly are true. Chances are, they’re not nearly as pornographic as the media claims. Anything that makes a media headline is usually designed to titillate more than inform. That’s just how media works. Ask any porn star.

However, given how many rich men there are in media and how only a handful of them generate this many sexual harassment allegation, it’s not reasonable to say that every woman is lying. The truth, as is often the case, is usually somewhere in between and not nearly as sexy as we think.

Now that O’Reilly has joined Ailes as old, right-wing blowhards who were done in by sexual harassment claims, a larger pattern has emerged. Now, the ardent critics of these trolls, of which there are many, have a new tactic for taking them down. They don’t have to contest their politics or engage in meaningful debate. They just have to nail them for harassment.

That, in my opinion, is a dangerous precedent. Sexual harassment and sexual assault are serious crimes. They should be treated and adjudicated as such. If they become tactics for silencing blowhards, no matter how much an asshole they may be, then that denigrates actual victims of these crimes.

It also gives opponents of these men powerful excuses to avoid actually confronting the substance of their words. As I’ve mentioned before, those kinds of excuses can create a dangerous mentality that allows people to circumvent critical thought of a situation.

In the end, I’m not going to miss Bill O’Reilly any more than I miss Roger Ailes. I really do hope the women accusing him prove their case. I hope that proof comes out and we can know with certainty whether they’re actually true. The truth has a way of adding greater weight to any situation. It also has a knack for getting lost in the media spectacle.

Whatever happens to O’Reilly from here on out is fairly inconsequential. He’s already made his money. He doesn’t need to troll any more unless he really misses the attention. With the precedent set, though, we may see more of this tactic against the professional trolls of the world. As annoying as these trolls are, the fact such tactics are necessary says a lot about how willing some are to find excuses instead of reasons.

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April 1, 2017 · 8:45 am

We’re ALL Perverts (According To Cracked)

In the interest of science, sex, and having an excuse to talk about subjects that get our blood flowing in all the right ways, I’d like to do a quick survey. Don’t worry. This isn’t a pop quiz. It’s not another one of my sexy thought experiments either. It’s just my way of making a point, one that may very well be important to our collective understanding of sexuality.

It’s just four questions. Anyone can take it. They’re simple yes/no answers. If it takes you more than 20 seconds, then you’re just overthinking.

Question 1: Are you a man?

Question 2: Are you heterosexual?

Question 3: Do you enjoy the sight of female breasts?

Question 4: Do art forms that depict female breasts appeal to you?

If you answered yes to all of these questions, then congratulations. You’re a pervert. That’s right. According to a growing sentiment within our culture, any straight man who dares to admire female breasts in any form of media, be it video games, movies, or TV, is somehow a pervert.

That’s the message that a recent article of Cracked.com gave. Usually, I’m very fond of Cracked.com’s work on discussing matters of sexuality. However, every now and then, they write an article that reeks of politically correct horse shit. This particular article talked about how video game developers put a lot of effort into the physics of breasts on female characters. For some reason, that makes them and those who play these games perverts.

Let’s step back for a moment and try to make sense of that without hitting ourselves in the head with a baseball bat. This is apparently an issue now. Men admiring women’s breasts is controversial. Granted, women’s breasts have been subject to controversy in the past and I’m not just talking about Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl performance either.

We’re still a culture that gets exceedingly queasy when we talk about sex in any form. We all remember how awkward it was in health class when we learned about the inner workings of a penis and vagina. Boobs have a sexual component to them. So unless you’re on a nude beach, at Mardi Gras, or in a Super Bowl halftime show, it’s going to be awkward.

Now there’s nothing inherently wrong about feeling awkward about sex or certain body parts. Who doesn’t feel a little awkward when they find out their best friend’s mom got a boob job? That doesn’t mean it qualifies as an outright perversion, does it?

Thankfully, we’ve advanced our society to a point where we have these things called dictionaries and this amazing achievement allows us to actually check the definition of a word to see if it fits a certain context. The definition of pervert in a sexual is actually fairly concise. According to Merriam-Webster, the definition is as follows:

An aberrant sexual practice or interest especially when habitual.

