Besides, this misses the point that unenlightened and I are making. The media can be responsible for our obsessions. — Michael

Low supply and high demand. Something in low supply but also low demand isn't going to be worth much. It was the media campaign that put diamonds into high(er) demand, which in turn increased their value. — Michael

Everyone finds them annoying; they are designed to upset. This is the whole foundation of consumer society. We at UNcorp set out to upset you, annoy you, make you anxious and fearful.

Because then you will want the cure for the disease we have created in you. Buy UNcorp's UNique UNderstanding today, not because you're worth it, though we'll tell you you are because we want you to love us, but because you are annoyed and upset.

And here is UNcorp's first rule of advertising:

Incomplete sentences, because if it doesn't quite say anything, it's not quite a lie. — unenlightened

Thought germs are everywhere, rotting your brain, and there is nothing you can do about it. Until now! Researchers at UNcorp have devised the first and only protective head gear for you and your loved ones that will kill 99% (recognise that figure?) of all intrusive thoughts. Also available in pill form. — unenlightened

The generalised human mind is what psychology studies. It is the average, the percentile. UNcorp doesn't care whether you buy its products or not, as long as 'people' do. — unenlightened

But history has suffered as a science in not being terribly mathematical in its theoretical thinking. That is what importing the mathematical tools of other sciences is all about. — apokrisis

I'm not sure then why people form rational policies around ideas of creative destruction, flat hierarchies, the value of managerial retreats, campaigns against red tape, skunk works, and a thousand other completely standard approaches to loosen up organisations, foster youthful energy. — apokrisis

Do you believe in neoliberal politics and not understand it? — apokrisis

Not perhaps great examples as they understood the power of monopoly. Which IBM taught them was the way to go. — apokrisis

But the Art of War is applied systems theory. It talks about the mature stage of systems development - flexible and not hidebound, energetic but not rash. — apokrisis

Now more than ever we need a scientific, and not a heuristic, definition of decadence (and its obverse). We can't wait for the new mindset to prove itself in another generation. — apokrisis

Yep. After you have been around long enough you will by definition have accumulated stuff that is of value - wisdom, property, power, resources. So attention does turn to risk-avoidance. It's classic investment behaviour. And senescent. — apokrisis

You don't take risks if you intuitively understand you have long lost the youthful powers of recovery from destructive perturbation. — apokrisis

But life should look very different from the perspective of a youthful "investor". Failure itself becomes the valuable learning opportunity - as every Silicon Valley entrepreneur chants as a mantra. — apokrisis

And again, if you hang around the circles of political or corporate power, that's their understanding. — apokrisis

Humans have the opposite tendency - if you check the anthropological evidence - to accumulate negentropic structure ... because it is negentropic structure that allows a successful acceleration of generalised entropification. — apokrisis

It's not all about you. You die whatever you think or do. The psyche is the generalised human mind, and if in general humanity is not concerned with sex, humanity dies. Sex is not necessary to the individual, but it is absolutely necessary to the species. — unenlightened

Do you think that when divorce was taboo and women were subjected to the authority of the husband, "true intimacy" flourished? — jamalrob

the state or experience of being isolated from a group or an activity to which one should belong or in which one should be involved: unemployment may generate a sense of political alienation.

a feeling of disconnection from the larger society

loss or lack of sympathy; estrangement — Bitter Crank

No one gives a hot damn about virtue, only whether you like fleshy dicks or plastic dicks, if you like it in the butt, in the mouth, or in the nose, whether you like black hair over blonde hair, tan skin instead of pale skin — Heister Eggcart

Therefore, it is usually a life without great “crisis” or great “depressions” (by the way, depression is the fatal fate of any affirmative life) — darthbarracuda

Here is a fundamental difference between your thinking and mine: Sex isn't the means by which people are alienated from each other. What is alienating is the abrasive competition for status, access to status, and goods; what is alienating is the meaninglessness that most people find in their work life; what is alienating is locating the meaning of individuals in their capacity to consume, or their low worth because they can not consume (enough stuff). — Bitter Crank

Rather than people being OBSESSED with sex, I think people LONG FOR warmth and sharing (intimacy). — Bitter Crank

Such blasphemy! How can you NOT watch your favorite puppet regurgitate some narrative that was passed down to him from the 'aliens' at the very top? — Question

what the hell is wrong with society if there is a disconnect between the individual and social 'operant' behavior? — Question

Ok, let me be clear; sexuality is important, and if it didn't have importance to the psyche, the species would go extinct. The same can be said of eating and breathing, but it does not entail that everyone is obsessed. — unenlightened

But even such a distortion, though foolish and unnecessary, does not amount to an obsession. It is the dearest wish of the media to convince you that everyone is getting it or thinking about it all the time, and if you are not, you need to buy - something or other.

It is not true and you are being manipulated. Resist!

I might start a thread on all this sometime, but this one is long and rambling enough, so I think I'll stop here. — unenlightened

However many caveats I make to my own experience, I cannot arrive at a figure close to 99%. — unenlightened

Ah, great minds! I see you have just posted about the urban rural thing.

