ITT we fawn over pretty girls

[Yosarian2]

Shea was pointing out the creepiness of tajo and others while stating his own opinion as to why their behaviour is creepy.

It's really not, you know. If someone posts a picture of themselves on a forum, in a thread like that, they generally expect some kind of comment on it. Saying that someone looks good in a context like that is not creepy at all.

[Yosarian2]

Note: only two females I've ever seen posting in the face with a name thread who didn't get fawned over were farside and xofelf.

...

So yeah, your "they're just commenting on pictures" point fails.

So, they're commenting on pictures in a positive way. You know, because most people are nice, and because most of those pics posted in that thread generally are good looking pictures.

Really, when did this whole strange idea come about that "giving a female a compliment about her looks", somehow equals "you're a desperate, pathetic stalker"?

[Yosarian2]

Really, when did this whole strange idea come about that "giving a female a compliment about her looks", somehow equals "you're a desperate, pathetic stalker"?

Said the stalker

Hey, I don't know how many times I have to tell you this; I'm not sure how I ended up in that tree in front of your house looking into your bedroom window, but I'm sure it was just a simple misunderstanding.

[Yosarian2]

Go for it. But I didn't see Shea make his own thread with a poll: "What girl is the ugliest ho-bag on the forums?"

What?

She made a poll to demonstrate that most people really don't mind it if someone says good things about how they look.

[Yosarian2]

No one said I was pretty when I posted a pic.

[Yosarian2]

Everyone feels it necessary to chime in whether they think shes hot or not, being creepy if she is decent looking and downright shitty if she's not, and getting into pissing battles about it if their opinion differs on whether she's a hot piece of meat or of "sub par attractiveness". WTF?!? That just sucks.

I totally agree with you that if someone has the guts to post a picture of themselves, puts themselves out there like that, and someone else insults them and calls them "unattractive" or whatever, or "rates" them like this is one of those stupid dating sites, that person is being an ENORMOUS asshole.

I still don't think that a nice compliment is "creepy", if it's done in the right way.

[Yosarian2]

At the same time, though, if a guy doesn't give an opinion on how a girl looks, it's assumed that he thinks they are ugly.

Only if the person is really, really insecure.

[Yosarian2]

IMO

Demeaning <-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Not demeaning
Insulting a woman for her looks -- Complimenting a woman for her looks --------- Complimenting a woman for something besides her looks

Yeah, but...it's a picture thread.

Honestly, this might just be me, but about the most frustrating thing that can happen on an internet forum is when you post something, especally something personal like a picture, and no one says anything about it at all, everyone else just completly ignores you and acts like you're invisible. That just sucks.

It is ridiculous how much more people comment on the attractiveness or not of women, compared to men.

I know, right? Why aren't more women in there commenting on how attractive all us guys are? Sheesh.

[Yosarian2]

Everybody is a little racist

I both disagree with and hate that phrase.

[Yosarian2]

Generally, I just dislike how biracialness is so often discounted in race discourse.

That's because racism was invented in the 1700's as an excuse in order to justify slavery; before that point, there were of course different forms of xenophobia and such, but the kind of direct color coded racism we think of today is almost entirely an invention of that era. For example, many of the early English explorers of the new world mentioned what the Native Americans wore, how they lived, ect, in great detail in their writings, but never bothered to mention their skin color; it wasn't considered important at the time.

The problem was that the first justification of New World slavery, the idea that "it's ok to enslave them if they're not Christian" theory common amoung Spanish and Porteguse that dates back to the re-conquest of Spain from the Muslems, stopped working when a lot of the slaves converted to Christanity, so they needed to come up with a new excuse.

And if you're trying to justify slavery so you can keep making money off your slaves, then it's much easier if you don't have to prove your slave is 100% African American in order for you to be justified keeping him or her as a slave. Which is where the "one drop of blood" thing came from; if you had one drop of African American blood, you were an African American, and therefore it was ok to enslave you.

Racism isn't something that "everyone has a little of", nor is it somehow natural; it was invented so people could make money off of slavery.

[Yosarian2]

xenophobia is something everyone has a little of.

Meh. I don't buy that either, but at least it's a little more plausable.

[Yosarian2]

suddenly you like russians?

Sure. Dated one, in fact.

how about muslims?

Yup, two of my favorate students are muslem.

Not accusing you, just the easiest examples. I am against it, it is illogical, but that doesn't mean I don't know what xenophobia is. And while I think I am not that bad at reckognizing it, and trying to stop it, it doesn't mean it goes away.

Eh...there may be a certain amount of natual fear and distrust of someone who seems "different", but it's really not that hard to educate people that we're not really all that different, ect. Xenophobia can be a problem, especally if people are exposed to a constant stream of negitive images about a certain group as "outsiders", but it's certanly not anywhere close to universal.

[Yosarian2]

Yos, yeah, I'm aware of that. There was also a lot of "fun" "science" involved if I recall correctly.

Yeah, although that mostly came later.

Muslims? One of my closest friends growing up was Muslim. I don't understand the Muslim-hate going on because just because some overly-religious wackos decide to make other peoples lives hell doesn't mean that everybody of their religion is one of them.

Agreed. I think the problem is that a lot of Americans were only vaugly aware that muslim people even existed before 9/11. If every time you've heard about a certain group, it's been in a negitive context, some people will sadly generalize that. Still, the anti-muslem stuff in this country is pretty recent, and I don't think the roots of it run deep; I don't think it'll last long once we're past the current crises.

[Yosarian2]

Xenophobia is instinctive. I'm not saying it's moral, but it's part of our animal nature and can easily be manipulated by outside forces.

Well, that may be true. However, it's also not that hard for people to form a worldview that just dosn't consider people of a different background or a different religion to be "outsiders".

[Yosarian2]

It obviously is that hard.

Well, no, since a lot of people do have that worldview. I'd say a reasonably high percentage of people have absolutly no xenophobia at all in practical terms.

[Yosarian2]

It obviously is that hard.

Well, no, since a lot of people do have that worldview. I'd say a reasonably high percentage of people have absolutly no xenophobia at all in practical terms.

So I guess all that racial discrimination/sexual discrimination/gang violence/revenge killings/wars/etc. just disappeared overnight. Good to hear

...well, you notice I didn't say "a majority of people".

Not that gang wars or revenge killings or wars are primarally caused by xenophobia, althought it can be a contributing factor.

[Yosarian2]

(I like to put xenophobia/racism/etc in the same basket. They seem like facets of the same instinct)

Well...they're related, I'm sure, but there's a difference. Racism is more of a toxic set of learned patterns, things people either directly learn/are told or, in a more insidious way, absorb from the culture in general; sort of a "person who has subconsious racist attitudes he's not even aware of makes a movie, the characters in the movie match those subliminal racist attitudes, people who watch the movie have those same subliminal racist attitudes strengthened."

Basically, I think racism is something people learn; it's probably related to xenophobia, but I don't think it's the same thing at all; I mean, the nasty racist undertones are so toxic and so prevalent that even people of that race can be affected by them, like in the classic experement where young black girls in the United States were given a black barbie and a white barbie, and asked to pick out which one is prettier, and most of them chose the white barbie.

[Yosarian2]

Why is this thread 17 pages long?

It takes a lot of time to properly fawn over pretty girls.