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Comment count is 53
fedex - 2015-03-17

"Thinking you are owed something for not being an asshole...makes you an asshole."


Perfectly put.


simon666 - 2015-03-17

While I agree with the sentiment, or spirit, of what the performers are saying my sense is that their subject, i.e., guys who complain about being in the friend zone, is a strawman. Maybe there are guys just like they describe, though I've never come across them, and if there are such guys I think they are likely a minority of those who might complain about being 'friend zoned.'

The term 'friend zone' seems to be getting at the following situation: One has a romantic interest in another, but comes to find out the other is interested in only friendship, and this might be a disappointing to one.

Being romantically interested in someone is not wrong in itself nor does it entail everything these performers attribute to their subject. No doubt if there were such a subject, he'd be an ass and perhaps worthy of ridicule. However, because I think most people who use the term 'friend zone' do so simply to characterize when a romantic interest is reciprocated, I thus think the performers are largely dealing with a strawman. I might even go as far as saying these performers are not interested in tackling the issue of their subject through the slam poetry form, but rather are interested in expressing an attitude they know will draw praise from their peers, ergo my 'preaching to the choir' tag.


simon666 - 2015-03-17

Correction in caps: "...when a romantic interest NOT is reciprocated..."


TeenerTot - 2015-03-17

Believe it or not, I am a female.
I get that the poem is shorthand for those of us who have experienced this. If you've never dealt with these entitled guys, lucky you. But it doesn't make what they say less true to so very many of us.


That guy - 2015-03-17

fedex, TeenerTot, how the fuck is this what you want to talk about for this video? Is this fucking tumblr?

the fuck


FABIO - 2015-03-17

Constantly harping on people for being assholes without any shred of empathy, or even a desire to actually change things for the better other than continuing to wade in the haze of your own righteous farts...makes you an asshole.

These people are like aggressive militant atheists. It doesn't matter how backward and misguided their target it, they're still assholes whose only concern is forever feeling superior.


simon666 - 2015-03-17

TeenerTot: I'm sorry you've experienced unwanted attention and aggression. My point wasn't to say that such behavior doesn't exist, it does, of course, and should not be tolerated--I tried to suggest so much in two places in my comment.

My point, to put it another way, is that the term 'friend zone' casts too wide a net; men who are assholes to women when their romantic interest is not reciprocated may in fact use the terms 'friend zone' when complaining about women not reciprocating their advances, but not all men who use the shorthand 'friend zone' are such assholes. Anecdotally, I've only seen the term 'friend zone' used playfully and to laugh at oneself on sites such as imgur and reddit.

Rhetorically, for the performers, it's better to frame their critique of asshole men as users of the term 'friend zone,' it is a topical and hip meme phrasing akin to 'I just can't even.' Nevertheless, I'm wary of any language that paints in too wide a strokes. By lumping the 'good' men who use 'friend zone' as an honest and silly lament with the 'bad' men who are assholes and use 'friend zone' in a pejorative sense towards women, we throw the baby out with the bath water; social critique, in my view anyway, should cut like a scalpel, identifying bad acts and bad moral judgments separately from good acts and neutral or good moral judgments.

I agree with the spirit of the performers, just not the execution. It doesn't convince bad men to behave better, only reinforces an existing disgust for these badly behaving men.

Anyway, I'd like to end by saying again that it's rotten you've experienced what you have and you shouldn't be treated in such a way. And if performance like this actually do help stop that behavior, then I'm willing to take it back and shut up.


Xenocide - 2015-03-17

That "IS THIS TUMBLR" response you see every time a woman on the internet is having an opinion is so telling.

It's almost like this sort of discussion makes some guys so uncomfortable that you want to segregate it away to one specific site so you never have to think about it. And then when someone breaks that imaginary rule it's like "WHOA LADIES we already gave you a website where you can talk about all your little problems, okay?"

Well, the joke's on you. Tumblr is for Doctor Who gifs. That's all they allow on there anymore. One time I posted a Star Trek gif and some guys came to my house.


TeenerTot - 2015-03-17

Simon:
"I've only seen the term 'friend zone' used playfully and to laugh at oneself on sites such as imgur and reddit."
There's the root of our different views. Anecdotally, the only "friend zone" I've ever heard used is in the worst, entitled dude sense.
"I agree with the spirit of the performers, just not the execution."
Fair enough. I'm not here to tell anyone to like this. I just wanted to say "Yup. That's happened to me."


