Tag Archives: Pop Culture

January 27, 2017 · 6:47 am

Villains vs. Anti-Heroes: There IS A Difference

Go to any message boards for comic books, movies, TV shows, or Twilight fan fiction and you’ll hear any number of twisted interpretations of certain characters. Everybody has their own opinions, but let’s face it. Some go out of their way to melt their own brain in an effort to interpret a character in a particular way.

Talk to certain Harry Potter fans and you’ll find takes on Voldermort that are creepier than all the clown makeup and anime porn in the world. As a noted comic book fan, I’ve certainly had my share of twisted interpretations, as well as heated debates on message boards. I understand that these debates are about as productive as spitting into the ocean in hopes of causing a flood, but it also reveals how broad our interpretations can be.

I bring this up because in my many discussions about evil, villains, and recent trends in villains, I knew there was going to be one major complication to this discussion that was sure to piss off certain fans of certain characters. Given how much time and effort some people put into dressing up as certain characters, that’s not an anger to take lightly.

For many of my discussions about Walter White from “Breaking Bad,” I referred to him as a villain. I even fit his narrative into the context of the “Villain’s Journey.” When I watch Breaking Bad and assess the story, I believe Walter White to be a villain.

I did this knowing that there’s a sizable chunk of Breaking Bad fans that refuse to label him as such. To these fans, and they’re not entirely misguided in their assessment, they see Walt as an anti-hero. They see what he did and why he did it as not being fit for a true villain. Never mind the problem with calling any villain “true” in the era of “alternative facts,” it’s not an unreasonable position.

Walter White is not Dr. Doom or Lex Luthor. He’s not Wolverine or Dirty Harry either. There are any number of debates fans can have, and there have been many, on this issue. I don’t want to have them all. My blog, if not the entire internet, simply isn’t big enough for that debate.

However, if I’m going to talk about villains like Walter White, Magneto, and Dr. Doom, I need to address the influence of anti-heroes. I hope to do another more in depth exploration of anti-heroes in a future post, but for now, I’ll keep it in the context of how they relate to villains.

First off, I think I need to make clear that villains and anti-heroes are not the same. Granted, they can be easy to confuse, but they are very different in terms of narrative, motivation, and personality. It’s possible for an anti-hero to be a complete asshat and still be heroic, as Wolverine regularly proves. It’s also possible for a villain to be endearing, as Freddy Krueger movies regularly prove.

So what’s the difference? What sets an anti-hero apart from a villain? Well, it doesn’t help that the definition of an anti-hero is somewhat vague. Even Wikipedia struggles to answer it. The simplest definition it offers is this:

An antihero, or antiheroine, is a protagonist who lacks conventional heroic qualities such as idealism, courage, or morality.

It’s not overly ambiguous, but it’s lacking in that it uses what a character lacks to define them. Unless you’re diagnosing personality disorders, that’s just not sufficient. Anti-heroes are as old as Ancient Greece, Don Quixote, and a time when Clint Eastwood actually had a successful acting career. By any measure, this concept does have roots.

Being a comic book fan, there are plenty of anti-heroes occupying my list of favorite characters. Wolverine is probably the most notable, but there are many others like the Punisher, the Hulk, Deadpool, and John Constantine. Some of these characters, like Deadpool, go out of their way to make clear that they’re not a hero. However, they do have some distinct qualities that set them apart from villains.

Anti-Heroes, especially those in superhero comics, still battle injustice in a larger world, just like traditional heroes. They fight criminals. They protect the innocent. They’ll even save the world from an invading alien army. The main difference is they’re just more willing to be assholes about it.

While most sane people have an innate aversion to assholes, we are willing to overlook a certain amount of assholery if it serves the greater good. Aristotle might have been a racist, anti-woman, douche-bag by most standards, but his contribution to western civilization was pretty damn important for our progress as a species.

There is a limit to just how much douche-baggery we’ll tolerate for an anti-hero, but core sentiment of the character remains. They still want to help others. They still want to save the day. They still, and this is critical, will do the right thing even if it doesn’t serve their best interests.

It’s that last quality that helps unblur the lines between villain and anti-hero. When faced with a chance to do the right thing or do something that’s self-serving, an anti-hero will most often do the right thing. They may be a total dick about it. They may even kill, destroy, or cuss like a hung over Quentin Tarantino. They’ll still do the right thing.

A villain will, at the end of the day, mostly favor the decisions that serve their interests. At the moment in the comics, Lex Luthor is a member of the Justice League and Dr. Doom is the new Iron Man. It’s a long story as to how this happened, and some of those stories are pretty damn awesome, but the sentiment of the characters is still the same.

Lex Luthor and Dr. Doom are being heroes because it still serves their interests. It’s not about doing the right thing for them. They may claim they want to redeem themselves, but that’s really not that altruistic when you think about it. They want to be perceived as heroes. They want to have that kind of adulation. On some levels, it’s inherently selfish.

Compare that to Wolverine or Deadpool. They couldn’t give two whiffs of a wet fart about how they’re perceived. They still do things their own way and their decisions aren’t always self-serving.

By this standard, Walter White is far more in line with a villain. He let Jane, Jesse’s girlfriend, die rather than save her when he had the chance. He poisoned a little kid as part of an elaborate plan to take down a rival. There are all self-serving decisions. These are, by most measures, morally abhorrent. That’s what makes him a villain and that’s what sets villains apart from anti-heroes.

I understand there are still arguments to be made about Walter White’s status as a villain and an anti-hero. I’ll save those arguments for another post. In the end, it’s still somewhat easy to confuse villains and anti-heroes. However, when you break down their character and what motivates them, the line isn’t as blurred as we think.

There’s a place for villains. There’s a place for anti-heroes. I imagine there will be plenty of debates about which is which and who is who, but it’s these very conflicts that help bring out the best and, necessarily, the worst in these characters.

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January 18, 2017 · 6:56 am

Love Or Obsession: Pop Music First Edition

Any form of media can seem innocent if presented in a cheery, upbeat form. You could probably present tax law and traffic tickets in a positive light if you just used a combination of boy bands, catchy tunes, and bland lyrics ripped from a Hallmark greeting card.

It’s an odd quirk of human psychology. If music is upbeat and catchy enough, we tend not to care what the lyrics say or what the song implies. Musicians like Van Morrison and Bob Dylan built entire careers on this quirk. Nobody can say it’s wrong because it really works. You can’t complain too much about the flaws in our brain wiring when it works so damn well.

If, however, you can dig beyond to upbeat tone and catchy lyrics, which is a pretty big if in many cases, you may find the contents of these songs can be a bit off. There are near infinite amounts of songs flowing through the various channels of media. A good chunk of those songs involve love, sex, and the pursuit of both, sometimes to distressing degrees.

Now I admit I’ve patronized many of these songs. My smartphone is full of sappy love songs, sexy dance songs, and gangsta rap that glorifies the female ass as if it were a holy relic. I love music and I’ll even dance to it, although it usually takes a certain amount of alcohol consumption. I think many of us are guilty of that in some form, sober or otherwise, at some point in our lives.

However you feel about the kind of bubblegum pop music that has been making teenage girls scream and teenage boys horny for decades, there’s no denying its impact on pop culture. It’s a part of our society. It’s a part of our lives. Hell, some of us may have even been conceived with help from these songs so we shouldn’t take them lightly.

With that in mind, I’d like to conduct another one of my “Love or Obsession” exercising on a few pop songs. I’ve already done it with TV shows and literature. Music is the just the next logical progression. Given the sheer volumes of bland, bubblegum pop music in the world, this will only cover a few songs. I intend to do others down the line. This is just the first and if someone wants to suggest a song to assess, I’ll gladly listen.

For this post, consider this the first edition of this analysis. I’ll stick to pop songs for now, but I’ll definitely consider genres for future assessments.

Britney Spears: Hit Me Baby One More Time

Love or Obsession?
Obsession

Let’s face it. Catholic school girls in mini-skirts are sexy as hell. Britney Spears found this out the easy way around the turn of the millennium. Being young, beautiful, and willing to dress like a sexy Catholic school girl, which is very much a fantasy of a good chunk of the male population, was a good way to achieve success.

Perhaps it’s because of that sex appeal that nobody looked closely at the lyrics to the song she sang in her first hit, “Baby One More Time.” The song talks about loneliness, being blindsided by a breakup, and wanting to stay in a relationship that clearly has some issues.