The keyword in that definition is “aberrant.” That means unnatural, improper, or abnormal. Now I know people don’t agree on what’s natural, proper, or normal. In fact, I would argue that most people can’t agree on that. They can’t even agree on pizza toppings. However, when it comes to our biological wiring that helps us survive and reproduce, I think we can find some common ground.

With few exceptions, straight men like breasts. They like the sight of breasts, the feel of breasts, and the depictions of breasts. I know this, both as a straight man and as someone whose readers regularly demand more vivid depictions of breasts in my novels. It’s as natural as enjoying a cold beer on a hot summer day.

So why is this wholly natural, hard-wired predilection being classified as a perversion? Why would the brilliant writers at Cracked.com see the efforts of video game creators to make more appealing breasts as a catalyst for perversion? Do they think men even need a catalyst to admire breasts or want to see them?

Well, a lot of it is our fault. By our fault, I mean both men and women alike. The media, and video games in particular, has been subject to much greater scrutiny lately in matters of sexism. If something can even be slightly misconstrued as sexist or objectifying, then that’s the end of the conversation. It’s sexist. It’s wrong. It’s immoral. Anyone who enjoys or appreciates it is a monster.

That last part was sarcasm, but I worry that sarcasm can’t do justice to the sheer absurdity of that notion. I don’t want to say it’s entirely a product of feminism, political correctness, or prudishness. However, it is a bad sign.

I don’t doubt that those at Cracked.com and those who complain about breast physics in video games have good intentions. They see beautiful, big-breasted women in media and think that’s objectifying and degrading. That’s an understandable sentiment. They completely lose my sympathy, however, when they try to conflate objectification with basic biological wiring.

The science is fairly conclusive. Humans are visual creatures, as evidenced by the significant amount of brain matter we dedicate to processing visual images. Art, media, and everything in between seeks every possible way to generate attention and garner interest.

Female breasts naturally create powerful imagery and not just for straight men either. They are a distinct feature within a sexually dimorphic species. As such, we’re going to respond to that imagery. It’s not a perversion in that it’s unnatural. Hell, you could make the case that it’s one of the most natural reactions human could possibly have.

I don’t deny that there are many facets of sex, nudity, and breasts are still taboo. However, it does our culture and our species a disservice when we start identifying natural reactions to natural sights as perverse. That conflicts with our own sexual nature and, as any Puritan will tell you, that nature is hard to suppress.

So in this case, Cracked.com is dead wrong. We are not perverts for enjoying the sight of female breasts. Game developers who put a lot of time and effort into the physics behind breasts should not be shamed or shunned. If anything, they should be celebrated. They’re putting that much effort into one of nature’s most beautiful creations. On behalf of all straight men who appreciate the sight of breasts, I thank them.

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Tagged as boob physics, boobs, breasts, cracked.com, female sexuality, feminism, human sexuality, male gaze, masculinity, sex, sex in media, sex in video games, sexual health, sexuality, sexy, technology, video games

March 31, 2017 · 6:59 am

The Negative Side Of The Body-Positive Movement

There are a lot of things that sound great on paper, but become a major problem when put into practice. Why else would anyone think that communism, slavery, or every reality TV show on TLC was a good idea at some point?

I’m not saying some ideas become a total disaster when put into practice. There are varying degrees of problems, screw-ups, and failures when it comes to to the extent of that disaster. Some are manageable. Some can even be glossed over and overlooked. Just look at the ideas behind every Adam Sandler movie ever made. That’s not to say that “Don’t Mess With The Zohan” wasn’t a ridiculous idea on paper, but it was still entertaining enough to work.

This brings me back to the body positive movement. I talked about it a lot when I discussed body shaming in general, but I’m bringing it up again for the same reason I reminded everyone that it’s okay to find beautiful people sexy. There’s a frustrating, counter-productive problem emerging in this movement that threatens to undermine its good intentions.

I don’t deny that those intentions are good either. According to Wikipedia, this is the goal of the body positive movement:

“The Body Positive teaches people how to overcome conflicts with their bodies so they can lead happier, more productive lives.”

On paper, that’s a wholly noble goal. It’s right up there with comforting a crying child, feeding a hungry puppy, or getting Bill O’Riley to shut up. I’ve no objections whatsoever to that kind of endeavor. There are people who have unhealthy conflicts about their bodies that need help. Whether it’s their weight, their hair, or their belly button, these unhealthy conflicts can cause a lot of stress for people.