Bort - 2015-03-17

I have to say, I've heard enough scary stories to realize there are men who do go off the deep end, and you can't always tell. The tale that sticks with me the most is the woman who kept asking to be let out of the car because the driver had gone into an angry rant about women always misleading men -- sweet baby Jesus, I am so grateful I've never been on the receiving end of that sort of insanity, where you don't know which of a dozen violent ends could be looming.

Seriously, it's something that, as a guy, I never really have to worry about: the pleasant person next to me isn't going to suddenly lose his mind and turn into an animal completely indifferent to boundaries and my rights as a person. How do you even function in society where that can happen (infrequently, yet all too often)?


That guy - 2015-03-17

If you don't see that this is bad rhetoric and bad art, it can only be because you're full-time trying to figure out who's on "your team" and who is not.

The fact that on poetv, two people in the first thread watched this artistic and rhetorical shit-show, and had the first reaction that "This is an important issue" and not "This is the worst shit I have ever seen" grants me the right and the fucking duty to tell them to take that kind of fucktarded bullshit over to some site where signing up for teamsin the echo-chamber league is more important than noticing what's a cesspool, plugging your nose, and laughing. This is a cesspool of rhetoric and art, where ideas and the skilful language are held under for 3:27.

Were the two pieces of shit in the video they the first people to notice that a guy who's a total asshole does things in an assholish way, including how he laments about the friend zone?? Or are they just using that fact to shit out "poetry" with forced, fucktarded liberal indignation that makes other, more important liberal issues guilty by association with these extremist turdburgers?
By 'important', yes I am implying that some kinds of equality, liberty, justice, etc are more important than others. But if you want to champion this one be my guest.

If this was about the issue of some men harassing women past all respect, I would not object. That's not what this is about, and since I have nothing better to do, I will prove it.

A real big fat fucking clue that this is a safe target is the typical response that no one's "allowed" to point out their rhetorical bullshit because it's said they are splitting hairs on a women's issue. Another fucking clue is that the target is straight men. So gross overstatement is allowed on the 'liberal' side, and it's called 'mansplaining' back the other way.
By the time any political movement disallows all objections to their rhetoric with more cheap rhetoric, they've left the center and all they're doing is building a metaphysical castle in the air.
MRA shitheels aside, saying "not all men" does count when one side is constantly rhetorically implying "all men" because they have tendentious metaphysics / group-think as their goal.

0:00-0:33 the set up shows gross insensitivity toward other human beings, and yet I'm sure the 2 fartists call themselves liberal. If you don't recognize hard-left bullshit when you see it, you're being tendentious as fuck.
They have drawn the overly broad circle of "guys who don't like to be friend-zoned", not "shitty guys who use this as an excuse to for specific bad behavior". At no point do they specify that they're talking about harassers only.

0:34-44
Personal feelings of frustration or disappointment in starting relationships are 'precluded because of the injustices of patriarchy and entitlement'. What this rhetoric implies is fairly fucking dangerous: group guilt and vilification. Furthermore, "straight male needs = wanting sex only objectification = bad". (We all know how everyone else's "needs = good" cashes out in this kind of campusy left-of-thou way of thinking).

0:45-0:53 further elaboration that "if a guy doesn't like to be friend-zoned, then he's in it for only sex (bad), and he' thinks he's entitled to it."
But what percentage of guys actually think that, and act like, they are automatically owed sex because they are a nice friend to a girl? Where the fuck do you live that 98% of guys aren't taking no for an answer?
To their argument it doesn't matter what percentage does this, because their group v. group metaphysic always applies. This isn't an especially dangerous kind of political extremism at present, but it's absolutely extremism.

0:54-1:13 "mansplaining" nice dismissal. Identity politics.

Apparently it's not human to lament that you want someone who doesn't want you back, it's wrong to try to change that person's mind, and the only emotion at play here is lust, which is evil if you're a straight male, of course.
[The only valid issue here is someone repeatedly trying to convince someone to start a relationship past the point of respect, which is a kind of harassment that I am sure plenty of people do. I'm not discounting that. This point is the only one in 3:27 and it's not what the speech is about.]