Now sometimes you do stay in a relationship out of love, hoping to make it work. However, when wanting to requires that someone “hit you one more time,” it’s getting dangerously close to abuse. You don’t endure abuse unless you’re trapped or obsessed. Given the context of this song, I go with the latter.

Backstreet Boys: I Want It That Way

Love or Obsession?
Love

Alongside the rise of Britney Spears, the Backstreet Boys proved that basic sex appeal and catchy lyrics can sell a fuckton of records. These kids were on the top of the world in the late 90s. They sung cute, sappy love songs to get the hormones of teenage girls going and it worked. It worked very well.

One of their biggest hits, “I Want It That Way,” epitomized their appeal and was, by far, one of their biggest hits. Given the tone and structure of the song, it’s kind of hard to hide the lyrics. They’re a bit messy. If they were on a greeting card, it would be a very confusing greeting card.

However, at the core of the song, there’s the sentiment that someone doesn’t care about the flaws or shortcomings of a relationship. They don’t want to change it into something it’s not. They, aptly put, want it this way.

As sappy as it is, it’s actually pretty damn healthy in terms of love. Real love involves accepting both strengths and flaws in someone. This song nicely embodies that and is probably one of the healthiest love songs a teenage girl can listen to.

Aerosmith: I Don’t Wanna Miss A Thing

Love or Obsession?
Obsession

This song was another big 90s hit that made Aerosmith relevant again. That alone is a hell of an accomplishment. It also accompanied a big Michael Bay movie of the time called, “Armageddon.” So between Aerosmith and Michael Bay, this song had a lot going for it.

Unfortunately, the sentiment in the song, despite Steven Tyler’s screaming, isn’t exactly very loving. It talks about just watching someone sleep and never seeing anything else when you close your eyes. The love he’s describing is literally something you can never not think about and not missing it seems like a live-or-death imperative.

This is the kind of song that Edward Cullen lives his life by. This is the kind of song that hopelessly-obsessed stalkers turn to when they want their obsession to seem like love. The implications are as distressing as they sound.

Rick Astley: Never Gonna Give You Up

Love or Obsession?
Obsession

Before it became an overplayed internet meme, Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” was a big freakin’ deal in the 80s. It was very much a product of the polished, prepackaged pop music of the time. Take a handsome guy with a handsome face, make him sing lovey dovey lyrics, and set it to weird techno-enhanced beats and you got yourself a hit.

With this song, however, there isn’t much need for analysis. It’s in the very title of the song. Never giving someone up, never letting them down, and always being around describes a very unhealthy mindset for someone to have with a partner. It basically champions making someone else the entire center of your world. That’s sweet, but wholly unrealistic.

It’s still a catchy song and the fact it became an internet meme reveals its staying power. That said, it has the same problem as “Every Breath You Take” by the Police. Break down the lyrics and it’s not a love song. It’s more a stalker/obsession anthem and there’s nothing romantic about that.

Hootie And The Blowfish: Hold My Hand

Love or Obsession?
Love

Here’s a band people love to hate for lousy reasons. Hootie and the Blowfish were a simple, but effective band at a time when music was emerging from the grim and gritty grunge era. Their music was upbeat. Their lyrics were simple. They didn’t try to look too fancy or gritty. They dressed like regular guys and made music.

Naturally, it became cool to hate them. It also ignored the fact that they were one of the most successful bands of the mid-90s. Their first big hit, “Hold My Hand,” got things going. It was not a dark and gritty grunge song. It was a simple, upbeat love song. Break the lyrics down and that sentiment just become stronger.

It’s another one of those songs that presents an oddly healthy attitude towards love. It doesn’t send the impression that you have to make someone else the center of your world. It says in the chorus, “I want to love you the best that (the best that) I can.” Trying to achieve an ideal is unrealistic and foolish. Trying the best you can is the most anyone can ask for, even in love.

Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell: Ain’t No Mountain High Enough

Love or Obsession?
Love (Mostly)

Here’s a classic from the late 60s and early 70s, a time when soul music and R&B began growing in popularity. It was also the pre-disco era so there weren’t any bell-bottoms or aphros. It was a better time is what I’m saying.

This song, which has been remixed and remade multiple times, has an upbeat tone and many unique rhythmic mantras. It’s pretty complex piece of music. As such, the lyrics are hard to judge. On one hand, they talk about there being no force on this world to keep someone from getting to you. That does sound a bit obsessive.

However, the context of this song, as well as the sentiment of the other lyrics, keep it from getting into that dark territory that “Every Breath You Take” fell into. As a whole, the song speaks more about keeping promises and being there for someone you love. That’s a good kind of love, even if the verbiage can be misconstrued.

The Beatles: I Want To Hold Your Hand

Love or Obsession?
Love

This is as simple and innocent a song from one of the biggest bands in the history of pop culture. Love songs and the Beatles are like peanut butter and jelly. They just go together so perfectly that it’s hard to imagine one without the other. Can anyone honestly imagine the Beatles doing a Taylor Swift style breakup song?

With one of their earliest hits, “I Want To Hold Your Hand,” the sentiment is simple. They don’t talk about wanting to watch you sleep, focusing every waking thought on you, or never being able to escape your love. They just talk about holding hands and sharing a simple kind of intimacy.

Being a hugger myself, it’s a sentiment I can appreciate. Holding hands is as innocent a gesture as it comes when showing love. It’s a far cry from never wanting to give someone up or watching them with every breath they take. For that, the Beatles deserve props for championing healthy love.

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October 24, 2016 · 6:57 am

The Outrageous Outrage Of The Outrage Over An Invincible Iron Man Cover

As a general rule, I try to stay away from overblown media outrages. It’s not that I don’t have an opinion on them. It’s just that in my experience, peoples’ attention spans are so damn short and their outrage is so damn selective that it’s just not worth the time. I’d much rather dedicate my energy to something more productive, like writing novels that make men and women horny for all the right reasons.

However, there are certain outrages that I feel obliged to address. If said outrage involves comic books, superheroes, and people who whine about insanely petty issues, then I’m going to make my opinion known. I love comic books and superheroes. I hope I’ve made that abundantly clear on this blog. I’ll continue belaboring that love for as long as I must.

So when someone decides to throw a hissy fit that gives comic book fans like me a migraine, I’m going to take notice and I’m going to have an opinion, especially if said hissy fit involves something petty.

So what has people whining, bitching, and moaning at superhuman levels this time? Well, it all has to do with a comic book cover for an upcoming series called “Invincible Iron Man.”

It’s not actually the main cover for the book. It’s what we in the comic world call a variant, meaning there’s only so much that are printed. They’re basically a gimmick for comic collectors and since they can be pretty damn awesome, most comic book fans don’t mind. I certainly don’t.

This one in particular is actually a variant cover exclusive by J. Scott Campbell, a very talented and highly respected artist among comic book fans. This one was actually done for Midtown Comics, a premier comic book store in New York City that I make it a point to visit every time I go there. So of course it’s special and of course it’s going to carry more weight than others.

So what’s the controversy? Well, before I reveal that, let me show you the cover. If you can immediately spot the outrage, then I think you’re already part of the problem so this blog post won’t affect you. If not, then bear with me because it’s going to get even pettier than you think.

Not bad, right? Good colors, good lines, and a generally upbeat tone. It depicts Riri Williams, a young African American woman who will be taking the role of Iron Man for a while. Those of you who only know Iron Man from Robert Downy Junior’s depiction in the Avenger movies may be confused. Trust me, it’s actually more confusing than you think.

I won’t get into the reasons why someone else is taking over Iron Man. I’ll just note that this happens a lot in comics. Every now and then, an established character will either die or go MIA for a while so someone else can take up the mantle. It’s been happening a lot lately because Marvel has been seeking more diversity in its heroes.

Riri Williams is hardly the first. Last year, they did the same with Wolverine. The former Wolverine in the comics died and was replaced by his clone/daughter, Laura Kinney. By and large, it was a success. It generated little to no controversy. Even comic book fans shrugged it off. Who better to take over for Wolverine than his own daughter? It’s a beautiful thing.

So what’s up with this cover surrounding Riri Williams? On the surface, it’s the kind of cover that appeals to comic book fans who want a simple, visually appealing hook for a comic. It’s a visual medium, after all. Shouldn’t it be pretty to look at?

For some people, being pretty is some horrible affront to all that is good and just in the world. How is it terrible unjust? Just look at the cover again. Look at how sexualized it is. No seriously, look at it. Is this piece of artwork really so overtly sexual that a generation of children will be scarred for life by seeing it?