As is often the case with any movement, though, some take it too far. By that, I don’t mean people go as far as a typical episode of “South Park.” The body positive movement still hasn’t reached the level of the PC Bros, although I do worry it’s getting dangerously close.

Why do I say that? Well, much of it has to do with an emerging trend from the body positive movement, one that’s distinctly negative. In many respects, it’s a backlash of sorts. If you’re going to give love and encouragement to those who don’t fit the mold of a typical Barbie doll, then what will you give to those who do to some extent?

This is part of the overly crude nature of human psychology. Like the rest of the human condition, it’s a blunt instrument. It’s not a scalpel that’s capable of discerning the fine details of a situation. That means if someone is going to direct love towards one group, then they’re going to direct hate towards another. It’s not always intentional or direct, but it is there and it’s happening more often.

Remember this little gem from the advertising world from the summer of 2015? It involved a beautiful woman, a bikini, and a question about beaches. In terms of sex appeal, it checks all the right boxes.

In any other era, it would’ve been as non-controversial as chocolate, kittens, and cartoon ducks. It’s visually appealing. It evokes an appealing mental pictures in those who see it. It generates some level of arousal in our brains. By all accounts, it’s as basic as it gets in terms of advertising.

However, those behind the body positive movement were exceedingly upset over this ad. From their perspective, this ad was shaming every woman who didn’t look like a goddamn bikini model. Never mind the fact that it doesn’t directly insult anybody. Never mind that it never directly says that people who don’t look like bikini models shouldn’t be allowed on the beach. This was the message the body positive movement gleaned from this ad.

As a result, those behind the body positive movement and those who protest against fat shaming decided to get loud, angry, and upset. Some protested it. Some parodied it. By and large, it was fairly healthy wave of outrage that social media did too good a job of fueling.

On some levels, I can understand why some wouldn’t like this advertisement. I can certainly see why some priest, mullah, or monk who takes a vow of chastity or laments at people thinking impure thoughts would be offended by an ad that features a beautiful woman. Those people, however, have far greater concerns than the body positive movement.

I can even understand why some self-conscious people might not like it. They may see that they don’t look that good in a bikini, get depressed about it, and not even want to go to the beach. Again though, it’s worth pointing out that this ad, and most others that involve beautiful people, don’t directly attack these people. They are just utilizing the current standard of beauty that most people find visually appealing.

For the body positive movement, that’s just untenable. To them, the mere existence of these ads is akin to lining up everybody who doesn’t look like a bikini model, standing them in a row, and then spitting on every one of them one-by-one.

This is where the body positive movement falters. It’s also why I have a hard time supporting it. The body positive movement has gone from a supporting role to an either/or, us-against-them struggle. If you don’t support people of every body type, then you’re a bad person. You’re mean. You’re a bully. You’re immoral.

From my point of view, that kind of approach is downright hypocritical in a movement that espouses positivity. It’s also wholly unequal in that the body positive movement focuses more on women than men. By that, I mean it disproportionally shames men more than women. Fat men are still pigs and slobs. Fat women, however, are inspirations.

As a man, I don’t just find this insulting. I find it to be an outright affront. It contains two of the few traits that most people find untenable, hypocrisy and inequality. It’ll cheer a woman like Ashley Graham, a plus-sized model who has been on the cover of Vogue. However, when it comes to men, they still haven’t given the likes of John Goodman or Drew Carey a call.

It sends the message that men are the enemy. They’re the ones behind all the fat shaming and insults. As such, they don’t get to be part of the movement. They can still be shamed for being fat slobs. However, if you dare shame a woman, then you’re a horrible person and it’s the job of the movement to make you a villain.

Now I get that men and women are wired differently. We’re a sexually dimorphic species. However, when it comes to being an asshole, the standards are gender neutral.

I still support efforts to help those who have unhealthy body image issues. Those people really do need help, love, and support. What I don’t support is immediately labeling someone who finds the old Barbie and Ken bodies attractive as somehow immoral or wrong.