1:14-2:08
"Who doesn't like to be put in something called the friend zone?" is such a wit-without-wisdom straw-man argument that it barely requires rebuttal.
Are people generally content with unreciprocal affection?

2:09-2:50
da fuq?

2:51-3:17
"If real friendship is somehow disappointing"
same straw-man as above, w/ implicit the false equivilency of "real friendship vs that false thing you wanted"

"THEN NOBODY WANTS YOUR ASS IN THE FRIEND ZONE, ANYWAY" - here and mentioned somewhat throughout, is this nice little audience-pander. Rhetorically it does not say "If you're going to harass me, we're no longer friends". It says "I am the high-status one who is gonna be tough about how you can't have me, deal with your place or be isolated" and it has a nicely implied 'friend with feelings bad, me good top dog'.
This seems to me to be a shitty first approach to deal with the feelings of a friend whom you have decided isn't worthy of your lust or love. IF they had made a case that they were talking about assholes who won't leave someone alone, this wouldn't matter, but they never do so. This is about empowerment, and like so many other empowerment issues, it is entirely incautious with limits or duties to others:
It lumps together how a woman should treat 2 very different friend zone guys:
1) the pushy asshole who won't ever stop and she shouldn't be friends with anyway- a lot of pushback or an ended friendship is justified as hell here
2) a friend who made a (possibly drunk and/or awkward) pass/text whom you don't fancy- "I'm better than you, deal with that shit"
This is what the 'preaching to the choir' tag is pointed at. You the audience of this poetry slam get to join in on the "OH YEAH? FUCK YOU" overreaction to a friend who wants you. That's pure, blinkered empowerment when some sensitivity could be called for- maybe give a male friend of yours the benefit of the doubt that he can step back his interest?? It's not always an affront, right.....? Or does 'patriarchy' and 'entitlement' make men just walking offenders all the time?
"He made a pass and I'm not interested" surely can't equal "He's an inappropriate sexist" ALL of the time, right?

Where is the responsibility of judgment for women who make friends with guys who won't take no for an answer?

Again, the rhetorical net hasn't been cast merely over all guys who harass, it's been cast about all guys who *complain* about this, because you can just drop the 'patriarchy' trump card on them and they're BAD.


About the art side of this "poetry slam", little needs to be said. Allowing that someone can call something poetry without it having verse or rhyme, all that's really left is rhetoric, economy of language and most of all, metaphor. The metaphors in this shit are very few, and very shitty.

Christ, if someone is harassing you, end the friendship and consider legal steps. That's still not an excuse for this video and the shit in it.


fedex - 2015-03-17

ohhhh, now I see. You ARE that guy.


Bobonne - 2015-03-17

yeah, the name isn't ironic


That guy - 2015-03-17

meanwhile, you assholes think this video makes a pretty good point


Nominal - 2015-03-17

Wait I'm confused. The video applauds a simplistic attitude of blanket vilification and contempt while That Guy lays out detailed points why that's a dangerous mindset, and That Guy is the hateful asshole?

Please point out the verse in the poem that calls for mutual love and respect. From where I sit, these people don't care about anything but polarizing and radical hatred. Casting the net as wide as they do makes them no better than the men who claim all women are gold digging whores.


Potrod - 2015-03-18

You don't need to even analyze the video that deeply to tell that the performance and performers are dogshit. Just look at the guy's face in the preload image.

But basically, "preaching to the choir," "strawman," and "topical and hip meme" are the key phrases here. Also, not just tumblr, but the entire internet is one big retarded echochamber, which is how "nice guys/friend zone" gets named and codified into this extremely specific thing. I'm sure this will show up on boingboing or something.


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

OH


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

FOR


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

FUCK'S


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

SAKE


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

YOU


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

PEOPLE


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

(except for Nominal, who is both right AND expended the bare minimum effort)


Nominal - 2015-03-18

*holds up bare minimal effort trophy*


asian hick - 2015-03-18

That guy is really fucking angry that people want to talk about things he doesn't want to talk about.


That guy - 2015-03-19

That's a nice conclusion there, asian hick, nice and campusy.
See you in discussion section.