I try to be fair and understanding in all major controversies. I really do. This time, however, I have to fight the urge to bang my head against a brick wall. Is this what really qualifies as being too sexual lately? Is this comic book cover, in an era where the hardest of hardcore porn is available with a simple google search, just too damn sexy for public consumption?

Sadly, enough people whined about it to prompt Marvel to pull the cover from the market. It’s a victory for those who are so fragile, so weak, and so petty that they can’t stand the idea of any form of media being the least bit sexy. For anyone who is just a fan adding more beauty to this deranged world, it’s the equivalent of a tequila hangover.

This isn’t the first time people have lost their shit over a comic book cover being too sexy. A few years ago, those same puritanical, overly petty types lost their shit over this cover for Spider-Woman #1.

That cover is by Milo Manara, an artist with a history of creating artwork that is overtly pornographic. Is it the best style for a superhero comic that’s marketed to adults and kids? Probably not. At the very least, there’s some merit behind the outrage here. It doesn’t take an overly petty person to look at this cover and see that it takes too much inspiration from Nikki Manaj videos.

Again though, how petty do you have to be to think Riri Williams in this cover is too sexual? Yeah, she’s a teenager and she shows off her mid-drift. News flash people, teenagers dress like that. Anybody remember Madonna? She was a teenager at some point too a million years ago and she dressed like this.

Have we really regressed that much since the 1980s? Are we really returning to a time when a woman exposing her mid-drift is on the same level as flashing her tits at a bus full of kindergartners? I know outrage is usually selective and petty to some degree, but this is a world of internet porn and Honey Boo Boo. I think that kind of pettiness is obsolete.

Again, here’s the cover one last time. Again, this is Riri Williams, a young African American woman who is about to become a superhero. Look at it closely.

She’s not wearing a thong. She’s not wearing a bikini. She’s not even wearing a dress for crying out loud. She’s just wearing what you’ll probably see high school kids wear around the beach, a mall, or anywhere they want to show off how many sit-ups they’ve done. If J. Scott Campbell wanted to make an overly sexy cover, there are many other ways he could’ve done it.

Except he didn’t. Some may argue that Riri’s bodily proportions are wrong and unrealistic. Some would much rather have her look like someone we would probably ignore if she walked into a coffee shop in New York. These are the same people who don’t seem to mind Photoshop being used on fashion magazines or breast implants being used by porn stars. Once again, they have to be extremely petty and selective with their outrage.

I can stand people being petty. I can stand people being outraged over dumb shit. We’re a flawed species. We’re bound to act stupid for obscenely stupid reasons. However, when that stupidity is given credibility, I have a problem with it. I doubt this will be the last such problem, but it sets a sad and dangerous precedent. It means that those who whine and complain loud enough will have their childish arguments taken seriously.

We don’t take children seriously when they whine about not being able to eat candy for dinner every day. Why should we take them seriously with this? Trick question. We shouldn’t.

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October 15, 2016 · 9:06 am

One More Point On Gender Double Standards (Courtesy of Cracked)

Are you tired of hearing me talk about gender and double standards? I don’t blame you. Can I guarantee I’ll never talk about this issue again? Of course I can’t. Making promises on the internet is pointless. In a digital world, anything you write (and even some stuff you don’t write that gets attributed to you anyhow) can come back to bite you down the line. So please, I beg of you, don’t make me belabor this more than I have to.

Double standards are important to point out, especially with respect to gender. There’s a reason I chose to explore this subject. It’s not just relevant in an era where Chris Hemsworth is a sex symbol when he takes his shirt off, but Nicki Minaj is a slut for shaking her ass too much. It affects my aspiring career as an erotica/romance writer.

Gender dynamics are kind of an important component of romance and erotica. By important, I mean that trying to work around them is like trying to perform open heart surgery on an angry lion. These dynamics shape and guide relationships, characters, and the overall sexiness of the product. These are all factors I must take into consideration when crafting a sufficiently sexy story.

I don’t just want to tell stories about some random guy or girl going out and falling in love/getting laid with some schmuck. I want to forge a relationship of equals. There are enough of those on the market today, from erotica novels to re-runs of Jerry Springer. Relationships of equal are more difficult and, as a result, much rarer. That’s why I went out of my way to highlight one when it showed up in an X-men comic of all things.

I won’t pretend the results of my efforts are perfect. I’m positive I’ll mess up along the way. Every writer does. Every goal worth seeking requires at least a few mistakes along the way. That’s exactly why we need to be aware of the obstacles in our path and double standards are just one of those obstacles, although finding a publisher has been a bit harder at times.

So in the interest of belaboring double standards just enough to get the point across, I’ll turn back to the fine folks of Cracked.com. They’ve been an insightful source for information and comedy on this blog before. As it just so happens, they did an article earlier this year on double standards we, as a society, just accept or turn a blind eye to.

Some are small and indirect. Others have major political implications that people on talk radio won’t shut up about. They’re all relevant in the sense that they’re a byproduct of these powerful double standards that shape relations between men and women. The more I think about it, the more I’m amazed that either gender can resist the urge to strangle one another.

With that upbeat thought in mind, here is another wonderful article from Cracked.com about double standards and the implications for gender relations. Just to be safe, keep your hands in your pocket for a while after you read it. You’ll thank me later.

Four Gender Double Standards Everyone’s Apparently Okay With

Number Four: Adele – Stalker

Seriously, listen to the lyrics of Adele’s hit song, “Hello.” I love that song too. Don’t get me wrong. However, if you really listen to what she’s saying and what she’s doing, it’s hard to differentiate that from a stalker. If a man sang this same song, then he’d be in line for a restraining order.

And let’s be honest: While in a scholarly way, we’re willing to admit that any scumbag thing a man can do, a woman can do as well, it’s generally with a reluctance that anyone would admit to a sexual crime perpetrated by a woman against a man.

Number Three: Sex Tapes/Selfies In The Media

Let’s be honest here, something that the internet often has a problem with. There are a lot of naked women on the internet. Men like looking at naked women and women (and even other men, to some extent) love to shame them. As for the naked men on the internet?

Well, we just all shrug and go back to searching for pictures of baby kittens on our phones. Jennifer Lawrence gets her phone hacked and nudes of her go all over the internet. Suddenly, she’s this tragic victim who had her privacy violated. Hulk Hogan gets his privacy violated, arguably in a way much worse and nobody can give two licks of a donkey’s ass. Is that fair? Hell no, but since when do double standards give a damn about fairness?

This is just one sad example from a site with the journalistic integrity of me after ten shots of whisky and a bribe, but it’s noteworthy for the way at least some of the media approaches the idea of invasion of privacy: Men have none, while women do. Hulk Hogan, whom not even science wants to watch have sex, must be watched! Jennifer Lawrence, darling girl of the Internet, must be white-knighted to the safety of Gawker towers, where none shall dare even glance at her ankles again!

Number Two: Hillary Clinton vs. The World

I am not going to get overly political on this blog. I would rather bathe in a tub of honey and stick my face in a beehive than talk politics. It’s the fastest way to ruin relationships, kill a mood, or offend everyone around you in a way on par with chronic diarrhea.

That said, I don’t think it’s disputable that Hillary Clinton and female politicians in general have to play a rigged game with a stacked deck. On top of that, she has to play cards that nobody with a white penis ever has to deal with. Again, it’s not fair. Regardless of what you think of her or her policies, the double standard here is pretty disgusting. Seriously, nobody should have to defend their record on anti-poverty spending and fashion choices at the same time.

Except Clinton’s getting raked over the coals for her emails, for her husband banging an intern about 20 years ago, for Benghazi, for various financial and ethical issues, and for her Wall Street ties. In other words, people have an entire list of genuine concerns about her as a politician. And then they want to know why she’s wearing an orange pantsuit. Clinton’s “free pass” costs just as much as any candidate’s, with the added bonus of having a dress code.

Number One: Amy Schumer’s Speech

Specifically, this one refers to a speech that comedian, Amy Schumer, gave back in 2014 where she recalled an incident with her, a drunk guy, and a night of sloppy sex. Now there’s nothing inherently wrong with sloppy sex. It happens. It’s the reason why romance/erotica writers like me have a job. We like to imagine stories where it doesn’t involve alcohol, regret, and a lack of orgasms.

