It's a bit more complicated than that. I appreciate you aren't supporting everything he says, but there is a way you sort of are. Take all the concerns about sexism in his statement about women on TV. You defended that as not sexist.

Where exactly does that leave people concerned the that statement equivocates the thoughts and likes of women, without taking to account the differences between a woman's thoughts on. Trump's sexist behaviour and thoughts about voting for them?

In defending Augstino that the comment is not sexist, you are saying there is no sexism in this equivocation, as if it were alright to be dishonest about the thoughts women, to ascribe to them a lack of authority in objection to Trump's harassment and assault merely because they happen to vote for Trump or otherwise like him.

I wasn't talking about flawed appeals to popularity or authority. Whether all or even any women think someone is sexist is not the measure of they are. That's a question of their comments and behaviour itself.

Consensus isn't relevant to reasoning about an issue like this. It merely rehtorical. My arguments and observations were about Augstino's behaviour and what they amounted to. If you want to talk about that, you'll have some postion worth attention or refuting. What's sexist isn't defined by who thinks it's sexist, but by whether it is, you know, sexist.

I would venture to say that is because Agustino is sexist. In this case, I want to move away from asking whether a particular statement he says is sexist and look at his behaviour.

Why is it, of all the testing insults and disagreements spoken in discusions with Augstino, he chooses to pick out what's been said by two prominent female posters? How come I'm not in the slanderous fire pit? Or any of the other regular posters who have pointed out his sexism?

Timeline and Mongrel are hardly the only people to ever steadfastly identify Agustino as sexist, yet he specifically targets them. He seems to lose it when challenged or attacked by women in a way he does not when opposed or criticised by men.

Then why are you making arguments like it is? What relevance does whether some women on TV denounces Trump's sexism, but still likes him, have to the question of harassment and assualt? Why you would suggest these women wanted to be subjected to actions as performed by Trump in his instances of harassment and assualt?

...in which case they wouldn't be hypocrites at all and your theory only has application in your wild imaginings.

I know that, but the argument supposedly reflects what women want, such that they would be hypocrites for taking issue with harassment and assualt in public life. You can't make that connection without repeating the myth women want to be assaulted and harassed.

If no woman wants what you say, your hypocrisy argument doesn't run. The women in question would just be arguing against others who are responsible for assualt and harassment.

What relevance can it have then?

We are talking about actions, about the way people act towards women and how these actions relate to the valuing of women-- namely that the sort of argument you made equivocates women as the things for male sexual authority, such that harassment and rape are considered myths because women "always want it."

You are replacing the question of action, that is assault and harassment in the world, with your "theory and value", as if that could represent the actual world we are speaking about. The way the argument works is to imagine the women you are speaking about are only values, which must fit this "theory", rather recognising they are people in the actual world.

You think you can talk about this issue while ignoring the actual world in which women are assaulted and harassed. That's sexism. You replace living women with your imagined theory of values.

But that's the only way the argument works. It needs people to function by this theory. That, somehow, they world is full of women who want unsolicited sexual attention and groping, such that they would be lying when the came out and said: "I was harassed and/assaulted."

Your argument doesn't function unless this particular theory is true of people in the world. We can't take that theory as true without repeating the rapist's fantasy that their victims actually wanted it. In practice, it's just repeating the idea women just want whatever attention a man gives them, especially if they only say "no" and don't get into a big fight when he doesn't stop.

Yeah... that's pretty much the sexism people have been hitting you for. Under that "theory", all women are equated as wanting their assualt or harassment, are projected as "untrustworthy" in any instance where they've been reportedly harassed or assaulted.

It's rape apology because it is a "a theory" which imagines a world that replaces the actual "practical" one in which people live. The use of such "theory" is to literally imagine a world in which unsolicited sexual attention or action doesn't violate consent and amount to harassment or assualt.

Pretty much. I mean there are certain role playing situations where one might define exceptions, but short of that one has to treat a "No" as genuine.

Would you ever be comfortable continuing were your partner to suddenly interject "No?" No-one can honestly just continue and claim to be concerned about another's well-being. If we are thinking of others, a sudden "no" prompts clarification if something is wrong.

Her desire. That's why you have to be thinking about others. One cannot just treat words as a permission slip. You have to be considering what another person thinks and wants.

Your argument says otherwise. You're tying the immorality of sexual harassment and assault to that of consensual lust, as if the two were equivalent. The polemic supposed that, if one is to be against the immorality of sexual assault and harassment, then then they must also be against consensual lusts.

