Shaming People

[challer1]

[quote]Uncle Gabby wrote:

[quote]challer1 wrote:
However, the fact remains that these people do live long enough to collect, and in the end will cost “the system” more than the fat person will on average. This is relevant because the original point was that fat people need to be shamed into losing weight, when it’s not anyone’s business how someone else chooses to live their life if it doesn’t affect them. People tend to think that it is their business how fat another person is due to the mistaken belief that obesity somehow costs the thin fit person money. It does not.[/quote]

Again, that’s just symantics. Living longer isn’t costing “the system”. It’s simply a matter of getting what you paid for. When I buy groceries it “costs” the store to let me walk out with the food I just paid for. Certainly it would be more profitable for them to charge me and keep the groceries to resell.

I’m going to drop out of this discussion, because we’re getting to the point where we’re just repeating the same thing over and over, and I don’t have nearly as much patience as Cortes.
But you state with conviction that obese people aren’t taking more than their share and that the percentage of people on disablility for obesity is negligable. Where are you getting this information from and what is the number?

If someone steals the change out the cup holder in my truck, the impact on me is “negligable” as in, it’s a miniscule portion of my net worth. But he’s still a theif.[/quote]

It’s not just semantics. Living longer does cost the system. You pay into social security and medicare, but in reality if you live a long time you end up taking much more than you paid in. These programs would cease to exist if everyone lived to be 80 (like the average fit person). The budget of these programs actually depends on the working obese who pay into these programs then die before they are too old to collect.

Can’t find stats on the US, but in the UK, where it is much easier to get on disability in the first place, 1 in 8500 people is too fat to work. These rates are definitely not as high in the US, but even if they were, you can see this is negligible compared to the fact that with 1/3 the population obese, and an average life expectancy of an obese male being 62, that about 1.5 in 20 adults will be an obese male worker who died before ever reaching an age where they could collect social security or medicare. This means that these obese are paying in and never collecting. When a fit person lives to be an old age, they are drawing more than they ever paid in - and it is the fat who die in middle age that are paying for it.

[Cortes]

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]challer1 wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]therajraj wrote:

So don’t peddle this “well it’s just you” crap to me. Obesity, especially female obesity has much larger repercussions on society than just straining the healthcare system.

[/quote]

Pretty much the crux of the entire problem here. To insinuate that things are just honky-dory with American health and the natural tendency of humans to prefer more beautiful and healthier humans, it is either naive or willfully ignorant to keep brushing aside this argument as if the net effect were negligible.

I know I’m like a broken record sometimes with my America/Japan comparisons, but when they work, they work. Here, we do NOT have near epidemic levels of diabetes, heart disease, stroke or many of the other myriad health problems that America does. In fact, the biggest current crisis here is our Social Security system because people tend to live TOO long and retirement is effectively forced at the ridiculously young (for Japanese) age of 65. The divorce rate is FAR lower (yes, I understand, there are many factors involved in this), hence, intact families are far more prevalent. Eating disorders…what are those? Believe it or not, kids in Japan generally even LIKE vegetables!

This is in danger of turning into a “why fat is bad” thread, so I’ll just stop by repeating that the take away point is that this issue, much like the issue of broken families, rising divorce rates, rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers, and on and on DO, very much DO, have far reaching consequences that affect all of us. Is it not just common sense that pretty radical, comprehensive infrastructural and demographic changes are going to result in unavoidable consequences for the entirety of the society in question?

Seriously? [/quote]

Legitimate concerns. But really, what is different about fat-related health problems and the myriad other health problems associated with poor lifestyle choices? I’m not arguing that fat isn’t bad, only that it isn’t bad in the way many think it is and that it isn’t a unique drain on the economy here. We have all sorts of drains on the economy, of which this is one.

You know what else is draining on the economy? People who live far distances from where they work. The commute time means more gas used, more emissions, more damage to the roads, more traffic (and less worker productivity as a result), and so forth. You know what else is a drain on the economy? Why don’t we shame people like my buddy who drives 45 miles each way from San Jose to SF in his F-350 to go to work? Why don’t we shame farmers, many of whom are subsidized so that they can grow food at artificially-high prices that the consumer wouldn’t otherwise be paying, all while we also subsidize their water usage which is one of the biggest sources of pollution in this country?

And to get back to the original point of this thread, what is shaming people going to do solve the obesity epidemic in this country? And if shaming does work, then why stop there? The fact is that virtually everyone in this country contributes in some way, shape or form to the degradation of American society that you guys are all so worried about. Like I said earlier, I just want to see some consistency.

So if shaming DOES work (which I would disagree with) why stop there? Shouldn’t we be shaming pretty much everybody in this country? Shouldn’t we be shaming the farmers, instead of making bullshit Super Bowl commercials with that fucking windbag, Paul Harvey, rambling on about them? Shouldn’t we also be shaming everyone who has written into their will that they don’t want the plug pulled if they’re in a coma? Shouldn’t we be shaming everybody who chooses to have their child rather than abort it if keeping it means getting govt assistance to support it? Shouldn’t we be shaming everyone involved with the glorification of drug dealers and pimps and the perpetration of violence against women? Shouldn’t we be shaming everyone who has to take out some student loans to go to college rather than pay for it out of their own pocket? Shouldn’t we be shaming everyone who makes their money selling the food products that contribute to obesity? Shouldn’t we be outside of fast food restaurants shaming everyone who goes in, regardless of weight, and spends their money in it, thereby allowing a business profiting off the looming obesity/healthcare crisis in this country?[/quote]

Because that’s more like micromanaging. I can’t know for certain, but, as I’ve been saying, both human pride and shame provide a crucial social function serves to keep most members of a social group adhering to behaviors beneficial to the group. Were either one removed, or either one completely unrestrained, we’d have a major problem on our hands because of the selfish, greedy, carnal, hungry, ambitious, nature of the human animal.