Do you think that, generally speaking, 'complaining about being put in the friend zone' = harassment? Just generally- allowing for exceptions- unlike the motherfucking retards who made this forced-indignant work of fart. Is the complaint, on the face of it, harassment?
Listen to the fucking fucktarded message. They're not talking about creeps only. They didn't say nasty co-workers who don't know that no means no. Don't try to figure out what you want them to have meant to have said.
HEAR WHAT THEY SAID.

Let me ask you what you've done on both sides of this issue:

A) Have you been cautious as hell when you are forced to friend-zone a FRIEND, who MAY have some objections that you don't want to ACCEPT them (love, fuck, whatever)- objections that they're not ready to let go of the minute you tell them?
Or have you based your reaction on identity politics? Sensitive as all fuck, unless it's a straight male, right?

Which of you is actually sick enough to deal with this situation as suggested by these turds on legs?

B) How have you felt when you have finally made the pass at a friend and been rebuffed? Did you never want to know why and/or convince that person? Is that harassment right off the mark, while your heart is fucking breaking, or is it more fucking nuanced than that?

Do you not get the social issue that is inherent in this speech? That straight male feelings don't count because they're always bad, because they're all the same creeps?
"You are allowed to paint in broad strokes when dealing with the other group" is what every group of assholes ever believes. It's what you hate about conservatives.
Recognize.

In the broad view, on the few occasions that this kind of hard-left thinking gets enough power to do their will, they do genuine fucking evil on people. Fuck you if you doubt that.

Art and rhetoric matter. Stop trying to guess who's on your team in the most retarded binary ways, you fucking assholes.

Have some fucking nuance, or you're just playing the same goddamn game that Fox News is playing, but for the other team. If you want to play that sport, please kill yourself, asshole. I don't care if you're on a slightly higher moral horse than conservatives if you're also a fucking knee-jerk, oblivious bigot.

Liberal shit also stinks and also belongs in the fucking toilet.
I'm fucking disappointed in this site for not recognizing this when it comes up here.


fedex - 2015-03-19

Time to lower your standards and/or get used to disappointment


asian hick - 2015-03-22

What was her name?


Bort - 2015-03-17

Why do I get the sense that, at least on this video, it's less about having legitimate complaints about "nice guys" and more about finding some group to hold in contempt without even the tiniest mote of empathy?

I still stay there's a spectrum of "nice guys", and while some exist who are exactly as described by these poetry slammers, a great many more have simply bought into what every TV show, movie, and afterschool special since forever have taught them: be yourself and people (including women) will see your inner charm and like you for you. When it doesn't work out quite like that for any number of reasons, they misdiagnose the problem. That doesn't make them monsters, just misinformed more than anything.

Now those who plunge straight into misogyny, that's another matter. But most of them are following a bad map, getting lost, and are frustrated that every step forward seems to get them more lost. A better set of directions is more likely to do some good than scorn.

Plus, there are probably a great many of them who have self-esteem issues -- imagine that, being socially inept tracking with feeling like shit -- and I bet most of them don't want to get laid, so much as receive validation that they are worth some other person's time. Not the greatest reason to look for a relationship, but again, it doesn't make them monsters either.

Nevertheless, since we can't rip on the gays any longer, we've got to find a new target for our collective abuse, amirite?


Meerkat - 2015-03-17

I think part of the problem is that society constantly reinforces the idea that you need a romantic partner to be validated.

"You're such a nice guy, you deserve a great woman." "Oh? Well what about you?" "Oh, uh, I'm uh, busy."

The point is nobody deserves a great woman or a nice guy or anything else for that matter. You don't ask, you don't get. There are many who don't really need someone else's validation and are perfectly happy if everyone would just leave me the fuck alone and stop trying to set me up with chicks they met in the drunk tank when they got arrested for DUI or whatever the fuck


badideasinaction - 2015-03-17

First off, let's make this clear: it's wrong to get angry at someone because throwing stuff/favors at them doesn't result in a relationship. You're allowed to be upset, hurt, angry at yourself etc. but that's not their fault. Nobody's obligated to date you, whether their reasons are shallow or not. Period.

However...

I've known plenty of people who openly admit to playing oblivious to someone's affections because the person in question is useful to them, and are happy to leverage the fact that the person is too shy to ask directly and is hoping for some sort of sign from the other person. In the meantime they're happy to accept gifts, services, attention etc.

The people in the former group need to learn the lesson of why the friendzone is bullshit. The people in the latter group need to stop using the friendzone rant when the person they've been using finally wises up and stops giving them stuff, and now they want to use that person's self-esteem as a punching bag.


