This is exactly the argument I am talking about. It's fine that we can't judge CEOs, but then why are they taking home millions of dollars?
If we can't judge them for failures then we shouldn't be able to judge them for successes as well and they shouldn't be able to pull out the "rare skills" argument
They are taking home millions of dollars because the owners of those companies want to pay them as much, and they have the final say over how much to pay.
Work doesn't define humanity, but the fruits of work are what enable humans to exist.
Also, work is the only means by which we do things that can benefit others. It's all very good to be concerned with your own experience, but if you want to be helpful to a partner, a family, or a community, you have to work.
This is why work has such meaning. It makes benefits that are not purely selfish. Benefiting other people strikes me as more meaningful than simply attending to one's self, trying to make the days until death more pleasant. This selfishness is what has always troubled me about the popular hedonistic conception of meaning that's taken hold in recent decades.
>incel, red-pill, and proud boy ideas that you must refrain from "spilling your seed"—that your reproductive emissions contain some of your essential energy
What you're describing is called NoFap; this community is based on the /r/nofap subreddit and is pretty much entirely separate from the culturally-Othered groups you seem to be trying to "weirdify".
Incel have no interest in NoFap.
To the degree that redpill and Proud Boy-like communities belive in NoFap, it's simply based on the repeatable observation that not masturbating increases energy and motivation - especially sexual motivation. Any man who can go two weeks without ejaculating will observe this easily for himself. The difference can be staggering - you feel like a different person.
It has nothing to do with some strange mysticism. Redpillers, especially, are entirely about rejecting traditional mystical beliefs ("soul mates", "love conquers all", "meant for each other", etc) in exchange for repeatable results-yielding methodologies. Nofap is such a methodology.
Not sure where you got this meme, but let's let it die here now because it's as disconnected from reality as most of what mainstreamers say about marginalized male sexual communities.
Is it a "structural" issue? Or is it just the fact that, statistically, poor people are really unlikely to pay back loans, so loaning to them profitably means charging really high interest? Or is that a "structural" issue?
Bluebird (mentioned by the parent) is a checking account alternative (read: not a real, FDIC-insured bank account). No one's loaning anything in this case. It's designed to appeal to people who, for one reason or another, cannot afford to open even a basic traditional checking account.
Edit: Before such ersatz-bank-account services proliferated, I believe it was common for poor people to cash their paychecks at a check cashing place (which costs time and money).
>the desire to preserve the inferior status of blacks has motivated policies against all members of the low-wage sector.
So your belief is, the dominant economic-political movement in America regards "preserving the inferior status of blacks" as an end goal in and of itself? Or is this an instrumental goal that somehow serves some other purpose?
The sentence previous to the one you quoted suggests the political reasoning. Those in power see diversity as a threat to the status quo, and demonizing an enemy has long been a textbook way for demagogues to raise political capital.
For lots of people in the dominant economic-political elite, it's probably not exactly a goal but an enjoyment in itself. Besides if you're WASP, why you'd want to acknowledge the needs of blacks, or even more, have them as business competitors?
At best, you want their sales and votes -- but even that, not if they vote for their interests and/or more progressively.
Besides the blacks, if not predominantly now, for a lot of time, were also among the poor and working class, which is an even bigger enemy if you want to keep your privileges.
It's phrased funny, but the gist that I got from it (and which seems plausible to me) is that the issue has been framed as involving the "other", and therefore those in power don't care.
Another mode of travel doesn't seem to be accounted for: Travel for pleasure.
Not to score social points. Not for meaning. Just to relax and feel good for a week.
Weather can be a big factor. In the middle of five months of winter, daily snow, not seeing the sun in weeks, and working hard in an office every day, a week relaxing in the sun somewhere warm can be very beneficial - and not just in a trite or self-indulgent way. Seasonal mood disorders and work-related stress are real problems and time far away is a real solution.
Plus, if we're here to enjoy life, then self-indulgence is also one ingredient of a good life (accompanied by others). You don't have to be seeking "meaning" every moment of every day like a Terminator seeking his target.
I agree with you, live life, be happy. The point the author is making is that people aren't even doing it for the reason of pleasure. It's more a function of people fulfilling a fantasy that's been manufactured by society to make people feel as though they MUST travel, or they're boring and doing it wrong.
The wool over my eyes was pulled aside on this particular illusion a long time ago, thanks to a buddy taking me on a semi-spontaneous road trip for a few weeks (during one of my worst depressions) that ended with us living in another state we'd never been to. At one point we sold grilled cheese and veggie burritos at a less-than-formal festival to raise road funds and it was an amazing experience of connectedness with others. Most office workers looking for some time away would never even consider such a trip.
When you really drill down into the reasons for your average consumer behavior, a lot of it is being pushed around by weaponized stories without recognizing or being honest with ourselves about it. It's a multi-faceted problem, but is probably most obvious with 'vacationing' activity. Think about what the highest costs of a typical leisure trip are-- getting there/back, food, and lodging. Unless you have a really compelling reason to be there, it's hugely wasteful on those points alone.
Grandparent didn't imply it was a triumph of foresight, but rather a failure of foresight.
I think that's what he's saying - a general point that people's understanding of climate (and thus predictions about it) are poorer than commonly believed.
Well, one day we might realize that we underestimated some critical aspect of climate change. Having overestimated it in the past is not an argument for relaxing today, and is certainly not a laughing matter.
In about a billion years the sun will exhaust enough nuclear fuel to cool and expand, boiling the oceans, blowing off our atmosphere, and turning Earth back into a sterile rock.
It's predicted by astronomers and physicists who study stellar evolution.
Or maybe - and call me crazy here - men and women are different, and want different things, and therefore, as we reduce discrimination, nearly every job and hobby will end up with a huge gender imbalance as individuals sort themselves into groups doing what they truly, freely want to do.
Then your conviction that every job must be exactly 50% of each gender no matter how much power must be wielded to make it happen would be a massively misguided recipe for tyranny, harming both men and women.
It's perfectly possible Mayer did unique work that paid her compensation and much more in savings. Without the counterfactual, we cannot judge her.