I’m saying that expressing one’s disapproval at another’s unhealthy or unethical lifestyle choices comes naturally to us. And that it is only very recently, extremely recently, from a historical perspective, that we have decided to turn this very basic, innate human inclination on its head. I think that may be imprudent, to say the least.

Let’s take move away from the fat topic for a moment. How about a problem we can probably both agree is empirically harmful to our society if we are using crime and poverty, among many other factors, as a standard. Unwed mothers. Particularly those who decide to sire multiple children with different fathers without any means or even real plans for how to provide for them, save government assistance.

Since Candice Bergman made it taboo to ever utter a syllable of ill will regarding the single mother, what options are we now left with? [/quote]

It comes naturally to the judgmental, IMO. It is easy for humans to hate others for our differences. We like to attack things that are different from us. We’re fit, so fat is bad. Is it? Why should we not try to rise above this so-called instinct rather than embrace it? In particular in situations where it really has no affect on the judge or even society as a whole, as is the case with obesity?[/quote]

Because instincts generally serve to ensure the survival and continued propagation of the species.[/quote]

There’s this really good book about how the natural instincts of man is to take from others and live in a state of perpetual warfare with one another, where the only goal is to ensure the survival and propagation of one’s self and his family by whatever means necessary, not the entire species.

It’s called “Leviathan” by Thomas Hobbes. It was kind of a big deal in its day.

Fuck, I’m sorry, Cortes. That sounded really condescending and was uncalled for. What I was trying to get at is that man’s natural instinct is more to preserve himself rather than the species as a whole. If I preserve myself and whatever woman I want to carry my bloodline forward, I will be ensuring the survival of the species. But the species as I want it. One of man’s most base instincts, actually, THE most basic instinct is to protect good old numero uno first and foremost. We are a selfish lot. [/quote]

I know. And our behavior within the collective is also determined by this basic instinct. And it just so happens that the preservation of one’s clan or tribe or community has historically been the most efficacious manner in which to achieve this. These are not simple, linear systems. They are complex beyond all reasoning, probably orders of magnitude more complex than we even imagine them to be now.

I don’t have an argument with any of this stuff.

I have an argument with the historically unprecedented abdication of them.

[Cortes]

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[DBCooper]

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike.

[therajraj]

The multiple children from multiple fathers is a direct result of social engineering via contraception.

People engage in much more riskier behavior in a dating market that removes the natural consequences of sleeping around.

[DBCooper]

[quote]therajraj wrote:
The multiple children from multiple fathers is a direct result of social engineering via contraception.

People engage in much more riskier behavior in a dating market that removes the natural consequences of sleeping around.

[/quote]

Last I checked, it was still a pretty big social stigma to have children from multiple fathers while unmarried and unable to support them. And what the fuck does your first sentence mean? That contraception is what’s responsible for multiple children from multiple fathers? People being encouraged to use protection has led to more pregnancies? Yeah, that makes about as much sense as you claiming that the signs of a sustainable society is an ever-expanding birth rate.

[therajraj]

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

Last I checked, it was still a pretty big social stigma to have children from multiple fathers while unmarried and unable to support them. And what the fuck does your first sentence mean?[/quote]

The stigma is nothing like it once was. Single mothers in the past would be shunned from society while we now offer a myriad of non-judgementalist programs to these women. They are welcomed and their lifestyles normalized.

[quote]DBCooper wrote:
That contraception is what’s responsible for multiple children from multiple fathers? People being encouraged to use protection has led to more pregnancies? Yeah, that makes about as much sense as you claiming that the signs of a sustainable society is an ever-expanding birth rate.[/quote]

Most reported causes of unwanted pregnancies are a result of contraception failure and improper use.

[Cortes]

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike. [/quote]

For the millionth time, no, I’m not. Give me some credit here. I’m perfectly aware that there are multiple factors involved. Did you miss my post just before that? Or the wall of text I posted about Japan’s suicide issue? Again, you are taking an example issue and turning it into THE issue.

Let me try one more time, as simple and unfettered as I can:

All societies, everywhere, by definition, have rules. No rules? Not a society, then.

All rules, everywhere, by definition, have means of enforcement. No means of enforcement? Not a rule, then.

Now I know for a FACT that if I am trying to determine WHAT means of enforcement should be applied to WHAT rules, DB Cooper’s beliefs and Deb’s beliefs and Raj’s beliefs and my beliefs are so far removed, one from the other*, that trying to reach agreement will end up being…well, this thread.

So I want to ask a different set of questions, and I’d appreciate a simple, honest, answer. First:

HOW should those rules be determined?

And then,

HOW the means of their enforcement?

.