Nominal - 2015-03-17

I remember that "m'lady" clip that was posted here where two women are complaining about the hordes of disgusting hobbit neckbeard fedoras who try to friend their way into fucking them, but also go on how they're useful for free drinks and 0 iPhone gifts. People in the comments (here, not youtube) were seriously saying, "What's the matter friends give each other gifts all the time obviously you don't have any!"

No decent person would accept expensive gifts from an unrequited suitor.


TeenerTot - 2015-03-17

Yeah. It's a shitty thing to use someone, knowing you've got a hold on them. I know a gal who does that as a habit. Sorry about that, guys. But I DID warn you about her.


badideasinaction - 2015-03-17

What it comes down to it people are selfish in the base sense - they can only see the world through their own eyes. It's not men, it's not women, it's just what people in general do.

The stereotype of the guy throwing money/time at the girl who won't date him is just the flip side of the stereotype of the girl repeatedly sleeping with the guy who won't commit to her; in both cases, one side is failing to realize is the other side already getting what they want, so why would they need to commit? And to top it off, the person getting what they want is probably convinced they're doing the other side a favor, and will get angry when they stop getting free stuff.


Bort - 2015-03-17

According to an awful lot of movies and TV, the key to winning over a woman who initially isn't interested is, of all things, persistence. Keep at it, don't let up, sooner or later she'll decide to let down that wall she has inexplicably been keeping between herself and you.

... What in the hell. WHAT IN THE HELL.


Nominal - 2015-03-17

John Hughes movies ruined an entire generation.


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-18

"No decent person would accept expensive gifts from an unrequited suitor."

Yet the two necessary parties seem to be so good at finding one another. I've seen it happen way too many times.


Think about how much publicity the reactionary Tumblr tone police have given the Reddit He Man Woman Haters Club and vice versa.

Think about the actual, real, serious social issues that are buried deep under the horseshit coming from everyone involved, regardless of what side they've chosen.


badideasinaction - 2015-03-18

I agree, there are substantive issues to discuss and debate but the rhetoric formed by both sides' echo chambers isn't helping; it's akin to someone walking up with a baseball bat in hand and saying they "just want to have a discussion". Any discussion falls to partisan hackery, inflammatory statements and threats.

In other words This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Talks, alongside conspiracy theory rhetoric, doxing/internet dogpiles , threats etc.


Prickly Pete - 2015-03-17

That dude's just trying to fuck her.


Bort - 2015-03-17

BTW I answered your linguistic history question over on that Bryan Fischer video; linguistics has a pretty definitive model of how language evolved and spread across Europe and Asia, Google for "Proto Indo European" to learn more about the language families most familiar to us.


Prickly Pete - 2015-03-17

Oh holy shit, I forgot about that. Good lookin out.


Bort - 2015-03-17

It's got me reading up on PIE and I'm discovering fun stuff as I go along. Guess which modern language is closest to the original Proto Indo European? Go ahead and guess. And you're correct, that language is Lithuanian!

http://www.lituanus.org/1969/69_3_02.htm


Caminante Nocturno - 2015-03-17

These people are utterly useless and a needless burden on society.


Caminante Nocturno - 2015-03-17

I do love that preload image, though.


Bort - 2015-03-17

Hey, is that her again?

http://www.poetv.com/video.php?vid=133219


Chancho - 2015-03-19

You are a pedophile with yellow fever so your opinions are invalid.

But yeah, poetry slams are awful.


Old_Zircon - 2015-03-17

This has even less to do with poetry than normal slam poetry does.


jreid - 2015-03-17

I'm going to do a poetry slam where I silently shit myself on stage while musically accompanied by an ironic trap+throat-singing mashup.


fedex - 2015-03-17

where can I get tickets?!


Caminante Nocturno - 2015-03-18

Don't forget to dress like you rolled through a pile of dirty laundry.


TeenerTot - 2015-03-18

I'm there.


Unmerciful Crushing Force - 2015-03-18

I gotta level with you poetv. I'm listening to this on some decent headphones and I could understand hardly a word these two warbled or screeched out.


Chancho - 2015-03-19

Me too, but I'm pretty sure they are repeating a bunch of jibber-jabber they found on the internet.


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