However, if you break down the details of the story, you see a pretty serious double standard here. Listen to it again, reverse the genders, and what do you get? You’ll get a guy whose life is over because in the court of public opinion and Twitter hash-tags, he assaulted her. Anything a woman does while drunk makes her a victim. If a man is drunk though, then screw it. He’s drunk. What does it matter?

The man is so drunk that he’s fumbling and stupid. He can barely get hard. It’s like he doesn’t know what’s going on. My God, Amy Schumer is a sex devil! But read the actual words Schumer spoke, and it actually reads closer to her being the one sexually assaulted. The only difference is that because she was hopeful for the encounter — because she wanted it to be good, to be that fairy tale romantic moment — she allowed it to continue. She didn’t rape the man; she let a drunken bum get off on her while she effectively rubbed a lamp and hoped for a romance genie to appear. But it never did

For safety reasons, I recommend everyone still keep their hands in their pockets for a few more minutes. It’s okay. The kind of sentiment you’re feeling is normal. As I said before, our caveman brains do understand fairness on some fundamental level. By exposing these double standards and the unfairness behind them, we can let caveman logic do the best. It’ll be good for both genders in the long run.

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October 12, 2016 · 6:53 am

Monogamy May Be Going Extinct (Too Soon)

A big part of being a romance/erotica writer is finding new ways to explore romantic and sexual love in novel ways. Let’s face it. There are only stories you can tell about love at first sight. Those themes are as old as Shakespeare and it’s hard to make those stories interesting these days.

There’s still a place for these kinds of bland, basic love stories and there always will be. I’ve certainly used those elements in my own books. We’re an affectionate species. We love to love every bit as much as we love to hump. However, the ways in which loving and humping manifest will change with time, culture, biology, economics, and whatever happens to be a popular internet meme at the time.

There are already some ongoing trends that are making religious zealots, registered republicans, and anyone overly fond of the 1950s very nervous. According to the Centers for Disease Control, marriage rates are declining. Divorce is declining as well, but that’s to be expected when people aren’t getting married in the first place.

If that weren’t horrifying enough to the “Father Knows Best” crowd, the average number of sexual partners isn’t one. According to the CDC, men average approximately 6.7 sexual partners over the course of their lifetime while women average around 4.3. Seeing as how men tend to exaggerate the amount of panties they’ve moistened and women underestimate how often their panties get moist, let’s just call it an even 5.0 for both genders.

For some people, these numbers are truly terrifying. It means people are daring to love more than one person over the course of their lifetime. It means they’re daring to have sex for reasons that don’t involve consummating a marriage, making a baby, or showing homosexuals on how it should be done. The horror.

I hope everyone can appreciate the sarcasm in that last paragraph because this really shouldn’t be terrifying. People have sex. People love more than one person. It happens because people are complicated creatures. We can’t even agree over pizza toppings and ice cream flavors. How can we possibly agree on the right way to love and make love to one another?

I say this as someone who comes from a family that has a fair number of divorces and a fair number of marriages that’ll probably last until the sun explodes. I know how erratic and fickle our passions can be. It makes sense that our eyes, as well as other parts of our bodies, would wander.

I’ve talked about it before on this blog. Our bodies and our biology don’t know that we live in an era of Tinder, internet porn, and no fault divorce. As far as our brains are concerned, we’re still hunting and gathering in close-knit tribes on the plains of the African savanna.

Within those tribes, monogamy can happen, but it’s not the only way our passions manifest. In some cases, like when women die in childbirth or men die hunting sabretooth tigers, we need to be able to share our passions with others.

Loving more than one person doesn’t just make sense from a biological perspective. It makes sense in that it ties us together closer as a tribe. If we love each other and want to have sex with each other, we’ll be that much more dedicated to protecting and supporting each other. It’s a beautiful thing. It’s also a sexy thing. Even the most ardent clergyman or nun can’t deny that.

So when I hear stories about how monogamy is in decline or that family institutions are decaying, I want to roll my eyes and bash my head into a brick wall. This sentiment gives the false impression that monogamy has always been the end all/be all of sex, love, and relationships. That’s just not how the world works. It’s not how we’re wired as humans. It’s not even the theme of most sitcoms anymore, as “Modern Family” can attest.

So who is claiming that monogamy is in decline? It isn’t just the usual cast of clowns from the overly religious types who think their particular deity wants them to micromanage every aspect of our personal lives. Even more liberal types, like the Young Turks, are proclaiming loudly that monogamy and family life is going the way of disco, bell-bottom pants, and the Macarana.

Now I can understand the doom-saying from both sides. They’re looking at the same data and noticing the same trends. People just aren’t getting married, having children, and living around a white picket fence for the rest of their lives anymore. For some strange reason, this life doesn’t appeal to every member of the human species. Go figure.

That’s more sarcasm by the way. Sarcasm is necessary when addressing any form of doom-saying, be it from wide-eyed hippie liberals or fire and brimstone loving religious nuts. However, this sentiment that monogamy is in serious decline is worth taking seriously, if only because it means I may have to tweak the themes of my books.

As I’ve noted before, the current economics for marriage and monogamy are shit. The legal framework in which love and marriage operate are woefully unequal. In some ways, men get screwed over. In some ways, women get screwed over. It is a horribly unequal, inefficient institution that may as well have been crafted by divorce lawyers getting paid by the hour.

Since I’ve beat that dead horse more than it needs to be beaten, I won’t go off on another rant about why divorce sucks and why expectations of monogamy are unrealistic. I don’t think I need to belabor those points than I already have. However, there is one element to this sentiment that I think is worth pointing out and it’s something the Young Turks even discussed to a certain extent.

While it may be true that marriage and monogamy are in decline, it’s not necessarily declining in an equitable manner. What do I mean by that? Well, in the same way that divorce and marriage laws are woefully unbalanced, our cultural concepts of sex, romance, and gender relations are just as out of whack.

It isn’t because of the rise of feminism or radical feminism. It isn’t because of men losing their edge or fearfully protecting their male privilege either. In many respects, the problem has to do with the lingering impact that our uptight, puritanical, monogamy-loving culture still has.

Keep in mind, we still live in a culture where women can’t agree on whether Kim Kardashian showing her naked body on the internet counts as empowering or shameful. We live in a culture where a man can’t just walk up to a woman, say she has nice breasts, and not dread being sued for sexual harassment. We live in an environment where false accusations of sexual assault can ruin lives.

In other words, our current culture isn’t ready to let go of monogamy. We’re still kind of stuck on it. We still have these strange, skewed expectations about how men and women relate to one another, both romantically and sexually.

We expect women to be reserved and prudish, never freely engaging in sex with as many men as she wants. If she does, we as a society just assume there’s something wrong with her and go out of our way to shame her. It can’t possibly be that she just enjoys having sex and all the toe-curling pleasure it gives her.

We also expect men to be aggressive, pig-headed brutes who would gladly hump a dead cow if it looked enough like Jennifer Lawrence’s ass. If a man goes out and humps every woman within his area code, then he’s just being a man. If he actually goes out of his way to love and be faithful to one woman, then he must be a total pussy.

You see the problem with these expectations? Now try to imagine a society functioning without monogamy. It just can’t work. Our collective heads will explode from all the double standards, hypocrisy, and conflicting biological imperatives.

The fact remains that gender relations in our current society are just too fucked up right now. They’re too unequal. They’re too imbalanced for monogamy to decline to the extent that doomsayers fear. I’ll let the immortal Eric Duckman sum it up in the most crude, offensive way possible.

https://youtu.be/G8xp8BQxftE

It’s unavoidable. Men and women today aren’t ready for a post-monogamous society. Too many of us still cling to the “Father Knows Best” principles of how love, relationships, and sex should manifest. Almost as many cling to the politically correct sentiment that one gender must be guilted and shamed to no end for past injustices. It seems like there’s no way for society to achieve a healthy balance.

I try to be more optimistic than that. Our society always has room for improvement. Trends change. Cultural attitudes change. We, as a species, are great at adapting to new conditions. It’s part of what makes us the dominant species on this planet.

We tend to be slow, clumsy, and inept as hell when adapting our culture to new conditions, but we do get around to it. I believe that at some point, the incentives for a truly balanced understanding of love, relationships, and sex will be greater than the forces driving us apart.

It may take a long time, but it’s one of those goals that is worth the wait and the effort. It’s a goal I hope to explore in my books in various ways. I might not be able to speed up the process, but I can at least make the wait entertaining and sexy as hell.

