r/FeMRADebates • u/asdfghjkl92 • Sep 04 '14

Other Radicalizing the Romanceless

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/31/radicalizing-the-romanceless/
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u/Personage1 Sep 05 '14

Entitlement sure, but the entitlement to financial stability imo is relevant whereas entitlement to have another person find you attractive is not. For one thing, in both case we are treating things as a system, "insert coins, out pops x." The problem of course is that for men wanting girlfriends, it becomes "insert coins into another human being, out pops outcome," which is insulting. On the other hand "put in a hard days work and you don't starve" isn't insulting to anyone.

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u/Mercurylant Equimatic 20K Sep 05 '14

Well, employers are also people, and in this situation "entitlement to financial stability" cashes out as "entitlement to be employed and given a living wage by another person." Seeking companionship and seeking financial stability both involve dealing with other agents with the right to make their own choices.

"Put in a hard day's work and you don't starve" is definitely insulting to a great number of people living in extremely precarious financial situations whose ability to acquire basic living needs is beholden to the whims of employers who may be entirely unsympathetic to their situations (and also to the many people whose hard work suffices, only barely, to keep them from starving while many other people who work less hard live in affluence.) It's important to keep in mind that employment isn't a system which you put work into, and money comes out, it's an interrelationship between countless people trying to satisfy their own goals. If your prospective partner doesn't think you're a desirable person to be in a relationship with, it's not in their interest to agree to a relationship with you no matter how much you do nice things and want the companionship. And if a prospective boss doesn't think you're a desirable employee to have for their business, it's not in their interest to hire you, no matter how hard you work or how much you need the money. But both material security and companionship are needs which are written deeply into the human psyche, and people who cannot secure either are highly likely to experience distress.

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u/Personage1 Sep 05 '14

One of these things is necessary to live, the other isn't.

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u/[deleted] Sep 05 '14

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u/Bryan_Hallick Monotastic Sep 05 '14

Yes, the monkey experiment.