No social movement has ever succeeded by insulting large swaths of people and shaming them for misguided reasons. Add traces of inequality and hypocrisy to the mix and that movement is bound to falter. It won’t always crash and burn, but people will eventually stop taking it seriously. In the end, apathy and annoyance will kill the body positive movement faster than any bikini model.

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Tagged as beauty, beauty standards, body positive, bullying, fat shaming, feminism, physical appearance, sex, sexual health, sexuality, skinny shaming, social justice warriors, the human body

March 30, 2017 · 6:32 am

Are We Becoming More (Sexually) Uptight?

There was once a time in American culture where the media couldn’t even acknowledge that sex existed, let alone happened between wholesome scenes of family dinners and fishing trips. An average episode of “Scandal” would’ve horrified audiences in 1965, who were used to seeing a married couple sleep in separate beds on “I Love Lucy.”

Without a doubt, sex on TV has come a long way. We no longer bat an eye when Kevin Spacey goes down on Kate Mara in “House of Cards” or when Glen Quagmire raises the bar for sexual debauchery on “Family Guy.” By all accounts, we’ve become a lot more accepting.

That being said, is it possible that we’re becoming more sexually uptight? Bear with me. I promise I’m not being sarcastic here. This is part of an ongoing observation that I’ve explored in other posts.

Some of it has to do with trends in feminism. Some of it has to do with the various peculiarities of the gender dynamics in our sexual culture. I’m not saying what I’m seeing is definitive, but as an aspiring erotica/romance writer, this does concern me because it may very well affect my industry.

Now when I ask whether we’re becoming more sexually uptight, I don’t mean to say that we’re regressing to a point where women can’t show their ankles and men can’t acknowledge that the female orgasm exists. In an era of internet porn and Photoshop, that sort of prudishness just isn’t possible. Never-the-less, there are other ways for Puritan attitudes towards sex to manifest in new ways.

Picture the following scenario:

There’s a beautiful woman walking around topless on a sunny beach. A young man takes a moment to stare at her breasts and admire their beauty. The woman notices the man and is appalled. The woman points at the man, calls him a misogynist pig, and rallies every woman around her to scold and shame the man for daring to look at her exposed breasts.

What I just described isn’t necessarily something that happens on a day-to-day basis. It’s more a manifestation of the kinds of sexual attitudes that are evolving. We no longer censor sexuality or deny that it exists. Instead, we shame people who dare to appreciate it in ways we don’t approve of.

In many respects, this is just as bad as any censorship by the FCC because it isn’t imposed by a government body. It’s something that we’re doing to each other. Unlike government bureaucracy though, shaming actually works. In fact, shaming pre-dates government because it uses the built-in system of guilt that every human who isn’t a sociopath has hardwired into them.

Now trends in being sexually uptight aren’t new. For much of human history, civilization has gone through various cycles of sexual attitudes. Some ancient cultures, like Egypt, were relatively liberal in their sexual attitudes. Others, like Victorian era England, were so famously uptight for their sexual repression that visible ankles were considered scandalous.

Even in modern times, there are some parts of the world that are more sexually repressed than others. Places like India and Saudi Arabia, despite being thriving modern economies, have some very backwards attitudes towards sexuality. They don’t need shame to shun someone who has sex in a way they don’t approve of. They have the authority to just throw those people in jail, which they believe is sure to kill their sex drive.

What makes this trend in the west so disconcerting, though, is that it’s emerging from a society where equality and justice are among our highest values. Countries like America pride themselves, despite protests to the contrary, in their values towards gender equality. The problem is that, for some, equality just isn’t enough.

Here’s a real-world example that illustrates this issue. Back in 2013, an incident occurred at Occidental College wherein two freshmen had consensual sex while drunk, but only the man ended up getting expelled. Why did he get expelled? Well, by their standards, a woman cannot consent to sex while drunk. Therefore, the man committed sexual assault.

Think about that for a moment and try to make sense of it. Two people get drunk, but they’re not so drunk that they can barely stand. In this story, the two people involved could not only send texts. They could also talk about using condoms and practicing safe sex. How can such responsible behavior constitute assault?

It didn’t matter though. By the standards of the school, the man still committed sexual assault and was expelled. The woman didn’t get charged with anything. She was a victim who was traumatized by the act of having consensual sex after a few drinks.