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October 6, 2016 · 8:17 am

Fixing The Flawed Wiring Of The Human Brain

I talk a lot about the flaws, failures, and absurdities of the human species on this blog. It’s not by accident, I assure you. It’s not entirely by choice either. I’d love to be able to attribute shortcomings in the human condition to evil spirits, curses, and watered down beer. It’s just a matter of inescapable pragmatism that I constantly circle back to the flaws in our collective human brains.

These flaws extend to issues like unhealthy attitudes towards sexuality, religiously-motivated self-torture, and irrational understandings of gender differences. There’s no escaping it. We, as a species, are a buggy beta version at best and a 10-year-old, malware infested laptop running Windows Vista at worst. The fact we’ve been able to survive this long is a testament to our adaptability and/or dumb luck.

There are a lot of complexities and intricacies to these flaws in the human condition. I’ve touched on many to date on this blog and I intend to explore many more, both here and within my own books. Some may argue that these flaws are part of what make us human. That may be true to some extent, but I also believe that we’re way overdue for an upgrade.

The problem with these upgrades is that the flaws in the human condition are closely tied to the flaws of nature as a whole. Nature, by its own overly-pragmatic accord, is a blunt instrument that is stuck using painfully slow processes to fix and tweak its creations.

Natural selection, adaptation, genetic variation are all painfully slow. They’re akin to bunch of blind rats trying to direct traffic down a busy city street during rush hour. This means they can’t be precise, calculated, or measured. They basically have to build a house using nothing but a baseball bat and globs of wet cement. It is possible, but it’s not going to be very refined.

This clunky, crude process is a big reason why humans are at the mercy of the caveman logic that’s hardwired into our brains. Human civilization progresses quickly and chaotically, but our collective brains are still stuck on the same settings they were when we were hunting sabretooth tigers in the African savanna and shitting in gopher holes.

These are some pretty serious flaws, but the human species, like other species that manage to survive this long, can still adapt because of and/or in spite of these flaws. The human brain itself can do this to a significant degree thanks to brain plasticity, the wonderfully complex process that allows the brain to adapt and tweak its wiring in accord with new experiences.

While this plasticity is somewhat limited, it does provide a mechanism for tweaking our faulty wiring when it gets too faulty. This mechanism can be used to treat issues like addiction, depression, or learning disabilities like dyslexia. There’s a whole cottage industry of sorts, complete with accomplished experts and outright frauds, for rewiring the brain in this way.

About a year ago, Big Think did an article that focused on methods for rewiring the brain to improve performance in their careers. They cited a study where people who actively practiced a particular skill on a piano affected their brains in a similar way as people who just thought about practicing that same skill.

It once again reveals the crudeness of our biology. Our brains don’t always know the difference between action and thought. Both will help tweak the wiring to some degree. Crude or not, it does show the power of this mechanism. It’s easy to exploit if you understand and appreciate the clunky processes it uses.

We can use these new findings about the brain to help us become better performers at work, more successful in our business dealings, and more fulfilled professionally. By consistently training our thoughts, like those imaginary piano players, we can expand the number of branches and synaptic connections in our hippocampus, potentially leading to an increased ability to retain new information and adapt to new situations.

This alone should give some people hope that they can wire themselves to be more efficient in their jobs, their personal lives, and everything in between. Just understand that thoughts and actions can have a similar impact. Thoughts will inspire your actions and vice versa.

So when a parent tells their kid, “If you think it’s going to be awful, then it will be!” they’re not bullshitting them. They are actually telling the truth and they have scientific studies to back it up. That’ll be handy to have for when I have kids one day.

It’s even possible to push this process even further. In his book, “How To Fail At Everything And Still Win Big,” Scott Adams talks about using self-hypnosis to re-wire your thoughts into a more successful framework. He even provides actual instructions for those seeking to get in shape, eat a healthier diet, and deal with idiots at work. It’s a great book that I highly recommend. Given the amount of idiots in this world, this kind of advice is invaluable.

While having a faulty brain that can be hacked is nice to some degree, there are limits. Human beings are complex creatures who are at the mercy of equally complex and exceedingly clunky natural processes. Sure, we have Einstein, Mozart, and Shakespeare, but we also have Stalin, Dahlmer, and Bieber as well. The sheer range and breadth of that margin of error is a tad disconcerting.

This is the point where I close my eyes, ignore the doomsayers, and speculate on the progress mankind will make with its technology one day. We have a distinct advantage compared to the gorillas, elephants, and raccoons of this world. We can do more than just gather food from trees and trash cans. We can build shit. We can build some pretty amazing shit. Hell, we built this.

Our ability to build awesome shit gives me some hope that one day mankind will find a more comprehensive way to fixing the egregious flaws of our biology. It’s not enough to just train our minds and bodies to be better. We need to build shit that’ll make us better beyond anything that biology will allow.

Nature can create the grand canyon. We can make Mount Rushmore, the Hoover Dam, and spray cheese in a can. These are things that can’t happen naturally and, in some cases, are impossible even in ideal conditions. At a certain level of complexity, there needs to be an intelligence force armed with more than a blunt instrument to shape the world around it.

When it comes to the wiring of the human brain, the biggest promise at the moment is nanobots. These are little tiny robots that we can put in our bodies or in anything else and have them perform processes that are impossible to achieve with blunt natural forces.

These processes include going into our brains and physically rewiring the parts that are making us dumb, dispassionate, and depressed. Since these things would have a measure of intelligence, they could do more than just slap duct tape on the structure. They could break it down and rebuild it with shiny new fixtures, polished marble, un-rusted nails.

What does that mean for us? What does that mean for society? How will men and women function in a society where our brains are not at the mercy of the cavemen logic that has guided, for better and for worse, since our hunter/gatherer days?

It’s very difficult to say since I, like the rest of the human race, am limited by my caveman brain. However, it is an idea that I’ve toyed with to some extent in my books. One of my first novels, “Skin Deep,” explored the idea of using technology to reconfigure the human body, which vastly changed how certain characters interacted with one another.

I’ve been contemplating ways to explore this idea in other books. I find myself imaging a future where the brains of men and women are bereft of the flaws and limitations of our current condition. I don’t see us all being these mindless drones in such a future. I actually see us becoming more emotional, more connected, and more passionate than we would be otherwise.

Since this is the internet and pretty much any bit of technology will be applied to sex, I also find myself thinking about how this would affect intimacy. What would it be like for two people, be they gay or straight, to have sex when their brains have been enhanced to such a degree that they don’t have any biological limitations?

What sort of emotions would we feel? What sort of thoughts would we think? What sort of orgasms would we have? These are the kinds of kinky ideas that keep me up at night, among other things. They’re ideas worth contemplating because this future may manifest in some form or another down the line.

According to futurist, Ray Kurzweil, nanorobotic technology will advance to a point where it can re-wire our brains at some time in the 2030s. He claims:

We’re going to expand the brain’s neocortex and become more godlike.

That’s a pretty bold claim, but one that only seems bold from our limited, caveman brains. I’m sure a mouse looks at a hot pocket or a cup of Ramen noodles and struggles to comprehend that as well.

Unlike a rat, we can speculate and tell stories about the lives of those who live in a world where their brains are functioning beyond that of mere cavemen. Will these brains be absent of the flaws, taboos, and hindrances that hinder our ability to be intimate with one another? It’s amazing to contemplate and could make for a damn good, damn sexy story.

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October 5, 2016 · 6:54 am

I Wish Ads Were THIS Honest

I saw this ad on a message board today and just had to share it. It’s a wonderfully relevant summation of the issues I discussed last week on radical feminism and sexual objectification. I know I said I didn’t want to keep talking about those issues. Believe me, I’d rather get a prostate exam from a lobster than talk more about these issues. Sometimes though, you just have to make an exception when it’s warranted.

When I saw this ad, I knew it was warranted and I’ll gladly make an exception because it reflects a point I didn’t get a chance to make in my previous posts. In our overly politically correct culture, we tend to get so emotionally worked up about overly specific shit that we can’t see the forest from the trees. If we’re not careful, we end up burning the whole goddamn forest down.

This particular tree already has wilting branches and dead leaves. It’s the tree of sex in advertising. Like peanut butter and jelly, Jack and Coke, or ketchup and damn near everything, it’s the go-to target for the politically correct crowd that loves to complain about objectification of women. To be fair, it’s hard to blame them when the target it this big.

However, this whining (like pretty much all forms of whining) doesn’t fix anything, nor does it acknowledge the actual context of the situation. It’s the other C-word that offends so many people without realizing it. That word, context, is the key to making sense of so many politically correct absurdities.