The hypocrisy is supposedly defined by someone being against sexual harassment or assault but for consensual lusting, as if being against the former mean you must be against the latter. This is simply not true. One is free to attack the immorality of sexual assault and harassment while also accepting consensual lustings. The former is a different question of value than the latter, no matter how moral or immoral consensual lustings might be.

That's incoherent. If a woman had consented, it would not be assault or harassment, whether it was immoral or not.

This instance cannot be applied to any instance of harassment or assault we might be talking about. If we are talking about an instance of assault or harassment, the morality of a consensual activity isn't at stake.

Even worse, if we do consider people who are hypocrites, that is, who calling we ought to disavowal Trump becasue of his sexism but who then turn around and vote for him, their statements are actually trustworthy with respect to the given moral goal.

If it were true, as the hypocrite stated, that we ought not vote for Trump because of his sexism, then we'd ought to agree with the statement, even if the person ended up being a hypocrite and voted for Trump.

But that's just the problem-- they're aren't hypocrites. Even if they were attracted to Trump, they could still object to his harassment and assault without any issue. They could even vote for him and they still wouldn't be hypocrites in identifying his sexist behaviour, harassment and assault of women.

For the argument of your polemic to function, you have to equivocate attraction with consent, voting for Trump with identifications of his sexist character, etc. For you polemic to have any force, you literally have to believe a lie, confuse the significance of different actions for each other.

Clearly you don't think it's wrong enough to be honest about it.

You would spread the myth that, somehow, being on TV means a woman wants to be harassed or assaulted. You would approve the falsehood that a women on TV who is attracted to a foamier, rich man desires to be harassed and/or assaulted. You would claim opposition to the harassment and assault of women who appear on TV, is somehow inconsistent with those women appearing on TV, as the women on TV "really wanted it."

The polemic itself is based on sexist values. That, somehow, the right of women not to be subjected to harassment and assault, is dependent on their own behaviour, as if "women who appear on tv" were to be justly subjected to some sort of corrective harassment or assault.

The whole premise of the statement and the value by which the polemic functions is sexist. It's outright rape apology, drawn out of the notion a women is their for whatever the rich man wants to do. Any question of what a women thinks or is interested is rejected in favour of assuming a (the problem is merely defined by you saying "all," but any) woman wants some sort of sexual attention just because a man is rich/famous and he wants to harass them.

Even a woman who was attracted to a famous rich man would fall under these concerns. Attraction is not the same as a desire to engage in sexual activity, let alone sexual activity in a public space (or close to a public space) with a famous rich man who you're never going to see again.

You're not even on the field with such objections. The issue is not that there no difference between any one, but rather that the identification of any such difference is misused.

In the sort of position and questions you are asking, you take difference not to be a measure of someone's behaviour or even competency performing a task, but rather a purveyor of status, that is, the existence of some particular difference gives a certain category of people the right to a certain value, authority or role.

Differences are used in this way to split society into respective teams of value (women and men) and then said difference is used to cordon off a particular social context (e.g. art, math, emotion, etc.) to one particular sex, such that it becomes unthinkable to consider a sex ever possessing authority on that context.

It may be sexist to suggest that women are not as good at math, or music, or art as men are, but that seems to me to be a possible opinion. Camille Paglia noted in her book Sexual Personae that women have had two centuries of extensive access to art instruction and art materials without producing much notable art. Is that sexist? — Bitter Crank

So yes, this sexist. Not because of a lack of differences, but rather because it is born from a use of "difference" which uses it as a self-fulfilling prophecy. The value of any art by women cannot be recognised, for it is outright dismissed, for because of "difference," women just don't do that sort of thing. Bring up the work of a women and the hoops will come out-- "She's not famous enough," "Her work only follows the experiences of a family," "She didn't made enough money," "It's not a totalising work of genius," etc.-- which are laden with dismissive value judgements which lock the work of women out of "notable art" as is required.

Women don't have anything to prove. The abilities of a person or the role they fill isn't dependent on some "difference" they've been assigned because of there category. It just a question of what they do. The status posturing of "prove someone X category" can do this just isn't relevant. If they do, a person will act.

With respect to sexism, the of differences wants no difference. Highly different or completely the same, the sexist nature of the difference argument remains. In either world, it's possible for there to be individuals who break such generalised rules, meaning such rules have no impact with respect to defining the presence of someone who does or doesn't do something.