Again, think about that for a moment. Think about what that kind of mentality indicates. Our sexual culture is becoming unequal again, but this time in a different way. Instead of women being shamed for their sexual practices, it’s men who are being shamed.

Today, a man who lusts for a woman and expresses his fondness of sex is considered a pig, a deviant, and a sexist. A woman who lusts for a man and expresses her fondness of sex is considered liberated, free-spirited, and strong. That is not equality. That is a recipe for repression and injustice, albeit in different way.

Ironically, this trend is regressing fashion trends among women. We’re already seeing it in superhero costumes. Female characters are less likely to show off their breasts or female curves. It’s as if highlighting the physical traits of women is now considered an act of misogyny.

As a man, I find these trends troubling and insulting. Am I somehow wrong, immoral, or sexist because I enjoy the sight of beautiful naked women? Are my attitudes towards women somehow flawed because I dare to admire their beauty? I wish those were rhetorical questions.

This troubles me even more as an aspiring erotica/romance writer because it means some of the novels I want to write might be rejected as being sexual in the wrong sort of way. I can easily imagine rejection letters saying “this book doesn’t have enough diversity” or “the man enjoys the sex too much” or “the woman is too feminine.”

I can just as easily imagine such regressive attitudes turning the erotica/romance I love into this target for those who claim it’s an affront to women. Never mind the fact that I write these stories to enchant, entertain, and titillate, some will still see it as some sort of egregious act of sexism.

This really does concern me. I’d rather not return to the days where people don’t even acknowledge sex exists and any attempt to discuss it is somehow taboo. We’ve already experienced that kind of repression and it doesn’t work. Let’s at least try to remain sane on matters as important and intimate as sexuality.

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Tagged as censorship, feminism, intimacy, love, Radical Feminism, romance, sex, sex in media, sex in movies, sex in society, sex on TV, sexual freedom, sexual repression

March 29, 2017 · 6:59 am

Important Announcement: It’s OKAY To Be Sexy

Today, I have a very important announcement to make. No, it has nothing to do with the release of my upcoming book, “Passion Relapse.” That’s still coming out on April 18th though. Yes, I’m going to promote the hell out of it in the coming weeks so get used to that.

This announcement is every bit as important as my first book. It may even be more important. Since I’m a long way from success as an erotica/romance writer, I don’t say that lightly. However, I do feel that this is worth saying. It needs to be said so brace yourself. This may shock a few people.

It’s OKAY to be sexy!

I’ll give everyone a moment to recover from the shock. Take all the time you need. I know. This is a startling revelation, but hang in there. We’ll get through this together. I promise.

Okay, that’s enough sarcasm for now. I’ll ease up on the melodrama, but it was necessary for a reason. I say it’s a good reason too because this is one of those topics that has no middle ground. Either people just shrug it off or they’re downright hysterical about it.

Since I’m trying to break into the erotica/romance world, this subject actually affects me and could very well affect my future career. The stakes are higher for me is what I’m saying. So what exactly makes this announcement so vital?

Well, to answer that, here’s some context. It wasn’t that long ago that people didn’t make too big a deal about characters in movies, video games, and comic books who were overtly sexual. I’m not saying some people got their panties in one too many knots. I’m saying that, for a time, it really wasn’t high on the list of things that pissed us off.

That time wasn’t too long ago. For reference, allow me to cite one of the most iconic female characters of the past couple decades, Lara Croft. She’s always been one of those characters with a special kind of sex appeal. You could argue that her sex appeal helped make her an icon. How could it not? This is what she used to look like.

That’s pretty sexy. I won’t deny that it’s somewhat impractical for a soldier or a fighter, but Lara Croft is still a badass, globe-trotting fighter who happens to look good in short shorts and bikinis. There’s nothing wrong with that. As a man, I greatly appreciate that sort of visual appeal.

Then, back in 2013, her character was essentially revamped and rebooted. The sex appeal was downplayed, if not outright purged. Lara Croft went from being a badass, globe-trotting fighter with a sexy attitude to just a badass, globe-trotting fighter. She’s still a beautiful woman by most objective standards, but she’s not allowed to be quite as sexy anymore. This is what she looks like now.