In the case of this ad, it basically says what shouldn’t need to be said to a reasonable mind, male or female. The fact we have to actually remind ourselves these days is deeply troubling for both genders. I guess some things just need to be belabored.

With that in mind, I’ll belabor the same point that this ad belabors so retreat to your safe space if you have to:

It’s okay for a heterosexual man to find a beautiful woman attractive.

I’ll give everybody a moment to stop gasping. I know. Shocking, isn’t it? Are we really at the point in our culture where we have to remind ourselves of shit like this? Do we really have to explain slowly and carefully to people that there is a context to all this sexy advertising? I’m usually pretty good at resisting the urge to punch my computer screen, but some days are harder than others.

There’s this disturbing trend in our culture where we’re shaming heterosexual men for finding women beautiful. We may as well shame them for breathing, farting, and coughing as well because this isn’t some elaborate patriarchal conspiracy. This is human biology 101. Heterosexual men find beautiful women attractive. Why does that have to be controversial?

Beyond the controversy, there’s another important point in the ad that’s worth belaboring. Again, retreat to your safe spaces because this may get heavy.

You’re not obligated to look at this ad and it’s perfectly okay to ignore it

This is where I feel like people give way too much credit to the human attention span. We live in a world where everyone cares about a dentist killing a lion one day and Kim Kardashian’s ass the next. We, as a species, are not good at paying attention for long periods of time. Anyone who fell asleep at an economics lecture understands this.

This is where my old friend, caveman logic, comes into play again. We have to have a finite attention span. Pay attention to one thing for too long and either a lion eats us or we forget to procreate. Our brains are wired in a way to help us forget trivial shit and what’s more trivial than an ad?

That’s not to say an ad can’t be offensive. An add that uses the Nazi holocaust to cell an oven is a bit harder to ignore because it exploits an egregious tragedy that actually killed people. A beautiful woman is not on that same level. It’s not even in that same time zone.

I get that some people find things more offensive than others. I get that some people are offended by next to nothing while others are offended by damn near everything. That makes ignoring trivial shit like ads all the more important. It serves everybody better.

Now, there’s one more point in the ad I’d like to make and this is probably something else that requires certain people to hide in their safe space.

Ads that involve beautiful women are targeted towards heterosexual men

I know it’s obvious. I know it’s downright inane, but it still needs to be said because it’s a context that some politically correct types just refuse to see. These ads aren’t just thrown out into the world to piss people off. There is another reason for it and, shockingly enough, it involves selling shit to a specific market.

Like it or not (and some do hate it), heterosexual men make up a good chunk of the market. They are a sizable chunk of the human population and, as I’ve pointed out before, tend to be much more visual compared to women.

They also make a lot of money. Heterosexual men don’t have babies and, historically speaking, have made up a larger chunk of the workforce. It wasn’t really until the 20th century that women, thanks to the development of birth control, were able to join the workforce in larger numbers.

Heterosexual men have money. Advertisers want them to buy their products so they can get some of that money. They make money by getting the attention of customers and what’s the easiest way to get the attention of a heterosexual man? Use a beautiful woman. It’s not just pragmatic. It’s basic biology. I’ll even argue there’s beauty in that biology.

Are you back from your safe space? Have you avoided any possible trigger warnings? Good. I’m glad I could share this ad and this insight.

As an aspiring romance/erotica writer, I want to appeal to everybody, be they heterosexual male, transsexual female, or something in between that I’m not equipped to define. As such, it doesn’t make sense and is kind of a dick move to single out one chunk of that population for shaming.

It’s okay for men to find beautiful women attractive. It’s okay for women to find handsome men attractive. It’s okay for gay men and women to find their own gender attractive. It’s also okay for ads to use this imagery. It’s not going to change our biological wiring. No amount of shame is going to change that. It’s better for everyone if we just accept it, hug each other, and move on with our lives.

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October 1, 2016 · 8:32 am

Logical Fallacies And How They Mess With Your Caveman Brain

I like to think this blog offers something useful other than announcements on books from a no-name aspiring erotica/romance writer. I want to both entertain and enlighten with my writing. If I can also titillate and arouse, then that’s a nice bonus. I’d like to enhance that bonus down the line, but for now I’m willing to be flexible.

Since I started this blog, I’ve talked about numerous topics. I’ve touched on controversial issues like unfair divorce laws, body shaming, and misogyny in modern society. I’ve also touched on lighter, less serious issues like sex-positive superheroes, terrible love triangles, and the joys of sleeping naked. For the record, I still sleep naked and I don’t intend to stop.

Through many of my twisted, and sometimes perverse thoughts, I use a common phrase. That phrase is “caveman logic.” It’s something I may want to copyright or trademark because I find myself applying more and more of it to various issues, be they exceedingly serious of overtly juvenile. It’s not intentional. It’s just that it works so damn well in making sense of the craziness in this world.

I’ve started contemplating a new idea, one that would be a major departure from my typical romance/erotica aspirations. I’m thinking of writing a non-fiction book to flesh out the concept of caveman logic. It’s an intriguing thought. What else could I apply to? Politics? Economics? Religion? More overly sexy issues to explain the insane sexual landscape of this crazy world? I think you all know which one I’m leaning towards.

As I contemplate this idea, it’s worth exploring more of the finer details of how caveman logic works and how it affects us. It’s important to understand because if we can at least acknowledge the mechanisms of our craziness, then we can at least appreciate it in the right context.

Make no mistake. Context does matter. People aren’t going to stop doing crazy stupid shit. We’re a species that obsesses over cat videos, hashtags, and the size of Kim Kardashian’s ass. We’re not a logical species. We can’t expect ourselves to make logical choices in religion, government, popular culture, and sex. I’ve already covered some of the sexy parts of this illogical nature. There’s still plenty more to cover.

The main crux of caveman logic is that human beings are not wired, be it by nature or whatever magical deity you think made us, to be logical. Our biological programming, from our brains to our body chemistry, is wired for two things: survival and reproduction.

Whether it’s by nature or by deity, it makes sense in that’s exceedingly pragmatic. It doesn’t matter how smart you are. If you can’t survive long enough to get laid, your species is screwed. This is why jocks and their meathead kids still dominate in the halls of public schools today. It’s why they’ll likely keep dominating, no matter how many shitty teen movies Hollywood makes.

In the context of caveman logic, it’s important to understand that the traits that aided our survival and ability to bone emerged in the African savanna. Biologically, our bodies are adapted to an environment that allows small tribes of humans to hunt, gather, and farm food. There’s nothing in our DNA that equips us to deal with smartphones that can download unlimited amounts of free porn.

Civilization, despite its many glories, doesn’t always do a good job of complementing or supplementing our caveman brains and bodies. Nature is, by and large, a blunt instrument and not a scalpel. It can’t tweak and fine-tune itself for us as we would like.

As a result, civilization and the complexities of the universe tend to screw us over. When the situation before us doesn’t involve survival and reproduction, humans tend to do a sub-par job of making use of it. This often reveals the faulty programming of our caveman brains. It’s the reason why we do things like mutilate our genitals or overly repress our basic desires.

This faulty wiring can manifest in very specific ways. Some call them logical fallacies. I just call them bugs in human software that nature is not going to fix as soon as we’d like. Evolution and adaptation are painfully slow. Societal progress is painfully slow. There are still countries that practice slavery for crying out loud.

That’s not to say we make no progress. Indoor plumbing, smartphones, and bacon flavored lube are all testaments to just how far we’ve come as a society. However, the bugs are still there. The flaws in our biological program still fuck with us every day.

Just how much do they fuck with us? Well, the fine folks at Cracked.com once again provide a valuable service by highlighting some of those kinks in our programming and they do it in a way that’s funny. For that, I thank them and share with you just how bad those kinks are. If you’re scared, worried, or depressed afterwards, I recommend getting some bacon-flavored lube. That’ll make your day better in some way or another.

Cracked: 5 Logical Fallacies That Make You Way More Wrong Than You Think

Five: We’re Not Programmed to Seek “Truth,” We’re Programmed to “Win”

Go on any message board or talk politics with anyone who voted for George W. Bush twice. You’ll see just how deep this bug in our system runs.

It’s called the argumentative theory of reasoning, and it says that humans didn’t learn to ask questions and offer answers in order to find universal truths. We did it as a way to gain authority over others. That’s right — they think that reason itself evolved to help us bully people into getting what we want.

