Everywhere in the world, obsessing over MKUltra is a far-left thing. Only in America did this particular form of insanity somehow migrate to the right.
I blocked people for posting this because I thought it was AI:
I knew that she’s a crass, vulgar woman, but I didn’t disrespect her enough to think she’s capable of this degree of exhibitionism.
I was so certain it couldn’t be real, I went on a rampage, blocking accounts left and right for posting this. Truly, no matter how poorly you think of these people, the reality is even worse.
And then these same individuals are going to tell us that Trump is distasteful because he put too many gold trinkets in the Oval Office.
Barquinero’s novel also has a political component that Calder’s book lacks. The Smartest Girl I Know is a novel about academia, and the writer shows how identifying as a leftist is so normalized in the academic world that it’s at the same level as identifying as human. It’s not simply the norm. It’s the only possibility that exists.
The novel also explains the reason why. The life of the mind is about trying to generate new ideas and figuring new ways of looking at things. It’s by definition anti-establishment.
But this is great news!l. All we need now is for academics to notice that the establishment has been boringly, predictably, and oppressively left-wing for half a century. What’s cool and counter-cultural is to be conservative. You can get tons of publications out of it because you will have something truly new and original to say about whatever it is that you are studying.
I’ve noticed this at conferences. Twenty speakers, one after another, talk about how “the patriarchy oppresses women”, and the audience is asleep. And then I get up and say my thing, and people immediately wake up and get really into what I’m saying. Because they haven’t heard it before. It’s interesting, it’s new, it’s fresh. And the “oppressiveness of patriarchy” is stale.
I finished Sarah Barquinero’s novel The Smartest Girl I Know. It’s an excellent novel by a young Spanish writer about the complexities of the modern dating life. It’s even somewhat better than Jem Calder’s novel I Want You to Be Happy that explores the same themes. Barquinero is braver and more ambitious than Calder. She writes for a Spanish-language publisher and audience and can afford to be more straightforward.
Both novels address the weird myth that women’s sexuality is identical to that of gay men. Young women are desperately unhappy because they are forced into behaviors which are completely alien and uncomfortable to them. But they have no idea how to tell not only others but themselves that they don’t want a life of endless promiscuity with a rotating roster of no-name partners. They want love, a relationship, marriage, and children. Having to pretend that they don’t exacts a steep psychological payment.
Where both novels fail is in explaining the behavior of the male characters in their late 30s who are perishing of loneliness and self-disgust, yet remain unable to form a stable relationship with a woman. These are high-prestige men who have an easy access to a harem of eager, besotted, pretty, and much younger women. If you’ve met the type, you know that Barquinero and Calder are right. As they start pushing forty, these men are anything but happy. The descriptions of their alcoholism, self-hatred, and efforts to sabotage their careers depicted in both novels are very realistic. Neither book, however, explains why these men are unable to snap out of the self-destructive behavior.
I have no insight into these men either. It’s completely against my nature to be one of a platoon of eager young things battling each other for the attentions of one capricious dude. I understand what motivates the female platoon but these men are a mystery to me. The ones I’ve known who are like that are all on antidepressants and have serious issues with addiction. The lifestyle is not making them happy. At 20, yes, absolutely. They’re in paradise. At 40, though, not so much.
Calder’s novel doesn’t show it for reasons that I explained before, but Barquinero does make it clear that good, positive, serious men who do offer a serious relationship and a profound connection are often rejected by young women who are hoping to win the lottery by attaching themselves to a wealthier, more prestigious man. This is a bad gamble that almost never pays off, but that doesn’t stop anybody.
As a male author writing in English, Calder is forced to be a lot kinder to women than Barquinero is. In the Spanish author’s novel, young women prattle endlessly about feminism and female solidarity while treating each other in most atrocious ways, as they battle for a short-lived turn in a prestigious man’s bed.
Love is a desire for what we do not have. We don’t fall in love with people who are identical to ourselves. Instead, we seek out the difference. The greater the difference, the deeper the love.
My husband is silent, thrifty, spartan, and modest. I am a gregarious, self-indulgent, prideful spendthrift. I love in him what I don’t have.
If love is one thing which you don’t have, it stands to reason that this should be true for self-love. You don’t love yourself by “being who you are.” To the contrary, true self-love resides in an aspiration to be better.
I’m making surf and turf for dinner tonight. I splurged on very good steak and large shrimp. We also have locally grown fresh produce for a salad. But I don’t want any of it. All I want is to lick the pot with the mashed potatoes that I made for Klara.
And she doesn’t even like the mashed potatoes that much.
The struggle is real. Mashed potatoes to me are like bourbon to an alcoholic.
This is exactly what I said a while ago. I knew because I personally spoke with one of the people who were in one of the delegations that went to beg Biden for the licenses. It was always a hard no. Similarly, and from the same source, there was a hard no on Ukrainian strikes against the Russian energy structure and military objects. The United States would not share intelligence with Ukraine that would make these strikes possible. Now, they are a daily reality.
Every serious counteroffensive or strike by Ukraine was blocked by the United States under Biden. Biden made pro-Ukrainian statements. Trump made a large number of pro-Russian statements. But words are always and only just that. Words. They don’t win wars.
Things are objectively enormously better for Ukraine right now than at any time during Biden. What anybody thinks or how they feel deep inside is not only unknowable but also deeply uninteresting.
Speaking about Jason Arday, it is worth noting that he was hired by Cambridge as a professor of sociology with zero training in sociology. His Ph.D. and all of the previous degrees were in education, specifically teacher training in physical education.