Now I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with how Lara Croft looks now. That hasn’t made her video games any less enjoyable to play. However, the removal of her sex appeal is somewhat jarring.

Lara Croft isn’t the only female character to undergo that change either. Remember when I did my list of female characters that make men hate women? Well, on that list, I put a character named Felecia “Black Cat” Hardy. She’s a typical female vixen character from the Spider-Man comics. She’s another character whose persona is built around sex appeal, as evidenced by her costume.

Well, like Lara Croft, she underwent a change too. No, she didn’t become any less likable. Yes, she’s still a character who will make men hate women on some levels. The only difference now is that she doesn’t show as much cleavage.

It’s part of an ongoing story in the Spider-Man comics to make Black Cat more of a crime lord than a vixen. The story has been mediocre for the most part. I won’t say it’s bad, but I will say that it has done nothing to change the parts of Black Cat’s character that make her so unlikable. Whether she’s fully clothed or wearing a G-string thong, she’s still a character that make men say stupid crap about women.

I find this trend somewhat troubling and not just because it means less visible boobs. It troubles me because for some reason, the image of sexy women is somehow a bad thing. Granted, sexy women have always made people feel a bit uncomfortable and not just in their pants, but this is getting into dangerously regressive territory.

There’s no doubt that there’s a certain level of sexism in the media. There’s also a vocal component of radical feminism that has this mentality that any man who admires the image of a sexy woman is somehow sexist, perpetuating sexism, or contributing to rape culture. For a guy just admiring a beautiful woman, that’s pretty extreme.

Beautiful women, pictures of beautiful women, and any female character that has some form of sex appeal is now somehow contributing to this concept of “toxic masculinity.” That’s basically a catch-all term for all the terrible things men do and, conveniently enough, the cause is something that’s hard-wired into their own biology. That’s like calling a man sexist because he sweats more than most women.

Never mind the fact that the ideas of toxic masculinity and rape culture are somewhat flawed concepts. Never mind that since 1995, rates of sexual assault against women have declined by 58 percent. Apparently, all these sexy images are causing a crisis somehow.

Regardless of the facts, these crises are becoming more and more petty. Last year, I mentioned some of the laughable outrage generated by a comic book cover for Invincible Iron Man. Maybe I should’ve pointed it out then too, but that was just one sign among many.

Whether it’s due to concerns about body image or female representation in media, there’s a new moral crusade brewing. This time, however, it’s not being led by clerics, mullahs, monks, and popes. It’s being led by ordinary, educated people who have somehow convinced themselves that being sexy or admiring sexy things is somehow wrong.

I’m here to say that’s simply wrong. It’s okay to be sexy. It’s okay to admire sexy images. Whether you’re a man or a woman, you’re not a bad person for enjoying things you find sexy. You’re just a healthy mind in a healthy body. There’s no reason to apologize for that.

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Filed under Sexy Sunday Thoughts

Tagged as beauty, beauty standards, body image, body positive, feminism, internet outrage, love, masculinity, outrage culture, popular culture, Radical Feminism, sex, sex appeal, sex in the media, sexy, the human body, toxic masculinity

March 2, 2017 · 7:00 am

Truth, Lies, And Why “Daria” Is More Relevant Now Than Ever Before

For the past couple of days, I’ve been talking about the best and worst when it comes to fictional female characters. Since I deal in fictional characters as an aspiring writer, it’s a relevant topic of discussion. I want to create great female characters for my novels. I think I’ve made some strides with novels like “The Final Communion” and “Holiday Heat,” but I always feel there’s room for improvement.

That brings me back to Daria Morgendorffer from the classic MTV show, “Daria.” In both my lists discussing the best and worst female characters of fiction, “Daria” found a way to the top of the list. There’s a damn good reason for that too. Daria, as a character, represents something that is more relevant now than it ever was in the late 90s.

As I said in my past posts, Daria is one of those characters who was just ahead of their time, but not in a Nikola Tesla or Elon Musk sort of way. She came during an era when dial-up internet was still popular, boy bands were still relevant, and pagers were still in use. It was a strange and different time.