*incidentally, although it may appear otherwise to people who only read GAL, on many political issues, Raj and I are as opposed in our beliefs as DB Cooper and myself are here. However, for some reason, all of our points of conflict seem to accrue in PWI, while whenever I see him here, I find myself on his side.

It surprised the living hell out of me the first time it happened, to be honest.

There are 20+ page threads in PWI, the bulk of which are the two of us telling the other one what an ignorant rectal fissure he is, lol. (^_^)b

[therajraj]

It’s lead to more unwanted pregnancies

[Cortes]

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]therajraj wrote:
The multiple children from multiple fathers is a direct result of social engineering via contraception.

People engage in much more riskier behavior in a dating market that removes the natural consequences of sleeping around.

[/quote]

Last I checked, it was still a pretty big social stigma to have children from multiple fathers while unmarried and unable to support them. And what the fuck does your first sentence mean? That contraception is what’s responsible for multiple children from multiple fathers? People being encouraged to use protection has led to more pregnancies? Yeah, that makes about as much sense as you claiming that the signs of a sustainable society is an ever-expanding birth rate.[/quote]

Wait, so then, you’re saying Western societal application of shame today is the same as it always was? That it’s not significantly diminished over the past, say, 100 years?

Ugh.

I need to stop typing tonight. I wonder if hamsters ever suffer existential malaise while running in their wheels. Probably not, eh?

[DBCooper]

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike. [/quote]

For the millionth time, no, I’m not. Give me some credit here. I’m perfectly aware that there are multiple factors involved. Did you miss my post just before that? Or the wall of text I posted about Japan’s suicide issue? Again, you are taking an example issue and turning it into THE issue.

Let me try one more time, as simple and unfettered as I can:

All societies, everywhere, by definition, have rules. No rules? Not a society, then.

All rules, everywhere, by definition, have means of enforcement. No means of enforcement? Not a rule, then.

Now I know for a FACT that if I am trying to determine WHAT means of enforcement should be applied to WHAT rules, DB Cooper’s beliefs and Deb’s beliefs and Raj’s beliefs and my beliefs are so far removed, one from the other*, that trying to reach agreement will end up being…well, this thread.

So I want to ask a different set of questions, and I’d appreciate a simple, honest, answer. First:

HOW should those rules be determined?

And then,

HOW the means of their enforcement?

.

*incidentally, although it may appear otherwise to people who only read GAL, on many political issues, Raj and I are as opposed in our beliefs as DB Cooper and myself are here. However, for some reason, all of our points of conflict seem to accrue in PWI, while whenever I see him here, I find myself on his side.

It surprised the living hell out of me the first time it happened, to be honest.

There are 20+ page threads in PWI, the bulk of which are the two of us telling the other one what an ignorant rectal fissure he is, lol. (^_^)b[/quote]

By societies rules, I assume you mean something different than codified law, like social norms. How should social norms be determined? I have no fucking clue. What is the end goal with these social norms? A homogenized society where no one acts out of line so that the masses aren’t offended? A society in which everyone’s behavior is for the good of society as a whole? Fuck individuality, it’s all about the group? The collective trumps the individual? What are we trying to achieve with these rules? Some sort of Utopia?

As far as enforcement goes, I have no fucking clue about that, either. Who gets to be the enforcers? Who determines that? It sounds to me like you’re on the verge of condemning individuality entirely. People make choices about their lives that aren’t good ones all the time.

You seem to be missing a VERY basic point that I made pages ago about all of this. I fully understand that humans are judgmental and that we do and say certain things to “keep people in line”, for lack of a better phrase. That judgmental nature is part of what makes us humans. But what you’re offering is not a solution at all. That’s why despite all of the social shaming and whatnot that humans have engaged in for century after century, regardless of the spikes and valleys in any graphical representation that you want to present on the matter, people still rebel against societal norms at a cost to society all the time. That, too, is part of human nature.

So it sounds to me that you want to encourage one aspect of human nature in an attempt to eradicate another part of it. We are imperfect beings destined to fail at many things. Fitting into some pre-conceived, normative version of society is one of the things that humans are destined to fail at, regardless of the cost of those failures to society.

I don’t have the answers. I don’t even know what the problem is anymore that we’re attempting to solve. Does shaming of people help eradicate social ills? No, of course not. Because those ills still exist today, period. Do we shame people less often for violating certain social rules? I don’t know, I really don’t know. That is something that is totally unquantifiable. You could point to some website about “fat acceptance” or whatever as proof one way and I could point to this website or the explosion of the fitness industry as proof in the opposite direction.

Have we downgraded the social stigma attached to being a pregnant teen or an unwed mother of six with six different fathers? Again, totally unquantifiable. The fact that no one on here so far really finds that sort of thing acceptable is proof to me that it is NOT socially acceptable. I’ve never seen anything that indicates it is. Your example of a fictional character in a 20 year old TV show was not analogous.

So to readdress your questions, I simply don’t have the answer. What are your suggestions?

[Cortes]

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike. [/quote]

For the millionth time, no, I’m not. Give me some credit here. I’m perfectly aware that there are multiple factors involved. Did you miss my post just before that? Or the wall of text I posted about Japan’s suicide issue? Again, you are taking an example issue and turning it into THE issue.

Let me try one more time, as simple and unfettered as I can:

All societies, everywhere, by definition, have rules. No rules? Not a society, then.