It helped us get laid and get food. That’s all evolution needs.

Four: Our Brains Don’t Understand Probability

Anyone who plays lotto is proof of this. For the record, I play lotto. Yeah. I’m part of the problem here.

It’s called neglect of probability. Our brains are great for doing a lot of things. Calculating probability is not one of them. That flaw colors every argument you’ve ever had, from the tax code down to that time your friend totally cheated you in a coin-flip.

Again, think back to the African savanna. Overestimating the probability that there’s a giant bear hiding under a rock may be stupid, but it decreases your chances of being eaten by a bear. That’s good enough for nature.

Three: We Think Everyone’s Out to Get Us

It’s not just bear attacks we like to overestimate. Remember, survival is a blunt instrument. You’re not going to do brain surgery with a sludge hammer and avoid collateral damage. So of course you’re go a little overboard when assessing threats. Again, you’re less likely to be eaten by a bear and that’s still good enough for nature.

Think about all the people you’ve disagreed with this month. How many of them do you think were being intentionally dishonest? Experts say you’re almost definitely overshooting the truth. It’s called the trust gap, and scientist see it crop up every time one human is asked to estimate how trustworthy another one is.

So can we trust ourselves? To an extent, we can. Let’s just be careful about that extent.

Two: We’re Hard-Wired to Have a Double Standard

I’ve talked about double standards before. There’s no logic to them, but remember. Nature doesn’t give a shit about logic and nor do our caveman brains. It sucks, but it helps us survive and get laid. That’s good enough.

It’s called the fundamental attribution error. It’s a universal thought process that says when other people screw up, it’s because they’re stupid or evil. But when we screw up, it’s totally circumstantial. Like if you notice a coworker showing up to work high on mescaline, it’s because he’s an out-of-control peyote hound. But if you show up at work high on mescaline, it’s because you had a flat tire and you needed the distraction.

So the next time you hear an athlete meltdown at the end of a post-game show, you know why he or she makes excuses. They still have to pull them out of their ass, but that’s our brain’s default setting.

One: Facts Don’t Change Our Minds

Go to any message board that talks politics and try to convince someone to change their mind. After you’ve punched your computer screen enough times, you should have sufficient proof that this is real.

Let’s go back to the beginning for a moment, and the theory that people figured out how to build arguments as a form of verbal bullying rather than a method of spreading correct information. That means that there are actually two reasons somebody might be arguing with you: because they actually want to get you to think the right thing, and because they’re trying to establish dominance over you to lower your status in the tribe (or office or forum) and elevate their own. That means there’s a pretty severe cost to being on the wrong side of an issue completely separate from the issue itself.

Facts are wonderful things. They help us make sense of the universe, seek universal truths, and expand our understanding. However, they don’t do quite enough to help us survive and have sex so they’re shit out of luck.

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September 30, 2016 · 6:54 am

CONFIRMED: Wonder Woman is “Queer”

In my limited experiences in this wonderfully imperfect world we live in, one of the most infuriating retorts is the horrendously overused, “Better late than never.” Every time I hear someone say that, I want rip my ears off punch the nearest brick wall. I’ve said it myself and I want to punch myself whenever it comes out of my mouth.

That said, there are some circumstances where this annoying phrase applies. It’s very true that good things are worth waiting for. Whether it’s a pizza, a cookie, or a lap dance at a strip club, the wait and anticipation can make the end result more satisfying.

Well, some things are just so damn late that you stopped giving a shit years ago. It becomes one of those unspoken taboos, like asking someone about a tattoo they regret or an oddly shaped scar on your ass. Even so, it’s still satisfying on some levels when someone finally gets around to finishing something that should’ve been finished.

Today is one of those days. Today, DC Comics finally came clean about one of the worst kept secrets in all of comics. That’s right. They admitted that Wonder Woman is “queer.”

Newsarama: Is Wonder Woman Queer? “Obviously yes,” says Rucka

Let that sink in for a moment. One of the most iconic superheroes of all time, and definitely one of the most iconic female superheroes of all time, is not entirely heterosexual. For most people in 2016, who have already seen same-sex marriage legalized and major gay actors become successful, this is barely worth a raised eyebrow. For noted comic book fans (and romance/erotica fans) like myself, it’s a big fucking deal.

Now I’ve talked about Wonder Woman before on this blog. I’ve explored the hidden BDSM elements of her origins and the unorthodox ideas championed by her creator, William Marston. By and large, these elements were ignored or outright nullified by DC Comics. It wasn’t until recently with the release of Wonder Woman: Earth One that these elements were finally revisited.

As a result, this created kind of a problem for Wonder Woman and by “kind of,” I mean “are you fucking kidding me?” After Marston, DC Comics took Wonder Woman down a very different path. They completely and utterly removed sexuality from her character. Yes, she was a woman. Yes, she was a beautiful woman by almost any standard. However, her sexuality could only ever be assumed and never explored.

This is a problem and not just because it allows fanboys on message boards to ascribe every kind of perverse proclivity to Wonder Woman and believe me, they are pretty damn perverse. The problem is that it removes a critical element from Wonder Woman’s character while sending a terrible message about female characters in general, albeit indirectly.

For most of her history (a good chunk of which was spent distancing her from her BDSM origins), Wonder Woman has been conveyed as a badass female warrior. Now there’s nothing wrong with that in the slightest. There’s definitely a place for badass female warriors in our culture. Woman can, and do, kick ass. They’ve kicked plenty of ass throughout history and that should be celebrated.

The problem with Wonder Woman, as she was developed for most of the 20th century, was that being a badass female warrior meant effectively nullifying her sexuality. That’s not to say she was completely asexual. She did have love interests, the most famous being Steve Trevor.

However, this relationship never developed into the kind of epic love story that other male superheroes enjoyed. Superman got to have a relationship with Lois Lane. Reed Richards got to have a relationship with Sue Storm. Spider-Man got to have a relationship with Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane Watson, the Black Cat, and a whole host of other women that would probably qualify him as a man-whore.

For Wonder Woman, though, Steve Trevor has rarely been more than a supporting character. They were never really that intimate. Most of Wonder Woman’s story focused on making her this badass warrior who could hold her own with Superman, Batman, and the rest of the Justice League. So it’s not right to say that Steve Trevor got relegated to the Friend-Zone, but he did get grossly overshadowed.

That’s not to say she didn’t have actual, functioning, intimate relationships with men. For a brief time between 2011 and 2016, Wonder Woman was in a relationship with Superman. It was a pretty serious relationship too. This was a time when he wasn’t with Lois Lane and she had a different role in the comics, but it was as serious a relationship as Wonder Woman has ever had.

It was one of the few times when DC Comics even acknowledged that Wonder Woman had a desire for intimacy. They never show them naked in bed or anything, but they do heavily imply that Superman and Wonder Woman engage in a little super sex. I’ll leave readers to fantasize about what that entails.

Admit it. You’re curious and intrigued by the idea of these two getting frisky. I know I’ve thought about it. Then again, I’ve thought about a lot of crazy sexual things in my life. That actually makes DC’s efforts to limit Wonder Woman’s sexuality all the more egregious.

It’s hard enough that DC goes out of its way to avoid sexual issues with Wonder Woman. They’ll let her get romantic with someone. They’ll even let her get intimate. However, they don’t dare dig a little deeper, as though a woman who grew up on an island of women would be a perfectly functional heterosexual woman.

This is where the context of this news gets pretty asinine. On top of all the taboos surrounding Wonder Woman’s sexuality, there’s the not-so-minor detail of Wonder Woman growing up on an island full of immortal women. Despite every effort by prudish comic creators who wanted Wonder Woman to be a kid-friendly superhero and not a gay icon, there’s only so much anyone can do to avoid the implications.

On an island populated only with women, do they all become lesbians? Do they all become bisexual? These are all questions that DC Comics was all too happy to leave unanswered. They had to know that generations of fans would assume that there would be a lesbian orgy on this island every now and then. It just took them until 2016 to actually acknowledge the possibility.

Greg Rucka, the current writer on the Wonder Woman comic and an accomplished comic book writer in his own right, finally ended DC’s silence. He didn’t put it in terms best reserved for an issue of Hustler, but he does finally put a dent in this old, outdated taboo.

“And when you start to think about giving the concept of Themyscira its due, the answer is, ‘How can they not all be in same sex relationships?’ Right? It makes no logical sense otherwise,” he continued. “But an Amazon doesn’t look at another Amazon and say, ‘You’re gay.’ They don’t. The concept doesn’t exist. Now, are we saying Diana has been in love and had relationships with other women? As [artist] Nicola [Scott] and I approach it, the answer is obviously yes.”