This wouldn’t be possible in my discipline because there is a barrier to entry even at the lowest level. You either speak Spanish or not. During the hiring process, people simply switch to Spanish and immediately grow you on your readings. In biology, chemistry, mathematics, all of the real disciplines, there is a barrier to entry. Not in sociology, though. Or in education, which tells you everything you need to know about these disciplines.
To get permission to hire, we have to write an essay explaining how this hire will advance diversity. This makes hiring requests in, for example, chemistry or statistics particularly entertaining.
If you don’t write this essay or write an unconvincing one, you don’t even get to begin the hiring process.
I’m writing this because, on the heels of the Jason Arday debacle, yet again people are starting to express the belief that there are no racial preferences in academia. This belief is not remotely grounded in reality. The hiring process is heavily racialized at every step.
Every time you think liberals have reached the absolute bottom, they happily show you that things can get a lot worse. A statement is made that is the exact opposite of what actually happens in reality. But it’s treated as a well-known fact that demands no proof or explanation. The actual existing reality is this:
U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics National Crime Victimization Survey data for 2017–2021 show the reverse directionality in interracial violent incidents:
– Roughly 191,970 violent incidents with Asian victims and Black offenders.
– Roughly 11,850 with Black victims and Asian offenders
Please observe the date of publication of this piece. It’s very recent. The people who write these articles haven’t suddenly disappeared. If they win electorally, they will unleash such lunacy on us that the year 2020 will seem extremely mild in comparison.
The article is behind a paywall, and I invite everybody to guess where its author found the evidence that Asians abuse and kill black people. Every diseased, insane model of reality attaches itself to some fact that it tortures into a convenient position. Can you guess what this one is? Here’s a disclaimer. I couldn’t.
It’s very hard to guess, so I’ll give you a hint: Natasha.
A conservative literary critic and college professor
” Spain is the sheer level of outspokenness, especially among women” The first time I was in Spain (Franco was still…
Well, that’s liberation for you, innit? Western societies are reaping the fruits of a movement that started in the 1950s,…
I wish I could share your optimism. Perhaps it’s because you’re in America, where even the most diehard leftists are…
“so what’s the point of even talking about anything Trump says?” You’re the one doing that.
I strongly believe that her getting them extracted on camera is a very possible next step. There’s probably not that…
It is real. For a second I thought she was extracting her eggs like that, was very confused for a…
Yes, apparently it’s real. She decided to freeze her eggs so that she can have children sometime in the future…
Is it real or not? Somewhat educational for me at least. Like what the hell is even happening in that…
LOL, Kid, the West has been increasingly self destructive for the past three generations. Perhaps if Calder and his ilk…
I commend the writer for placing the whole novel within the framework of #MeToo. She shows that these young women…
Women are supposed to be the big winners of the demolition of the society created by the Franco regime. I’d…
Yes, so what’s the point of even talking about anything Trump says? Most of it is false or he walks…
“his word is pretty much worthless” Yeah, that’s her whole point. Don’t pay attention to what he says, pay attention…
“Not great for men ” Yeah, they were included in ‘anyone’ though the nature of the not-greatness, especially longer term consequences,…
Not great for men either :/
Christianity, obviously, has some things to say about that. Nobody is listening, and it seems like in leftward circles, attaching…
“they don’t want a life of endless promiscuity” Longterm promiscuity is bad for anyone, mentally and physically but especially so…
Trump did walk a lot of it back, and since his word is pretty much worthless I don’t think we’ll…
The statements I quoted were made today, during a joint press conference with Zelensky and Vučić. The article you link…
What are you talking about? Trump walked that back already:https://kyivindependent.com/we-have-not-agreed-to-that-trump-walks-back-promise-of-patriot-licenses-for-ukraine/?hl=en-US You really seem to be grasping at straws finding way…
I am not disagreeing at all. None of this is good.
I hear you, my friend. That little evildoer is irresistible.
I have the same problem with the crusty toasted crunchy rice in the bottom of the pot after I make…
Sorry, Kid, had to laugh ;-D
Actually, if you really wish to see the end of such behavior we must use accurate words. There was no…
55% of assistant professors, which is the lowest tenure-track rank, are female. At the highest rank, which is full professor,…
C’mon Kid, DEI is simply the latest terminology desperately hoping to camoflage, to disguise, the deliberate cheating for privileged groups.…
Oh yes, Indians in particular are passionately pro-Russian. I have no idea what Ukraine ever did to them, but it’s…
Of course, I was making a joke. I mean they do hate blacks and aren’t too crazy about whites, especially…
My absolute limit was that year when the university was refusing to let me hire a professor of French, yet…
Yes, but abusing and killing? that’s not even a stretch. That’s fantasy.
Asians don’t like American blacks. They’re not too crazy about white people either. Walnut
new initiatives… As long as you never settle on the boring thing that works, you can hire expensive consultants forever.…
As always, this is coached in pseudo-psychological language of emotivity and caring. But the actual reason for this is cold…
” the only reason why this is being done. In short, it’s a scam” I keep waiting for some new edcucational…
I agree that this could be a very neutral practice, but we would have to be in a very different…
I know exactly what I am, and there is no need to address me in this rude manner over it.…
Oh honey, you’re neurodivergent, assuming you tell the truth here about N, then he is neurodivergent, thus the two of…
I don’t know anything about these rules except what you posted, but as a male Brit of a certain age,…
My child is completely normal, thank you very much. Are you feeling unwell that you need to run around diagnosing…
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