All rules, everywhere, by definition, have means of enforcement. No means of enforcement? Not a rule, then.

Now I know for a FACT that if I am trying to determine WHAT means of enforcement should be applied to WHAT rules, DB Cooper’s beliefs and Deb’s beliefs and Raj’s beliefs and my beliefs are so far removed, one from the other*, that trying to reach agreement will end up being…well, this thread.

So I want to ask a different set of questions, and I’d appreciate a simple, honest, answer. First:

HOW should those rules be determined?

And then,

HOW the means of their enforcement?

.

*incidentally, although it may appear otherwise to people who only read GAL, on many political issues, Raj and I are as opposed in our beliefs as DB Cooper and myself are here. However, for some reason, all of our points of conflict seem to accrue in PWI, while whenever I see him here, I find myself on his side.

It surprised the living hell out of me the first time it happened, to be honest.

There are 20+ page threads in PWI, the bulk of which are the two of us telling the other one what an ignorant rectal fissure he is, lol. (^_^)b[/quote]

By societies rules, I assume you mean something different than codified law, like social norms. How should social norms be determined? I have no fucking clue. What is the end goal with these social norms? A homogenized society where no one acts out of line so that the masses aren’t offended? A society in which everyone’s behavior is for the good of society as a whole? Fuck individuality, it’s all about the group? The collective trumps the individual? What are we trying to achieve with these rules? Some sort of Utopia?

As far as enforcement goes, I have no fucking clue about that, either. Who gets to be the enforcers? Who determines that? It sounds to me like you’re on the verge of condemning individuality entirely. People make choices about their lives that aren’t good ones all the time.

You seem to be missing a VERY basic point that I made pages ago about all of this. I fully understand that humans are judgmental and that we do and say certain things to “keep people in line”, for lack of a better phrase. That judgmental nature is part of what makes us humans. But what you’re offering is not a solution at all. That’s why despite all of the social shaming and whatnot that humans have engaged in for century after century, regardless of the spikes and valleys in any graphical representation that you want to present on the matter, people still rebel against societal norms at a cost to society all the time. That, too, is part of human nature.

So it sounds to me that you want to encourage one aspect of human nature in an attempt to eradicate another part of it. We are imperfect beings destined to fail at many things. Fitting into some pre-conceived, normative version of society is one of the things that humans are destined to fail at, regardless of the cost of those failures to society.

I don’t have the answers. I don’t even know what the problem is anymore that we’re attempting to solve. Does shaming of people help eradicate social ills? No, of course not. Because those ills still exist today, period. Do we shame people less often for violating certain social rules? I don’t know, I really don’t know. That is something that is totally unquantifiable. You could point to some website about “fat acceptance” or whatever as proof one way and I could point to this website or the explosion of the fitness industry as proof in the opposite direction.

Have we downgraded the social stigma attached to being a pregnant teen or an unwed mother of six with six different fathers? Again, totally unquantifiable. The fact that no one on here so far really finds that sort of thing acceptable is proof to me that it is NOT socially acceptable. I’ve never seen anything that indicates it is. Your example of a fictional character in a 20 year old TV show was not analogous.

So to readdress your questions, I simply don’t have the answer. What are your suggestions? [/quote]

How are you so unsure about all of this shit but dead certain that shaming is a bad idea?

[therajraj]

Cortes - I think we disagreed a lot in PWI but really only a couple of topics were discussed at great lengths.

-The existence of a god

• Gay marriage

I can’t really recall any other real huge disagreements.

[DBCooper]

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike. [/quote]

For the millionth time, no, I’m not. Give me some credit here. I’m perfectly aware that there are multiple factors involved. Did you miss my post just before that? Or the wall of text I posted about Japan’s suicide issue? Again, you are taking an example issue and turning it into THE issue.

Let me try one more time, as simple and unfettered as I can:

All societies, everywhere, by definition, have rules. No rules? Not a society, then.

All rules, everywhere, by definition, have means of enforcement. No means of enforcement? Not a rule, then.

Now I know for a FACT that if I am trying to determine WHAT means of enforcement should be applied to WHAT rules, DB Cooper’s beliefs and Deb’s beliefs and Raj’s beliefs and my beliefs are so far removed, one from the other*, that trying to reach agreement will end up being…well, this thread.

So I want to ask a different set of questions, and I’d appreciate a simple, honest, answer. First:

HOW should those rules be determined?

And then,

HOW the means of their enforcement?

.

*incidentally, although it may appear otherwise to people who only read GAL, on many political issues, Raj and I are as opposed in our beliefs as DB Cooper and myself are here. However, for some reason, all of our points of conflict seem to accrue in PWI, while whenever I see him here, I find myself on his side.

It surprised the living hell out of me the first time it happened, to be honest.

There are 20+ page threads in PWI, the bulk of which are the two of us telling the other one what an ignorant rectal fissure he is, lol. (^_^)b[/quote]

By societies rules, I assume you mean something different than codified law, like social norms. How should social norms be determined? I have no fucking clue. What is the end goal with these social norms? A homogenized society where no one acts out of line so that the masses aren’t offended? A society in which everyone’s behavior is for the good of society as a whole? Fuck individuality, it’s all about the group? The collective trumps the individual? What are we trying to achieve with these rules? Some sort of Utopia?