In this identification of sexism, we move from descriptions or questions which claim status of a particular group (e.g. only men are suited to be leaders because they are more often aggressive, only women are suited to be carers because the are more often nurturing), to descriptions of the people as the exist interacting in society (e.g. this women's art has been dismissed because society has a cultural system which rejects it's value).

The categories "male" and "female" simply have no relevance because they are not any existing person who performs an action or role. Any individual's competence, and so their value at performing a certain task, cannot be measured in such a category.

For sure, but that only shows the failure of the pill as a solution. It couldn't also save those who would refuse to take it. If we are to advocate and hope for the pill as a solution, it means accepting the weakness of those who will refuse it. Our enemy is not human weakness, but rather just human weakness of those would take the pill.

The point is, to the question of overcoming human weakness, Christianity is a failed cure. It desires and advocates for the weakness of unbelievers. It may be true and even just, but it is still an abject disaster at overcoming human weakness. It's incapable of helping the unbeliever.

So in the context of human weakness, say of the horror of death and anything terrible that comes afterwards, Christianity is both ineffective and amounts to a tragedy. It both advocates and is no solution to their human weakness. For all the Christian speaks of forgiveness and the overcoming of human weakness, they cannot extend it to unbelievers. If someone's goal is merely a solution to human weakness, Christianity is not attractive nor particular hopeful. There are countless other possible ways existence might go which would be better at overcoming human weakness.

If someone wanted a solution to human weakness (as opposed to merely the weakness of Christians), Christianity would be one of the first positions rejected. It is an advocate of human weakness.

No, I don't revel in it, I would just do it because it has to be done. Not because of sadism - as Nietzsche implies in his quote - but rather out of love for my wife.

No it doesn't, that passage describes a sadist, because what makes him great is his lack of regard for the suffering he causes. In my case, what makes my action great is my love for my wife and my desire to protect her, whatever it takes. — Agustino

Nietzsche's point is that is a far greater revealing in the given cruelty than any sadist. The sadist only revels in terms of what he wants or how he feels. In terms of sadism itself, there is the possibility of rejecting the given cruelty, for even the sadist to say: "Well, even if I want to be cruel or it would feel really good, now is not the time...".

For the sadist qua sadism, there is the possibility of denying the cruelty in favour of a cruelty of self-denial because the later is moral and the former immoral.

Morality cannot take such prisoners. You can only do whatever it takes to protect your wife. If your wife is in danger, there is no option to refrain from cruelty. You must act, no matter how much cruelty is involved or how much you would prefer it to be otherwise. In the act of obtaining a moral outcome, no quarter can be given.

Your greatness and cruelty are one the same. Had you hesitated, had you not enacted the cruelty to the the attacker to protect your wife, she would be dead and you would be a moral failure.

I think you're are falling for a bit of red-herring in your metaphysical reasoning. The acosmist's God is already excluded from the world's evil by it's definition. If you are dealing with Spinoza's or maybe even Aquinas' God (if we take the non-being of God and address it logically), the notion God must be evil because of omnipresence is rejected outright. God's omnipresence is not presence qua the world, it's otherworldly presence with the world.

The presence of worldly evil just doesn't challenge goodness of an otherworldly God. In Spinoza case, for example, the evil of the illusionary finite world cannot undermine the goodness of the Real (infinite, or "otherworldly" ) of God.

Still, I think there is a worse misunderstanding. Most of the time of I've encountered "evil=absence of good," it is has not been a claim of metaphysical or meta-ethical basis, but rather than expression of how evil outcomes occur if someone doesn't act in good way. It's usually a call to action against letting evil occur by inaction-- "all it takes for evil to flourish is for men [who would like to think they were good] to do nothing."

In that context, both good and evil are actually independently defined, with "the absence of good," that is refusing to act to bring out good outcome, being evil in-itself.

The point isn't shame. I'm not saying God/Christianity is immoral. That's a different argument.

My point is Christianity is a failure with respect to overcoming human weakness of sin/death/worldly suffering. Just as the vacuum cleaner isn't effective at cleaning dishes, Christianity isn't an effective means of overcoming human weakness. It fails to clean sin and weakness from the unbeliever.