It’s painfully true, albeit in a sexy sort of way. Wonder Woman comes from an exotic culture of warrior women, gods, and demigods. Naturally, her approach to sex and her understanding of what means to be gay, straight, or bisexual will be very different.

We need only look at the matriarchal societies in the real world to see just how different our assumptions can be on matters of sex and intimacy. Why should Wonder Woman’s situation be any different? It shouldn’t.

It’s 2016. We have same-sex marriage, gender-neutral bathrooms, and enough lesbian porn to build a small island in the Pacific. The news that Wonder Woman isn’t entirely straight shouldn’t be an issue. It also shouldn’t have taken this long to come out, but better late than never, right?

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go punch myself for saying that.

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September 29, 2016 · 6:32 am

Sex-Positive vs. Sex-Negative Feminism

I know I keep saying I don’t like talking about feminism. I know I make it a point to belabor that concept way more than I should. Well, it still needs to be belabored.

It still needs to be emphasized too because I really don’t want to get too deep into this issue. It’s only going to distract from the larger purpose of this blog, which is to get people interested in issues that will make them inclined to by more romance/erotica novels, hopefully the ones I write.

Well, as much as I don’t want to talk about this, there still a few more things that I feel need to be said. Then, we can get back to talking about more interesting topics, like the several different kinds of orgasms. Again, if this is the kind of discussion that makes you want to punch your computer screen, you may want to skip this article and Google “cute baby pigs” to cheer yourself up. Here, I’ll even help.

Still with me? Did the cute baby pigs help? If not, then I’ve done all I can. It’s up to you to brace yourself from here on out because I am going to talk about feminism again. I want to get this over with as much as you so let’s do this.

I didn’t originally intend to write another post on feminism, but during my research (which is basically nothing more than multiple Google searches) for my article on sexual objectification, I came across an issue that ties in closely with this concept. It’s an issue that highlights an ongoing struggle within feminism that, at least from the perspective of a straight male who writes romance/erotica, is a major source of division and disdain among those in this field.

A big part of the issues the surrounding sexual objectification of women in movies, TV, and video games comes from these sets of assumptions that certain feminists hold regarding female sexuality. These assumptions include esoteric concepts like “rape culture” and “male gaze.” I won’t discuss these concepts at great length, if only because they require even more assumptions than I can reasonably make for this discussion.

However, these assumptions are at the core of a larger conflict. That conflict is between feminists who consider themselves sex-positive and those who are more sex-negative, who are often referred to as radical feminists. It’s not an irrelevant conflict. Sex is pretty damn important in any issue that involves either gender. As an aspiring romance/erotica writer, I know how important it is.

In that sense, it’s completely understandable that there would be disagreements among feminists about how to handle sex. Hell, there are disagreements among men about how to handle sex, but it’s more likely to involve whether breasts or butts are sexier. With women, there are more issues at play here and these are issues wholly unique to women.

As a man, I really can’t contribute much. As I’ve said before, I believe that women’s issues are best handled by women and men like me have next to nothing to contribute. However, since men have sex too and it is kind of important to us, I feel like I can add at least something to this conversation. I’ll just try my best to be polite and thoughtful about it.

First, here’s a little background on the conflict. Back in the 1970s, a time when wearing bell-bottoms wouldn’t earn you awkward glares, the emerging feminist movement developed some radical elements, as all movements do. Just look at recent trends in boy bands for proof of that.

Within these radical strains of feminism, this extreme ideology developed on issues involving pornography, prostitution, and marriage. These strains saw all these things as inherent evils of a patriarchal, white heterosexual male dominated society that must be destroyed, outlawed, or overthrown. Pretty much anything men deemed sexy was considered wrong. Even by non-patriarchal standards, it’s pretty extreme.

In response to these radical strains, which also created some nasty PR for those who didn’t want to live in world devoid of sexiness, a different strain of feminism emerged. This was sex-positive feminism and, as the name implies, they had a much more positive view about sexy issues.

That’s not to say they didn’t oppose certain patriarchal traditions. They most certainly did. However, they did not agree with their radical counterparts that the world needed to be devoid of pornography, prostitutes, and sexy Super Bowl ads. A society like that isn’t very free or just. Look at Saudi Arabia for proof of that.

It’s an entirely reasonable response. It happens in every movement that gets too radical. One part goes too far so another has to emerge to counter it. It’s like a house party that’s starting to get out of hand. Someone needs to step in before they burn the whole house down.

This debate between sex-positive feminism and radical feminism remains unresolved and will probably never be resolved. As is often the case with ideology, be it feminism or opinions on a message board, people are fairly entrenched in their beliefs.

They will not, and in some cases cannot, change their minds on an issue until there is a clear benefit to doing so. I’m not going to try to change anyone’s mind with this post. I know I’ll fail. Instead, I’m going to try and assess this conflict within a proper context.

Since the issue of sexual objectification was the catalyst for this post, I’ll use this to help make my point. There are cases when women (and men to some extent) are overly objectified and exploited. Slavery, forced labor, and forced prostitution reduce women and men to glorified slabs of meat whose thoughts and feelings have the same value as a dead fly. Those are crimes. Those should be fought.

However, the picture of a sexy woman in lingerie or a man in tighty-whitties should not be lumped into the same category. The same goes for the porn we consume and the romance/erotica that guys like me write. We can, and sometimes do, sexualize things to an extent that sends a bad message.

Nobody should assume that a shampoo endorsed by Jennifer Lawrence is going to make someone as beautiful as she is. Nobody should assume that a diet pill endorsed by David Beckham is going to make them as fit as he is. Nobody should assume they can fuck like porn stars after watching a few hours of porn. This is that obscure gray area where we, as a society, have to inform one another that the real world still exists.

Yeah, it sucks. It has limits. Some of us are incapable of exceeding those limits while others have more opportunities than they deserve. However, that doesn’t mean that we should obsess over making sure nothing is sexually objectifying to anyone. That’s not possible. Human beings are sexual creatures. We are going to see our media and each other through a sexual lens. It’s just how we’re wired. It’s part of what makes us human.

This is where the radical feminists get too radical and where the radical Men’s Right’s Activists follow suit. In this extreme context, a few stains on a couple shirts warrants throwing out an entire wardrobe. One crack in a single window warrants demolishing the entire building. Can you see why that approach is problematic, not to mention needlessly destructive?

It already manifests in ways that are disingenuous to women and men alike. Recently, Playboy magazine featured its first Muslim woman wearing a hijab. Naturally, it’s going to generate plenty of criticism from a population of religious zealots who think their god wants women to be glorified pets/baby-makers. However, even some women got worked up over this.

One of them was a blogger named Nishaat Ismail. In many respects, she takes on the radical feminist ideology that all sexual media is inherently exploitative towards women. Considering that many Islamic countries continue traditions that are grossly exploitative towards women, it’s pretty ironic. Look up “honor killings” for proof of that.

It is a twisted form of irony that radical feminists would share the same sentiment as religious zealots, who would prefer to see women subjugated and censored in a way that even Christian Grey would find excessive. Ms. Ismail did try to make her criticism sound reasonable though, but the irony is still there.

Blogger Nishaat Ismail also questioned in an opinion column the wisdom of Tagouri associating with an institution “based on the objectification of women.”

“Are the voices of women — and in particular Muslim women — buried so deep under the cries of those who claim to speak on our behalf that our only available response is (to) involve ourselves with Playboy, a magazine that has solely existed for the past 63 years for men to gawp at the bodies of half-naked women?” wrote Nishaat.

“Is this really how we reclaim our own narrative?”

I can actually answer that to some degrees. Yes, it’s part of how you reclaim your own narrative. You’re a woman. You’re a human being. Humans are sexual creatures. So why suppress what you are? Celebrate it!

There are flaws in our society and some of those flaws dis-proportionally affect women. There’s no doubt about that. We live in an imperfect society full of imperfect people. That’s why it’s important to keep making improvements every step of the way.

This is why, in the grand scheme of things, sex-positive feminism is more conducive to the human condition. It acknowledges that women are sexual creatures too. It acknowledges that women can enjoy sex just as much as men and why shouldn’t they? It’s something that gives pleasure to both genders when done right. It literally brings us together in a deeply intimate way and that’s definitely a positive.

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