As far as enforcement goes, I have no fucking clue about that, either. Who gets to be the enforcers? Who determines that? It sounds to me like you’re on the verge of condemning individuality entirely. People make choices about their lives that aren’t good ones all the time.

You seem to be missing a VERY basic point that I made pages ago about all of this. I fully understand that humans are judgmental and that we do and say certain things to “keep people in line”, for lack of a better phrase. That judgmental nature is part of what makes us humans. But what you’re offering is not a solution at all. That’s why despite all of the social shaming and whatnot that humans have engaged in for century after century, regardless of the spikes and valleys in any graphical representation that you want to present on the matter, people still rebel against societal norms at a cost to society all the time. That, too, is part of human nature.

So it sounds to me that you want to encourage one aspect of human nature in an attempt to eradicate another part of it. We are imperfect beings destined to fail at many things. Fitting into some pre-conceived, normative version of society is one of the things that humans are destined to fail at, regardless of the cost of those failures to society.

I don’t have the answers. I don’t even know what the problem is anymore that we’re attempting to solve. Does shaming of people help eradicate social ills? No, of course not. Because those ills still exist today, period. Do we shame people less often for violating certain social rules? I don’t know, I really don’t know. That is something that is totally unquantifiable. You could point to some website about “fat acceptance” or whatever as proof one way and I could point to this website or the explosion of the fitness industry as proof in the opposite direction.

Have we downgraded the social stigma attached to being a pregnant teen or an unwed mother of six with six different fathers? Again, totally unquantifiable. The fact that no one on here so far really finds that sort of thing acceptable is proof to me that it is NOT socially acceptable. I’ve never seen anything that indicates it is. Your example of a fictional character in a 20 year old TV show was not analogous.

So to readdress your questions, I simply don’t have the answer. What are your suggestions? [/quote]

How are you so unsure about all of this shit but dead certain that shaming is a bad idea? [/quote]

Because I work with people every day who have been victimized by shaming of one sort or another. I’ve been shamed for certain types of behavior in the past as well. I’m a recovering alcoholic and drug addict. I work with people in recovery all the time. You know what happens to a lot of people who are shamed? They try to find other ways to fit in that don’t work, or they bury the embarrassment they feel under whatever makes them feel good. For many people, what makes them feel good is exactly what they are shamed for in the first place.

I don’t come across people who got sober because someone else shamed them into it. It’s when they become completely ashamed of themselves that the light starts to flicker in their head. When people engage in behavior that is clearly not good for them or those around them, that is problematic, but the fact is that they do so anyways. It’s an escape, it’s something to bury whatever else is going on or it’s simply an addiction, which food can be and is to many obese people. They do it despite evidence that it is bad because it makes them FEEL good. So when you make someone feel bad, they are going to seek out what makes them feel good, no matter what that is and regardless of the later repercussions.

For obese people, it is food. For me, it was cocaine and booze. I was shamed by my family on a pretty regular basis for being a drug addict and a drunkard. DId it stop me from engaging in that sort of behavior? No, if anything it further exacerbated it. It wasn’t until I found people who were into solution-based approaches to my problems that I got better.

None of those people were telling me that my behavior was OK even though none of them even came close to shaming me for who I had become. THAT is the distinction you seem to be missing. By shaming people, all we do is tell them that there is something wrong with them, when the only problem is their behavior, not who they are as people. When you tell someone that the person they are is a fat-ass and a drain on the economy or a worthless coke head and they start to BELIEVE that that is what they are, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When you tell someone that they don’t have to be that sort of a person and then offer an alternative, a plan of action, is when the real difference is made. Most of the people who the participants in this thread would want to shame are well aware of the true nature of their behavior. But they need help, real help. That’s just the way it is. When left to figure things out on their own, they end up fat, or addicted, or perpetually drunk or pregnant at 15. These are people that clearly don’t make the best decisions when left to their own devices. So they need help from others.

They don’t need people to say “you’re a lazy, fat piece of shit who is draining our economy”. They pretty much already know that and it doesn’t make them feel good at all. Given that, why WOULDN’T they gravitate toward the whole “fat acceptance” movement that is allegedly sweeping over this country? They don’t need people to remind them of what they already know deep down inside. They need people to show them a solution, a way out. Shaming people doesn’t do that at all and in many cases buries them further in their own problems.

[SkyzykS]

Those are some very good points DB. In a lot of cases, shame doesn’t work. You can’t make a person feel any worse than they already do, and even if you try your efforts are both futile and sadistic. You might be able to get the person to feel worse, but at that point you might as well throw them off of a bridge.

My wife has had a weight problem, and after having our son it has become worse. What do you guys suppose I do? Come home every night and make her feel like complete garbage? Keep doing that until she no longer feels like breathing?

No Thanks. I already know that she feels very badly about herself. Do you guys suppose I should make that worse? Maybe I can make her feel so badly that she develops a good healthy eating disorder like anorexia or bulimia. Or how about just shaming her into leaving so that I don’t have to look at her any more? Then she can be a single mother with a new baby and I can be a single dad with a nice child support payment and a lifetime of regret!

You guys are fucking genius!

Or maybe I can just be supportive and present some healthy options for diet and exercise that we can both feel good about.