So for someone who has the end of human weakness in mind, Christianity isn't a beacon of hope. If they were to hope for Christianity, they would literally be a dishwasher requesting a soap that could only clean a particular subset of dishes that were meant to be clean. The point is there is a profound mismatch between what Christian likes to claim about itself ("the saviour of man" ) and what it actually amounts to (really, it is only the saviour of Christians ).

You are pretending you don't reveal in the screams of the burglar.

The impact of your morality on others is ignored. You will not admit the quoted passage to which you objected to so strongly describes you inflicting suffering and death on the burglar.

Exactly. That's my point precisely. Christianity cannot remove human weakness from the unbeliever. It is a failure at overcoming human weakness for large numbers of people.

I wasn't suggesting Christianity claimed or needed to do otherwise, only pointing out it doesn't meet the rehtoric of "grand solution to everyone worldy death and suffering." It cannot save the unbeliever. It advocates that human weakness.

It's absolutely the failure of unbelievers, but that's the problem. Someone concerned for overcoming with overcoming human weakness of death and suffering of the world despises such failure.

With respect to the question you asked in your other thread, a successful solution to human weakness would remove the failure of the unbeliever. It's the weakness of death and it's suffering of the world. A weakness the Christian God is incapable of removing by God's own intention. God is no great solution to human weakness.

A great solution to human weakness would eliminate the failure of unbelievers too, for it would mean less people are caught in the suffering and death of the world. Christianity is only for the self-satisfied who want themselves to be better than everyone else, who want the weakness of unbelievers.

Okay, sure, so what's the point? You don't seem to like the idea of eternal hell. Why not? Can you - a created being - decide what the just punishment is better than the uncreated God? If the uncreated God decided that eternal hell is the just punishment, why would you say it's unjust? Based on what? — Agustino

Objections shouldn’t start with injustice. It will always fall prey to either the opposed moral position or speculation about the nature of hell. As a beginning point, to call an God’s treatment of humanity and hell an injustice isn’t at all convincing. A better window into the failures of Christianity is the question of human weakness.

Is God successful, not in the sense of morality, but with respect to the question overcoming human weakness? We begin with with the question you were asking in another thread: how can human weakness be overcome? How do we get beyond death, pain and suffering which haunts us here on Earth?

Under this measure, Christianity is an abject failure. It cannot overcome human weakness for millions of unbelievers. Indeed, Christianity is constituted by the presence of human weakness, for it specifies the hierarchy of Christian (strong) and non-Christian (weak). If our concern is overcoming the weakness of human death or the suffering instituted by worldly conflict, a Christian world is amongst the greatest tragedies, a natural disaster constituting human weakness of millions of people.

If someone is purely concerned with the question of overcoming human weakness (as opposed to the limits of overcoming human weakness in the world, be they defined by ability or morality), Christianity is a failed cure. Why would anyone concerned only with overcoming human weakness be attracted to Christianity as an ideal? Such a world leaves millions of unbelievers with human weakness. If it really just is human weakness that matters, the ideal solution is one of many possible outcomes where non-believers are also granted the strength of victory over death and sin.

Christianity is only effective at overcoming human weakness for the Christian. It an absolute disaster for any one concerned about the human weakness of everyone, even if it does happen to be just— a tragedy of the order of having to let someone starve to death so another can have food, only multiplied into the millions.

Well, no, I don't think rape, etc. are okay towards the guilty. This doesn't seem to be what Nietzsche is saying at all either. — Agustino

Indeed. Nietzsche is commenting on the structure of morality. The point is not that rape (or anything else) is moral, but that morality always specifies and defines its unique cruelty. If it were true (so in the case of God, if God commanded it) the immoral ought be raped, then such cruelty would be moral virtue. And so on and so on, for any moral virtue and the cruelty which constitutes it.

Nietzsche point is Christianity is telling a falsehood. With respect to the presence and seeking of cruelty, Christian morality is no different to pre-Christian morality. It just specifies different cruelties. God is its aristocracy. Instead of suffering the whatever whim the aristocrat of man might decide, we suffer the whim of God.

Often this is better morally, no longer is morality merely spoken in terms of a human’s (the aristocrat) authority and whim, such that we must any action he takes, including those done for greed at the expense of others. It reorders morality to remove certain cruelties. Still, being morality, it puts it’s own in, the extent and nature of which depend on the particular account of God you are talking about.

