the fundamental thesis of looksmaxxers has been unchallenged since they first emerged, and i imagine it'll stay that way. i see transgender people (women especially) and looksmaxxers as holding common ground mainly on the fact that our existences are both centered around adaptation and external appearance as necessary to our survival. for the looksmaxxer, looking good allows him to be his authentic socially awkward self without immediately being outcasted. for the transgender woman, looking good keeps her from being written off without even being given the opportunity to express herself in any capacity whatsoever.

it's proven by anecdotal experience and at scale. it's undeniable. you can say it's immoral (whatever that means), that society shouldn't function this way, but it simply does. if you want to get special privileges, if you want to 'rise above' the bare minimum level of treatment people 'like you' can expect, one of the quickest and most immediately visible ways to do this is by having sex appeal and appearing attractive and confident.

@cyb3rm0shp1t this is a trap and a way to accept things "just so". it's true that people are shallow and looks matter to social existence but applying it reductively is exactly what leads to the current of transfeminine pessimism that is so present. behind the veneer of practical truth that we are asked to coldly accept is fascising body politics, eugenicism, white supremacy and an investment in spectacular society. these things do not reproduce themselves from nowhere.

@cyb3rm0shp1t there's nothing authentic about it either, the looksmaxxing people are people we view not even just through the lens of a camera at whatever pageant their handlers and marketeers think of next, but then filtered through discourse and controversy. i do find it interesting but in a way where there's a deliberate irony to the whole thing, a campness in the maintained kayfabe of it all and an experiment in influence and virality. a research experiment for psychological warfare

@winterklaus im not sure that anyone has a defined blueprint for resisting the allure of the spectacular society, though, especially for people whose quality of life drops dramatically the less spectacle they participate in (down from an already low quality of life compared to the average.) i dont think the path forward looks like a refusal to accept and participate in the fundamental drivers and rules of society. i think if we make ourselves meaningless, if we refuse to appear meaningful, we'll continue to be treated as such forever, and we'll be the ones who suffer most from it

@cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus it's kind of difficult to advocate this when the systems that produce meaning are rooted in and cyclically perpetuate oppression and murder . but it's also true that our alternative is kind of to resign ourselves to don't-existence and the social death it results in . i have yet to see someone suggesting a viable model for surviving don't-existence besides hard separatism which has a lot of obvious problems

@cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus participation in spectacle is not the same thing as participation in society. Evidently just about everyone who isn't privileged by the spectacle is better off not engaging with it. Everyone that's not participant in the spectacularly mediated images of the red scare, corporate queerhood etc is far better equipped for surviving on this planet right now than those who are.

lowkirk the way zoomers appropriated the image of kirk getting capped is one of the most successful instances of detournement of current year

@cyb3rm0shp1t people treat you better if they like you

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus wait they appropriated the image? how??
not looked at zoomer memes, just seen the phrase 'lowkirk' flung around a lot

@emilis people are drawn to and appreciate hot + confident people more easily than ugly + insecure people

@cyb3rm0shp1t This is true, and looksmaxxers aren't super wrong about their analysis but I think it is possible to aspire to established ideals in some respects while opening up possibilities for different conceptions of attractive and beauty in others. Especially for these looksmaxxer types, they awaken something very maternal in me and I just want to tell them that while it's generally positive to be fit and cut, that there's also a place for nerdy guys and that there's niches where their weirdness might not just be accepted but appreciated.

@wyatt @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus With the exception of the zoomers that had already fallen for the tpusa op _none_ of them were having it with the official narrative of condemnation of the act and kirky mourning and "you have to be respectful" shit. The stupid ass face he was making the second before he got shot became a normie meme before he was even publicly announced dead.

I remember the timeline so clearly... someone poasted that kirky got shot and was in the hospital and I was playing with my hitachi magic wand and then they said he was dead and the world collectively said lol

@cyb3rm0shp1t it's just simply not true that refusing to abide by this bullshit amounts to an unworkable divestment from society. it's falsehoods and truisms that present themselves as utterly necessary. I'm not even saying to so nobly refuse service in favour of some non-extant alternative. I am in favour of approaching appearances constructively for pragmatic means - it's true that it has plenty of benefits in this world. that needn't come with a total submission to the ideological assumptions that go with it. It's a false kind of master morality, seizing a constrained and necessarily limited kind of power or value

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t what is this from sis am unaware of it

@winterklaus @cyb3rm0shp1t henry flynt blueprint for a higher civilization

@corpsedoll @winterklaus i think i should read this before engaging further in discussions ... i am ignorant of this

@cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus It would be more useful to prioritize picrel

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus this whole discussion seems to be closely related with the politics of queer visibility , which is a whole can of worms , and more granularly with the issue of passing which is obviously also controversial . but i'm not super well acquainted with the literature and discussions of visibility . it also seems to be related to the idea of optics in activism .
from what maive's said that i have agreed with i think the importance of spectacle has been misplaced

@ikeWren @corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t visibility and optics are both highly entangled in this but also have their own dimensions. i haven't quite found the words required to situate what I am thinking of wrt navigating spectacular politics in this moment and context. pulling apart the ideas and images that are put before us and being willing to see how they are discrete objects acting on a preexisting field of desire and to be able to assess them in those moments of replication where we are otherwise asked to accept that what is being spoken of or presented is Just So... it takes a level of paranoia where u have to always ask what is behind things or otherwise curse yourself to divestment (as discourse traps are part of the game)

@ikeWren @corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t what scares me is we have been full throttle towards a world where petty superficial bullshit IS infact becoming more important on a lot of levels of seeming, to the point where it becomes necessary to have the tools to navigate that with the right amount of investment and dispassion but I think being able to speak on these terms entirely requires being able to place yourself above or outside it.