[DBCooper]

[quote]therajraj wrote:

The stigma is nothing like it once was. Single mothers in the past would be shunned from society while we now offer a myriad of non-judgementalist programs to these women. They are welcomed and their lifestyles normalized.

You’ve simply gone from one extreme to the other. And you’re a bit misinformed, as usual. Single mothers in the past WERE shunned, yes. But that went for ALL single mothers, not just the ones who were incapable of successfully raising a child.

The difference today is that we don’t necessarily shun single mothers, nor should we if they are capable of raising a well-rounded, well-adjusted child. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. Where you err is that you equate the two. Yes, MOST single mothers don’t do so well. But not ALL single mothers fail.

As far as welcoming and normalizing “them” I don’t know if you mean failed single mothers or ALL single mothers. The fact that we offer programs that are non-judgmental is a natural result of the culture of shame that previously surrounded them. The pendulum swings both ways, Raj. Those who shunned single mothers right out of society are the ones who started swinging that pendulum in the first place, so the shaming thing is as much to blame as the culture you are so quick to condemn. The culture you condemn is your own creation, one that will manifest itself in other forms the more that we shame people.

[Cortes]

[quote]therajraj wrote:
Cortes - I think we disagreed a lot in PWI but really only a couple of topics were discussed at great lengths.

-The existence of a god

• Gay marriage

I can’t really recall any other real huge disagreements.[/quote]

Sex education. But yeah, I think we just spent so much time on the threads that we did that it seemed like we must be matter/antimatter, lol.

[Cortes]

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike. [/quote]

For the millionth time, no, I’m not. Give me some credit here. I’m perfectly aware that there are multiple factors involved. Did you miss my post just before that? Or the wall of text I posted about Japan’s suicide issue? Again, you are taking an example issue and turning it into THE issue.

Let me try one more time, as simple and unfettered as I can:

All societies, everywhere, by definition, have rules. No rules? Not a society, then.

All rules, everywhere, by definition, have means of enforcement. No means of enforcement? Not a rule, then.

Now I know for a FACT that if I am trying to determine WHAT means of enforcement should be applied to WHAT rules, DB Cooper’s beliefs and Deb’s beliefs and Raj’s beliefs and my beliefs are so far removed, one from the other*, that trying to reach agreement will end up being…well, this thread.

So I want to ask a different set of questions, and I’d appreciate a simple, honest, answer. First:

HOW should those rules be determined?

And then,

HOW the means of their enforcement?

.

*incidentally, although it may appear otherwise to people who only read GAL, on many political issues, Raj and I are as opposed in our beliefs as DB Cooper and myself are here. However, for some reason, all of our points of conflict seem to accrue in PWI, while whenever I see him here, I find myself on his side.

It surprised the living hell out of me the first time it happened, to be honest.

There are 20+ page threads in PWI, the bulk of which are the two of us telling the other one what an ignorant rectal fissure he is, lol. (^_^)b[/quote]

By societies rules, I assume you mean something different than codified law, like social norms. How should social norms be determined? I have no fucking clue. What is the end goal with these social norms? A homogenized society where no one acts out of line so that the masses aren’t offended? A society in which everyone’s behavior is for the good of society as a whole? Fuck individuality, it’s all about the group? The collective trumps the individual? What are we trying to achieve with these rules? Some sort of Utopia?

As far as enforcement goes, I have no fucking clue about that, either. Who gets to be the enforcers? Who determines that? It sounds to me like you’re on the verge of condemning individuality entirely. People make choices about their lives that aren’t good ones all the time.

You seem to be missing a VERY basic point that I made pages ago about all of this. I fully understand that humans are judgmental and that we do and say certain things to “keep people in line”, for lack of a better phrase. That judgmental nature is part of what makes us humans. But what you’re offering is not a solution at all. That’s why despite all of the social shaming and whatnot that humans have engaged in for century after century, regardless of the spikes and valleys in any graphical representation that you want to present on the matter, people still rebel against societal norms at a cost to society all the time. That, too, is part of human nature.

So it sounds to me that you want to encourage one aspect of human nature in an attempt to eradicate another part of it. We are imperfect beings destined to fail at many things. Fitting into some pre-conceived, normative version of society is one of the things that humans are destined to fail at, regardless of the cost of those failures to society.

I don’t have the answers. I don’t even know what the problem is anymore that we’re attempting to solve. Does shaming of people help eradicate social ills? No, of course not. Because those ills still exist today, period. Do we shame people less often for violating certain social rules? I don’t know, I really don’t know. That is something that is totally unquantifiable. You could point to some website about “fat acceptance” or whatever as proof one way and I could point to this website or the explosion of the fitness industry as proof in the opposite direction.

Have we downgraded the social stigma attached to being a pregnant teen or an unwed mother of six with six different fathers? Again, totally unquantifiable. The fact that no one on here so far really finds that sort of thing acceptable is proof to me that it is NOT socially acceptable. I’ve never seen anything that indicates it is. Your example of a fictional character in a 20 year old TV show was not analogous.

So to readdress your questions, I simply don’t have the answer. What are your suggestions? [/quote]

How are you so unsure about all of this shit but dead certain that shaming is a bad idea? [/quote]

Because I work with people every day who have been victimized by shaming of one sort or another. I’ve been shamed for certain types of behavior in the past as well. I’m a recovering alcoholic and drug addict. I work with people in recovery all the time. You know what happens to a lot of people who are shamed? They try to find other ways to fit in that don’t work, or they bury the embarrassment they feel under whatever makes them feel good. For many people, what makes them feel good is exactly what they are shamed for in the first place.