My point about the rape and torture of Hell was to show God’s morality has the same logical relationship as the human aristocrat. If such rape and torture were moral, if God commanded it, they would be a moral virtue-- just as the command of the pre-Christian aristocrat. The Christian is confusing how their morality is different from the past. Rather than eschewing domination and cruelty, Christian morality only specifies different cruelties. (in this respect, post-Christian morality is no different either. Secular liberalism, for example, has its own cruelties it inflicts to achieve what it understands as moral virtue).

This is just a non-sequitur for example, confusing an is with an ought. — Agustino

Nietzsche is pointing that exact fallacy. The mere presence of world doesn’t define a moral relationship. One needs an account of morality, which specifies which acts of violence, exploitation, rape and destruction are unjust and just. Without such an account, there is just life doing whatever it does. Nothing can be "intrinsically" unjust, that is, unjust merely by existing. Morality needs to do that work.

Yes, but not in the sense of raping them, and so forth. It demands cruelty in that the immoral are told that they must change their ways, repent. In a certain sense this is a cruelty. One is even being cruel to themselves when they demand that they change. But this is absolutely not the same as the cruelty of violence, being raped, etc. — Agustino

For sure, but only because that is the limit of God's command in this case. If God were to command the cruelty of a rape at some point, it would be just. All instances of morality are cruel in this sense, in their unflinching demand for domination and/or destruction of immorality. While it's different in the normative sense, it's the same in the descriptive sense that Nietzsche is interested in.

No, this would be wrong. Moral greatness - even according to Nietzsche actually - comes from strength, and is not a reaction to the weakness of others. It is a self-affirmation of one's own greatness, it is not being cruel and possessing the immoral. — Agustino

Yes and no.

In the sense Nietzsche holds morality is from strength, for sure. This isn't a rejection of either cruelty or domination though, just an argument people should be aware and honest about what they are doing. For example, sinners are not damned because of their weak of lack of repentance, but rather because of the self-affirmaiton of God an the Christian-- "Only those with the strength of repentance are saved."

You're right Nietzsche is against being cruel and domination, for the sake of domination (e.g. you must because you exist, and terrible, and belong to me), but that doesn't mean morality (even his own) is free of cruelty and domination. When cruelty and domination are a result of strength and self-affiirmation, they belong to the moral (which is why he praises aristocrats; they are honest about morality as a self-affirmation. Even if they are normatively abhorrent, they understand morality is defined in the affirmation of a particular will to power-- in being good and seeking it over the immoral, rather than by worthlessness and failing).

The point wasn't about innocents. It was about those God sends to the torture of Hell: the guilty. Nietzsche is entirely right. If you're guilty, then violence, rape and death are fine. Such cruelty cannot be intrinsic immoral (or moral). It takes a morality to define actions or states as such, and it demands cruelty to the immoral.

No doubt it's a positive... that's the point: moral greatness is found in the cruelty to and possession of the immoral. Given this, how do you disagree with anything Nietzsche states in the quotes you seemingly found so offensive?

I think he does-- the nature of morality is such that it advocates things violence, rape and killing. Morality is a justification for such actions. By Christian doctrine, billions are sent to burn for all eternity and it is moral greatness

God gets to be amongst the cruelest beings there will ever be and it is good. Throwing someone into the violence, rape and torture of Hell is moral virtue for God. All that cruelty, it is the greatest achievement of God. What Nietzsche advocates is nothing less than what God commands and celebrates for vast numbers of people.

I think Nietzsche means what he says, maybe it’s in a bit of embellished tone which drags the imaginations of some readers away from his point, but it seems an earnest point about morality.

People just don’t pay attention to what he is describing. They think he is arguing something absurd like sadism, torture and others being forced to do whatever you say, regardless of the moral status of actions, is somehow moral. Nietzsche is not interested in any such incoherence.

It’s the character of morality itself Nietzsche is trying to capture. What does it mean if some state or some person is immoral? How does it impact on their significance and our actions towards them? Nietzsche is describing the cruelty constitutive of morality, the pain and suffering inflicted on the inhabitants of the world to achieve moral virtue— the bodies in the ground, minds and bodies wasting away in a cell, the pain of belonging with someone who you despise, the pain of losing a partner because their distress at being stuck with someone they couldn’t stand was unbearable, distress of being forced to live in a world which violates their values, etc.-- it's the greatest thing that might ever be, for a moral world is achieved.

To be moral means to be cruel to someone. The very being of morality holds the immoral ought be destroyed, be restricted or forced to live in a world which defies their sensibilities— their acute emotional and/or physical distress is sought to create a world of moral virtue.