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t (skimming a bit for now I should return to it if I'm more capable of focus later) wow we got situ-esque incel theory? this seems like it could b critically useful

@cyb3rm0shp1t i dont see it that way at all, i think the looksmaxxing is a misogynist anxiety project by design. these people rag on women for being the tinniest bit assymetrical when they look fine.

looks do not get you everything even remotely, and structural loneliness looms far beyond the individual. fhere was a stream clip where they told elliott rodger he looks incredibly attractive but i think its lost now. but a woman basically said he looked really nice and just has to dress a bit better.

@winterklaus @corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t paranoia is exhausting -.-

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @ikeWren anyways at risk of rambling too much possibly a happier position to take would b that if we do want to see a certain kind of value in self-image construction with necessary critical caveats or whatever,, sistercommunism is refusing to see each other as competitors in an imagemarket and partaking in acts of care and production of the self communally

@cyb3rm0shp1t and one other thing i think people take for granted is that theres a specific kind of person that upends the entire project of 'looking nice' in public. literally like, sad burn victims and shit like that. theres a sensitivity that can divorce people from the vanity play sometimes.

a large part of how people judge you is based on how youre dress and hair looks, your makeup work, your mood. men dont like wearing makeup (even though im pretty sure clavicular literally does wear it iirc). men dont enjoy being in a cooperative and boisterous mood. men dont style their hair (unless they are black, and black dudes with dreads and such are genuinely noticably more self confident). there is a reason why people like Quentein Tarintino and Orson Welles have these big personalities, because in order to be a director people care aboout you unirionically have to work on yourself and your self presentation, so you see what a cooperative and friendly white guy looks like. its an anomaly we take for granted a lot of the time.

@winterklaus @cyb3rm0shp1t flynt is the GOAT

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t u rly can't go wrong reading random shit off monoskop sometimes fr fr

@winterklaus @cyb3rm0shp1t here's a soundtrack to go with it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBiLeTVieSQ

and here is all you need to know about mr flynt https://www.henryflynt.org/

and also https://lo2.org/pdf/people/henry_flynt/

@winterklaus @cyb3rm0shp1t i mean you can basically go anywhere you want in your pajamas now. people just dont care. the world got a lot more arbitrary about these things. if a politician wanted to, they could do speechs while wearing their pajamas and nobody would care. its all very *waves my hand in a circle*...you know.

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus looking into this . (delusionally) im kinda like this guy if he were a trans lesbian

@ikeWren @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus here, you want https://lo2.org/pdf/people/henry_flynt/personhoods_self_cancellation.pdf

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus 10 words in and holy shit yeah i love this . i'll see about reading this properly on my break later

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t wait I swear I have heard this recently and forgot, or something that samples it

@Erato_Heti @winterklaus @cyb3rm0shp1t the way tattoos have just become acceptable too

@cyb3rm0shp1t everybody seems to forget that just because something is a social construct, or shouldn't exist, it doesn't mean that it doesn't

@morrigan @Erato_Heti @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus when I'm running to be mayoral dictator of Portland I'll have my tattoos visible and only ever do speeches in pajamas

@morrigan @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus the ubiquity of tattoos does sorta get to me sometimes since i dont have any tattoos or piercings and that gives me a bit of identity fomo as i approach 30. i just think i dont have a very cosmetic relationship to my body outside of thinking 'yeah i need to style my hair up a bit better and get laser for my face'. as much as i speak from a stance of authority i think in many ways im just very unplugged from all of this. i walk around the house in my boxers and will have full serious thoughtful discussions because it doesnt matter to me at all.

@morrigan @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus im an ordinary vessel from which occasional insight spills out of accidentally i just dont see a point in trying to put too much prestiege on top of that. its sort of pointless. a lot of physically being around in the world is a little pointless. its hard to explain.

@cyb3rm0shp1t @morrigan @winterklaus i am flanked by all sides by the bells and whistles brigade. but i dont want the noise, I dont want the parade, its all kaput.

@Erato_Heti @morrigan @cyb3rm0shp1t my frustration with all this is partially never having been very good at any of this having a body stuff... though at the same time I'm v much shooting for this late 20s to early 30s glowup of becoming a cool tatted up alt dyke woman

@Erato_Heti @cyb3rm0shp1t @morrigan @winterklaus youre so real for this i feel this exact way

@fiore @Erato_Heti @cyb3rm0shp1t @morrigan @winterklaus same

i wanna get a bunch of lil simplistic tattoos

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus i really like how he's constantly like "it could be this or not idk. maybe this is a good argument or maybe i look insane" . unbelievably real

@corpsedoll @cyb3rm0shp1t @winterklaus oh my god this guy fucking gets it. he fucking gets it