I don’t come across people who got sober because someone else shamed them into it. It’s when they become completely ashamed of themselves that the light starts to flicker in their head. When people engage in behavior that is clearly not good for them or those around them, that is problematic, but the fact is that they do so anyways. It’s an escape, it’s something to bury whatever else is going on or it’s simply an addiction, which food can be and is to many obese people. They do it despite evidence that it is bad because it makes them FEEL good. So when you make someone feel bad, they are going to seek out what makes them feel good, no matter what that is and regardless of the later repercussions.

For obese people, it is food. For me, it was cocaine and booze. I was shamed by my family on a pretty regular basis for being a drug addict and a drunkard. DId it stop me from engaging in that sort of behavior? No, if anything it further exacerbated it. It wasn’t until I found people who were into solution-based approaches to my problems that I got better.

None of those people were telling me that my behavior was OK even though none of them even came close to shaming me for who I had become. THAT is the distinction you seem to be missing. By shaming people, all we do is tell them that there is something wrong with them, when the only problem is their behavior, not who they are as people. When you tell someone that the person they are is a fat-ass and a drain on the economy or a worthless coke head and they start to BELIEVE that that is what they are, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When you tell someone that they don’t have to be that sort of a person and then offer an alternative, a plan of action, is when the real difference is made. Most of the people who the participants in this thread would want to shame are well aware of the true nature of their behavior. But they need help, real help. That’s just the way it is. When left to figure things out on their own, they end up fat, or addicted, or perpetually drunk or pregnant at 15. These are people that clearly don’t make the best decisions when left to their own devices. So they need help from others.

They don’t need people to say “you’re a lazy, fat piece of shit who is draining our economy”. They pretty much already know that and it doesn’t make them feel good at all. Given that, why WOULDN’T they gravitate toward the whole “fat acceptance” movement that is allegedly sweeping over this country? They don’t need people to remind them of what they already know deep down inside. They need people to show them a solution, a way out. Shaming people doesn’t do that at all and in many cases buries them further in their own problems.[/quote]

Wasn’t it you who said bullying was no big deal?

I’m not trying to play gotcha, I actually may be remembering wrong.

[DBCooper]

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]DBCooper wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]debraD wrote:

The same instincts that lead to “rampant unprotected sex, women having children by multiple fathers”…

[/quote]

Oh, I see. Shall we compare charts?

Because if you are correct as I’m understanding it, the historical occurrence of this particular demographic should looks like a flatline.

It is my conjecture that that a graphical representation of such behavior should look like a hockey stick, meandering horizontally along for thousands of years, then suddenly and dramatically shooting up starting around 1960.

What am I missing here?

[/quote]
What you’re missing is the sheer multitude of other factors acting on this graphical spike. [/quote]

For the millionth time, no, I’m not. Give me some credit here. I’m perfectly aware that there are multiple factors involved. Did you miss my post just before that? Or the wall of text I posted about Japan’s suicide issue? Again, you are taking an example issue and turning it into THE issue.

Let me try one more time, as simple and unfettered as I can:

All societies, everywhere, by definition, have rules. No rules? Not a society, then.

All rules, everywhere, by definition, have means of enforcement. No means of enforcement? Not a rule, then.

Now I know for a FACT that if I am trying to determine WHAT means of enforcement should be applied to WHAT rules, DB Cooper’s beliefs and Deb’s beliefs and Raj’s beliefs and my beliefs are so far removed, one from the other*, that trying to reach agreement will end up being…well, this thread.

So I want to ask a different set of questions, and I’d appreciate a simple, honest, answer. First:

HOW should those rules be determined?

And then,

HOW the means of their enforcement?

.

*incidentally, although it may appear otherwise to people who only read GAL, on many political issues, Raj and I are as opposed in our beliefs as DB Cooper and myself are here. However, for some reason, all of our points of conflict seem to accrue in PWI, while whenever I see him here, I find myself on his side.

It surprised the living hell out of me the first time it happened, to be honest.

There are 20+ page threads in PWI, the bulk of which are the two of us telling the other one what an ignorant rectal fissure he is, lol. (^_^)b[/quote]

By societies rules, I assume you mean something different than codified law, like social norms. How should social norms be determined? I have no fucking clue. What is the end goal with these social norms? A homogenized society where no one acts out of line so that the masses aren’t offended? A society in which everyone’s behavior is for the good of society as a whole? Fuck individuality, it’s all about the group? The collective trumps the individual? What are we trying to achieve with these rules? Some sort of Utopia?

As far as enforcement goes, I have no fucking clue about that, either. Who gets to be the enforcers? Who determines that? It sounds to me like you’re on the verge of condemning individuality entirely. People make choices about their lives that aren’t good ones all the time.

You seem to be missing a VERY basic point that I made pages ago about all of this. I fully understand that humans are judgmental and that we do and say certain things to “keep people in line”, for lack of a better phrase. That judgmental nature is part of what makes us humans. But what you’re offering is not a solution at all. That’s why despite all of the social shaming and whatnot that humans have engaged in for century after century, regardless of the spikes and valleys in any graphical representation that you want to present on the matter, people still rebel against societal norms at a cost to society all the time. That, too, is part of human nature.