In his seemingly excessive comments about cruelty, Nietzsche is only making the honest pronouncement as a moral advocate. He is holding up a mirror to morality to show us what it means for us and the world— “Oh the Lord be praised, the unrepentant sinners burn is Hell as they deserve, never has there been so much moral virtue.”

The point is not that morality is untrue or even unjust, but that it is cruel, about asserting power over someone, holding them under your toe to form a world of moral virtue.

Even morality with the virtue of compassion partakes in such cruelty; the bully is shamed and denied power, a selfish hedonist is attacked for not showing compassion, many an individual and their interest is sacrificed for compassionate goals, all to achieve a moral world.

To be moral is to partake and reveal in a cruelty. In the passages on cruelty, the moral advocate is looking upon themselves, at what they celebrate and enact, to produce a world of moral virtue. Just it may be, but it is undeniably cruel to the immoral and that is morality’s intention.

Those who think morality is just defined by caring for others, by thinking about their concerns and helping them, are peddling a fraud. Ignorant of themselves, they have failed to consider how their morality impacts upon the world, of what it demands on certain people to achieve moral virtue.

"]But it's an elevated, almost superhuman perspective to adhere to. It's a bit like that of Heraclitus, who felt that to God all things are good and just, but men typically think some things just and others unjust. — Erik

Nietzsche is targeting nihilism. His philosophy is about the separation between morality and meaning. He demands honesty about values and meaning. Rather than being dedicated to identifying what people ought to do, his philosophy is about undoing the pretence it’s morality or justice which deifies meaning.

Holding Nietzsche is taking a position that “all is good” is somewhat close, but also quite mistaken. His position would be better described as all has meaning. No matter how moral or immoral the world might be, meaning obtains. The meaning or “worth” of the world cannot be ransomed to appearing in the ways we demand or only those ways “which make sense” to us.

The nihilistic fool says: “I cannot go on. Life has too much pain to have any meaning. There needs to be a transcendent force which inputs meaning.”

A depressed Ubermensch says: “I will not go on. The meaning of my life is constant pain. I ought not go on. Death (whether it be a figurative death of an action which might have occurred or the literal death of suicide) is my meaning.”

Nietzsche’s point is existence is always a creation or affirmation. Moral or immoral, wonderful or horrific, meaning obtains. To exist is to mean, no matter what happens to you, whether you enjoy it or not, whether you live a month or a hundred years. He’s not discussing how to be moral, but rather describing how meaning is present regardless of moral status (morality, no matter how true, is just a social whim, concerned with possession and origination of finite states. Often important, but never any threat to meaning).

The distinction is is also clear in Agustino misunderstanding of asceticism and Nietzsche. If one is honest about asceticism, that one endures of because the world (i.e. you, the ascetic), then Nietzsche doesn't have a problem. It actually fits pretty with Nietzsche's thought ; the treadmill of seeking feeling pleasure often constitutes nihilism, where getting the next hit is a transcendent solution to meaningless.

It's the falsehood Agustino is telling which is the problem for Nietzsche. The ascetic doesn't succeed by renouncing the world, but rather in affirming it-- "I am the existence which denies petty desires, who does not fall into just seeking my wishes and pleasure. "

Nietzsche opposition is to morality is as an excuse for hierarchy. Not in the sense of there are no right or wrong actions or people who are better or worse, but rather to the citing of moral character as an account of the worth of existence.

He wants us to be honest about are hierarchy: if I exert power to obtain my preferred social organisation, my action is not done because the people I lock-up, kill or oppose in values are meaningless wretches, but rather because I am exerting power to achieve a (supposedly) just social organisation. No more lying that its because someone else, no matter how moral or immoral, is meaningless.

In this respect, Nietzsche is more Christian than the Christian. He takes the Christian attack on sacrifice to its end. Since sacrifice does not undo what has been done, it cannot pay for wrongs at all, not even in Jesus.

God is just as ignorant as the sacrifice obsessed humans which went before him, at worst building a religion on the very premise of sacrifice which was meant to be targeting, at best lying about why Jesus is sacrificed (i.e. that Jesus died as a sacrifice for sins, rather the death being a cultural act of power to cause people to alter their relationship to sacrifice).

Worth and meaning are given without sacrifice, payment or forgiveness. No matter how evil might be, the significance of existence goes on, one can always do better, can help with there actions. God is dead because we already have the meaning God is meant to grant us and always well.