I would suggest that the corporate environment is a place where folks conform their talk to the corporate needs, which are to promote sexual insecurity in order to sell more make-up, room fragrances to cover, I mean eliminate, the smell that you cannot smell because you've gone "nose-blind", or the kind of car that the babes will love you for ( it also magically eliminates traffic). — unenlightened

So I agree with you that there is a lot of pressure, particularly on the young, who are most ignorant and susceptible, and I agree too that there is probably an increase in sexual obsession. — unenlightened

Given it's colour, I expected it to taste like strawberry, — Sapientia

What's my prize? — Sapientia

But your friends seem to be different. Perhaps I live in a little island of rectitude, but I have been propositioned once by a woman of the streets and that aside, I cannot remember having talked about sex with anyone but Mrs un to any significant degree in twenty years, excluding the odd philosophical comment or joke that is hardly obsessive. So I speak as I find, that the folks I come across are by no means obsessed with sex, but have much more interesting things to obsess about, much to the chagrin of the media, no doubt. — unenlightened

So to be free from the obsession with sex that some people (but probably fewer than appears) have is certainly to be looked for. — unenlightened

Yes, you don't know it because you are argumentative and do not read carefully or charitably. — unenlightened

This makes discussion unpleasant and unproductive, and indeed, I am too busy denying your endless straw men to leave much space to develop any expression of the common ground. — unenlightened

You are happy to just make assertions without evidence. You describe the facts as they need to be to make your version of reality correct. — apokrisis

But the very fact you must still present "evidence" in the form of these imaginary facts gives the game away — apokrisis

And then, more relevantly, where General Glubb expresses your lament against social decadence, it in fact is an an amateur's way of getting at what theoretical biologists understand as the canonical lifecycle of organised systems. — apokrisis

So yes, that describes how things start immaturely in a burst of youthful zest and energy. The history of the world has been written by the rise of social groups which have "just enough" organisation to be cohesive, yet also a new lack of constraint in terms of some source of power - like horse riding, better ships, social mobility, or whatever. The group can ride out and take over their more conservative and hidebound neighbours.

And then a maturity develops. Even the Mongols and other "barbarians" got quite civilised, leading to a more balanced and persistent state of existence. — apokrisis

But inevitably - in a society that can't foresee the danger - conservative habit starts to create social rigidity and immobility. A fossilised elite develops. Folk start worrying that they aren't the stout stoics that laid the ground for cultural success. The focus goes to the lack of the old discipline, the decadence that is taking over. — apokrisis

But equally, the critical problem of the system is the senescence represented by the conservative elite. It naturally thinks the answer to new problems is the answer to old problems. If what is seen as a symptom is decadence, then the cure must lie in exerting even greater control - applying old habits with even more effort. — apokrisis

But social habits make sense because they work. To enforce them is to try to crank a broken system harder. Instead, an intelligent society is one that seeks to evolve new forms of general cohesion. It encourages social experimentation as it needs to strike on whatever it is might be the new better balance. — apokrisis

But where we differ is that I'm in favour of the right kind of liberality - a science-based freedom of thought. Political and economic systems need to be evidence-based and aimed at the general good. — apokrisis

So the fossilised thought habits of religious conservative elites are a clear and present danger for a modern society that wants to avoid its "inevitable" collapse. — apokrisis

So the formula is conservative/religious social norms and economic liberalisation. — apokrisis

But clearly the two are interlocked because ultimately the only justification for Goldman Sachs and its ilk being allowed to rape the world is that the US is God's chosen people. — apokrisis

But any outsider can see that its political system is deeply dysfunctional now. It is powerless to actually "drain the swamp" when all it can do is appoint a nespotic buffoon who exists in a bubble of bias-confirming Brietbart factoids. — apokrisis

I know we agree about a great deal on this topic — unenlightened

No, it isn't. If it were so, I wouldn't be talking about it. You might also notice, but seemingly haven't, that I have carefully refrained from advocating a way of life. I know we agree about a great deal on this topic, but nevertheless, please try to reign in your tiresome habit of derogatory innuendo; this is a serious matter. — unenlightened

I have not only done this to 'sex'; but, also to my social life, and other areas of my being. — Question

Now, that is an interesting hypothesis. I suppose it can be true to some degree. Doesn't bother me though. Strange, eh? — Question

It may be sad; but, it is true. And that it is true is an affirmation of my petty and rather uninteresting life, which is fine by me. — Question

So, while celibacy could be an advantage, could be a blessing, it could also be part of a repressive system under which very well educated, hard working, devoted professed members chafed to the point of being ready to quit. — Bitter Crank

So to be free from the obsession with sex that some people (but probably fewer than appears) have is certainly to be looked for. But celibacy maintained through gritted teeth, as it were, is not any kind of freedom, and maintains the obsession far more strongly than having a sexual relationship. — unenlightened

We could easily fix climate change if we could manage to overcome conservative habits and take the problem seriously. — apokrisis

I agree Trump is a good test of civilisation's current level of foresight and resilience. But surely you can rely on the CIA to arrange an accident for the sake of the prevailing neoliberal elite? — apokrisis

Yeah sure. There are lots of ways the symptoms might present. But no serious (scientific) historian is going to talk about a loss of motivation when it is instead a loss of cohesion, or the senescence of habit, that removes the possibility to act. — apokrisis

Yep. If it is a choice between your own bias-confirming scholarship and the actual scholarship of scientists who have to go out and confirm their ideas empirically, then surely we are all going to agree ... with you.

Don't you see how ridiculous this sounds? — apokrisis