So it sounds to me that you want to encourage one aspect of human nature in an attempt to eradicate another part of it. We are imperfect beings destined to fail at many things. Fitting into some pre-conceived, normative version of society is one of the things that humans are destined to fail at, regardless of the cost of those failures to society.

I don’t have the answers. I don’t even know what the problem is anymore that we’re attempting to solve. Does shaming of people help eradicate social ills? No, of course not. Because those ills still exist today, period. Do we shame people less often for violating certain social rules? I don’t know, I really don’t know. That is something that is totally unquantifiable. You could point to some website about “fat acceptance” or whatever as proof one way and I could point to this website or the explosion of the fitness industry as proof in the opposite direction.

Have we downgraded the social stigma attached to being a pregnant teen or an unwed mother of six with six different fathers? Again, totally unquantifiable. The fact that no one on here so far really finds that sort of thing acceptable is proof to me that it is NOT socially acceptable. I’ve never seen anything that indicates it is. Your example of a fictional character in a 20 year old TV show was not analogous.

So to readdress your questions, I simply don’t have the answer. What are your suggestions? [/quote]

How are you so unsure about all of this shit but dead certain that shaming is a bad idea? [/quote]

Because I work with people every day who have been victimized by shaming of one sort or another. I’ve been shamed for certain types of behavior in the past as well. I’m a recovering alcoholic and drug addict. I work with people in recovery all the time. You know what happens to a lot of people who are shamed? They try to find other ways to fit in that don’t work, or they bury the embarrassment they feel under whatever makes them feel good. For many people, what makes them feel good is exactly what they are shamed for in the first place.

I don’t come across people who got sober because someone else shamed them into it. It’s when they become completely ashamed of themselves that the light starts to flicker in their head. When people engage in behavior that is clearly not good for them or those around them, that is problematic, but the fact is that they do so anyways. It’s an escape, it’s something to bury whatever else is going on or it’s simply an addiction, which food can be and is to many obese people. They do it despite evidence that it is bad because it makes them FEEL good. So when you make someone feel bad, they are going to seek out what makes them feel good, no matter what that is and regardless of the later repercussions.

For obese people, it is food. For me, it was cocaine and booze. I was shamed by my family on a pretty regular basis for being a drug addict and a drunkard. DId it stop me from engaging in that sort of behavior? No, if anything it further exacerbated it. It wasn’t until I found people who were into solution-based approaches to my problems that I got better.

None of those people were telling me that my behavior was OK even though none of them even came close to shaming me for who I had become. THAT is the distinction you seem to be missing. By shaming people, all we do is tell them that there is something wrong with them, when the only problem is their behavior, not who they are as people. When you tell someone that the person they are is a fat-ass and a drain on the economy or a worthless coke head and they start to BELIEVE that that is what they are, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

When you tell someone that they don’t have to be that sort of a person and then offer an alternative, a plan of action, is when the real difference is made. Most of the people who the participants in this thread would want to shame are well aware of the true nature of their behavior. But they need help, real help. That’s just the way it is. When left to figure things out on their own, they end up fat, or addicted, or perpetually drunk or pregnant at 15. These are people that clearly don’t make the best decisions when left to their own devices. So they need help from others.

They don’t need people to say “you’re a lazy, fat piece of shit who is draining our economy”. They pretty much already know that and it doesn’t make them feel good at all. Given that, why WOULDN’T they gravitate toward the whole “fat acceptance” movement that is allegedly sweeping over this country? They don’t need people to remind them of what they already know deep down inside. They need people to show them a solution, a way out. Shaming people doesn’t do that at all and in many cases buries them further in their own problems.[/quote]

Wasn’t it you who said bullying was no big deal?

I’m not trying to play gotcha, I actually may be remembering wrong.
[/quote]

No, I never said anything like that. If I said anything along those lines at all it was probably overly satirical in nature.

[Cortes]

My (tentative) final word on the subject: Shame doesn’t have to necessarily be verbal, or vituperative, or even conscious.

But what we have now is a complete reversal of standards that have been considered normal for basically the whole of human history.

We have ever younger girls who are encouraged by social media to indulge in their natural inclination to narcissism, posting photo after photo of themselves in provocative, sometimes downright pornographic photos. They are hooted and go-girled and encouraged by their friends, male and female, and rewarded for degrading themselves. We have sexual predators capitalizing upon this, encouraging these same girls, some of them not yet even teenagers, to strip and dance and pose and expose themselves; and sometimes, to meet up.

We have girls who should not be considered sexually attractive by any rational standard posting pouty mouthed pictures of themselves flaunting their bare, drooping potbellies and exposed ass-cracks, brimming with adipose. They too, cheered and rewarded with comments like, “Sexy mama!” “Lookin hawt!” and “Moar!!1!”

We have a society where people are afraid to criticize ANY act or lifestyle for fear of being branded as “hateful” and “bigoted,” and who are screamed and shamed to Coventry by the current mob, who’s motto is “Anything-goes, so long as we says soes.”

One thing that appears to have been forgotten in this thread is that shame is the necessary counterpart to humility. And now that the former has all but disappeared, so too the latter.