Sacrifice, payment, punishment, forgiveness, desire, everlasting life-- these are all only about hierarchies of the world and possessing worldly goods. Many times they are about morality and justice, but the have nothing to do with the infinite of meaning or worth.

In the sense relevant to this topic, theories cannot be fact laden because of the distinction between states and description of states (theory). There is never a point where the world can be defined purely in a theory.

At no point can we take a theory and proclaim it is a rule which "constrains" outcomes in the world, for each new state is formation or creation defined in-itself-- gravity, for instance, needs states of particular behaviour to form if the theory is to apply.

Our desire for theories to be "fact laden" leads us to confuse our theories with what might happen in the world. We jump from our desire for the world to have a particular meaning, to be described by a part theory, to the idea facts laden with that theory are the only possible outcome. It breaks down scientific method. Since we've assumed there is only one possible future outcome, we just take it's going to happen, without bothering to observe the world and check if it does.

I think that question is abandoned entirely. In older parlance, the question of "social construct" was about how something was caused, the whole "nature" vs "nurture" question which tries to ask what people were capable of separate to their own existence. People were trying to sort out whether behaviours, social positions, thoughts, etc. were created (and usually necessitated) by primordial nature of biology as opposed to the actions of human culture.

Nowadays this separation is more or less understood to be incoherent. Biology never does anything without an environment. Culture never does anything without biology. The question of "social construction" has shifted from a means of causation (nature vs nurture) to something more like a description of being-- to be "constructed" means that nature/biology has interacted with nature/culture to form a particular state rather than another.

In this sense, everything is constructed because it has to be formed by a continent state coming into being. There is no longer any opposition of "constructed (not real)" or "not constructed (real)," only the real which is constructed.

So if we are to talk about any state of our society, it amounts to a "social construction," for it is a state of existence of society, constructed out of particular biological and environmental interactions.

I don't know exactly. After the site was sold, it ran pretty smoothly for a while. I don't know whether it was just because there were no problems or because the owners were maintain it.

Then the forums broke, I can't remember exactly how, but it was serious, like trouble logging in/database issues/not displaying content properly and the owners just didn't fix it. The site became unusable. Someone else here probably knows more about it than I do.

I think Landru was part of the initial group of posters here or pretty close to it; he's got over 200 posts here. If I remember correctly, his posting dropped off and he stuck mostly to the original PF, till it imploded.

I think you've misread me. My point about the maliciousness of power at any time. This is not a truth brought about in the development of postmodernism, it's just identified and made explicit in postmodern analysis of society and values. I was giving the postmodern critique of power in the context of society-- it's the postmodernist's criticism I am speaking here.

The issue of the infinitely long decimal line is actually finite. Our problem is we just can't think enough of the discrete numbers at once to name the all-- we might say that we actually know an infinite here (the neverending nature of decimal numbers), but we lack knowledge of the finite (the many discrete numbers in the infinite set).

Thinking like this changes the question of knowablity. The infinite doesn't present any problem to knowledge. Limitations on knowledge are drawn from that any instance of it discrete and finite.

Someone cannot know everything because any instance of knowledge poses a logical distinction that excludes all else-- if I know "1", I do not know "2" in that moment. This limitation even applies to any existing omniscient being.

Even if someone managed to know everything, all at the same given "point" (a bit like Dr Manhattan experiencing all times of his life at once), each instance of knowledge would still be a seperate logical entity. Despite knowing everything all at once, the omniscient being would still not know everything in any one moment.

You didn't catch my bit about glory holes?

If you want to argue that there's always some emotion during sex, that's fine and I'm not a psychologist who knows better, but very evidently some sexual encounters can be less emotional than others where sexual satisfaction is the goal for both parties rather than intimate or emotional connection.

So I ask again, what's so wrong about that? — VagabondSpectre

Other people are involved with glory holes too. The same argument applies.

I'm not asking a comparative question about emotion. Caring isn't defined by suddenly becoming irrelevant because you don't want to life for someone forever. It's always tied to the context.

If you want to have sex, another has value to you, is desired by you, it's tied to your emotional state (your desires/what makes you happy/ what makes you frustrated) and how you value other people. Sexual satisfaction is an emotional goal in which another is significant, no matter what form it might take.

Nothing is wrong, per se, with different sorts of sexual relationship. They can be short, long, exclusive, open, etc. but the way people understand the sexual relationships and what others happen to think matters a great deal. It affect how people relate to others and whether they are considered in the context of sexual interactions.