It was also a time when concepts like “alternative facts” and “fake news” were more associated with skits on “Saturday Night Live” than actual concepts that the general public has come to dread. In that sense, Daria is downright prophetic in the sense that she highlights a concept that become increasingly obscure over the past decade.

Throughout the five seasons of “Daria,” as well as two movie specials, one Daria’s most defining traits is her ability to point out the harsh truth that nobody wants to acknowledge. She doesn’t shy away from it. She doesn’t celebrate it either. She just points it out and lets the harsh truth do its thing.

For the overall narrative of this series, this is kind of necessary because Daria is often surrounded by those who constantly avoid the harder truths of life. Sometimes, as with air-headed dumb-asses like Kevin Thompson and Brittney Taylor, it’s out of ignorance. Other times, as with her sister Quinn and her eccentric teachers, it’s out of hopeless self-delusion.

Daria, being an outcast who isn’t afraid to think for herself, sees all of this from a distance and isn’t afraid to point it out. She doesn’t care that it alienates others. Even her sister, Quinn, refused to publicly acknowledge that they were even related until the final season.

Her parents constantly think something is wrong with her. Her teachers and peers constantly think she’s weird. Everyone thinks there’s something wrong with her. Daria even acknowledges that. However, as crass and callous as she may be, Daria may actually be the most sane person in her world.

This is best shown in Season 4, Episode 47 entitled, “Psycho Therapy.” In this episode, Daria’s family undergo a psych evaluation as part of a screening process for her mother’s promotion. It makes for some odd and entertaining escapades, but the most revealing moment comes when he doctors reach a remarkable, albeit unsurprising conclusion.

Daria, despite being so emotionally withdrawn and overtly sarcastic about everything around her, is by far the most well-adjusted person in her family. She understands and acknowledges all of her family’s quirks, but she doesn’t obsess over them or lament over them. She just accepts them and moves on with her life. I’m not a psychologist, but that’s way more healthy than we can expect of most teenagers these days.

In fact, Daria might as well be a unicorn dipped in gold with diamond-encrusted hoofs. She isn’t just accepting, understanding, and well-adjusted to her surroundings. She actively thinks for herself and no one else. She doesn’t shy away from the facts, nor does she avoid their implications. She is, by all accounts, the very antithesis of this current era of buzzwords, fake news, and alternative facts.

That’s what makes her so much more relevant now than she was back in the early 90s. She came at a time when people who said the cold, hard truth didn’t get it twisted through internet memes, social media feeds, and hashtags. Daria doesn’t do beat around the bush or try to twist the story. If something is true, honest, and blunt, then that’s the end of the conversation.

In an era where everyone, from our politicians to our gym teachers, has to have some kind of personality, Daria Morgendorffer is a breath of fresh air and from 1999 no less. What’s that say about our current state of affairs? I could spend the next 38 blog posts discussing it, but that wouldn’t be very sexy for a blog run by an aspiring erotica/romance writer.

I will say, though, that the attitude Daria embodies is something that’s a lot more critical now than it was in 1999. We live in an era where everyone seems intent on joining a trend, becoming part of a movement, or denigrating those who oppose your movement. Daria, being the consummate realist and independent thinker, would roll her eyes at both.

The idea of someone who just thinks for themselves shouldn’t be such a radical concept, especially when it was the core of a successful animated show that ran for five seasons on a network best known for documentaries about teenage mothers. However, that idea couldn’t be more important in 2017.

We current live in an unpleasant convergence, of sorts, where truth and brutal honesty are easily circumvented by fake news, alternative facts, and online trends. It’s too easy for someone to insulate themselves from the harsh realities of life. We all need a Daria Morgendorrfer in our lives to keep us anchored and too many don’t have one.

Being the optimist I am, I believe Daria’s words of wisdom will one day pierce the many veils of bullshit that permeate our culture at the moment. It may take a while. It may be painful, arduous, and distressing in the process. However, that’s exactly why it’s worth doing.

Thankfully, Daria herself gives us some memorable words of wisdom to make the process easier. In the spirit of celebrating everything Daria represents, here it is.

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Filed under Jack Fisher's Insights

Tagged as alternative facts, Daria, Daria Morgendorffer, Election 2016, fake news, female characters, feminism, lies, media lies, movies, MTV, news, news media, technology, truth, TV

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