The myth "sex is just about pleasure" is wrong because it's ignorant of how other people are involved in the sexual encounter. Instead of terming sex in terms of the significance of the other (e.g. "I want to have sex with someone as an expression mutual desire"), it does so only in terms of what one individual wants (e.g. "I'm having sex just to get pleasure). Not only is objectification, but the person isn't even aware it's objectification, for they just don't conceive the other person and their significance is playing a part at all.

Let's use the bar example to show what I mean. Should a man just walk-up to a woman, act like she is interested in him and hit on her after some seconds have passed? This should be fine because the woman "should be able to handle it" right? After all she's all dressed up, in the place where (supposedly) people go to find any stranger for sex-- that's what she must be there for right, to meet any random man? She must just be the object there to agree to give a strange man pleasure.

If we pause to actually think about the other person for a moment, we'll find this obviously not true. People often go to bars just to be entertained. They dress up and do out with their friends. It doesn't mean they are there looking for a casual sex partner. Even if they are looking for a partner, it doesn't mean they'll want attention from a particular man.

The ethics of any approach become more considerate and more complex. Instead of interrupting the group of friends clearly talking amongst themselves, to spend a night with one (or more), one will leave them alone because they are clearly busy. In making any approach, on will consider the impact they will have on others by doing so, how the pressures of being hit one might impact on someone. One won't just automatically go around hitting on everyone because they are interested and might get a night of pleasure. The idea women should "just be able to handle" a man's becomes abhorrent. We see it's nothing more than a man thinking he's entitled to try and get what he wants, without consideration of the circumstances or interests of any woman involved. In some cases, the (dis)interests of women are enough to mean an approach is unethical, even in a bar.

To think about sex as "is just about getting pleasure" is to ignore an element which defines all sexual relationships, other people, and so miss an element critical ethical behaviour in that context.

Obtaining orgasms are sometimes the only value that people want out of sex, what's so wrong about that? — VagabondSpectre

It's objectification and ignorance of what's going on in their own head. Since sex involves other people, it cannot be just about orgasms. Even in the most casual fling, another person is desired; they are valued as a participant in the act in the sex act, be as an objectified body or another person.

By definition an impulse to have sex involves at the very least valuing, if we are talking about instances where orgasm is the goal, obtaining orgasms by being involved with another person, in both body (e.g. how ever their body is important) and mind (as they have feelings, thoughts and value related to the act of sex). "Emotionless" sex is a myth. Consensual one night stands still involve the desires, expectations and valuing another person. Sex is an act between people. It cannot be separated for the significance of others and reduced to a pleasure motivation.

What do you even mean the female body becomes protected in public display? Protected from what exactly? :s — Agustino

I mean display of the naked body is valued. If we’re lauding displays of the naked body in media, especially in celebrity media, the idea it’s lewd or disgusting becomes impossible. You can’t just admonish any public display of nudity.

If the photo of Serena is beautiful for example, an expression of value of a particular embodied meaning in public, arguments for a lewd or disgusting display of a naked body have to become more nuanced. You have to start specifying the context, such that’s it distinct from the valuable naked displays. The link between the publicity of the naked body and disgust is severed.

In politics this has a significant effect. You can’t just people for displaying nudity in public. The immediate rhetorical disgust is lost. Shaming becomes more complicated than seeing a display of a naked body and attacking the creator/participants for the immediately obvious action of what’s been done with their body. You can’t make a moral example of a topless women marching in the Slutwalk just for appearing with bare top.

The question of displays of nudity is opened up to scepticism. If some of them are valuable, then they (displays of nudity) can’t be disgusting and lewd just by being naked.

In the case of the Slutwalk, for example, one of the points is about how the female body is objectified, about how other assume that a display of a naked female body means she is there for someone sexual consumption. Is the toplessness of the women actually any sort of problem? Not necessarily, if some displays of nudity are valuable, toplessness isn’t just lewd or disgusting of itself. Even if you’re taking a position opposed to the wider politics of Slutwalk, toplessness can’t just be a problem of displays nudity itself.

The accusation of category error is opened up with regards to the attack on toplessness: that you are mistaking an issue of sexual morality (advocating sexual permissiveness) for the display of toplessness. You lose a rhetorical force tied to embodiment— maybe the position of those marching on permissive sex is wrong, but that doesn’t mean being topless is.