I’m just a little poster on the SDMB. This, to me, was the smallest, meanest article Cecil (Ed) has ever written.
Put it this way…if the person with the query was so “dumb,” then why are there umpteen studies looking at, essentially, the same question/idea? Honestly, I’d expect less vitriol from, say, Dan Savage.
This is not to say that I don’t understand why “Cecil” made a snide remark, just that it wasn’t necessary. It’s really a good question at heart (says someone who identifies as strongly bisexual, or very weakly heterosexual, if that matters).
Yes, I also noticed that going through the cited studies. I’m sorry Bailey and J. Michael writing for the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, I guess you are complete dumbshits.
I’m sure evolution has given us much diversity with sexuality. What role the environment further plays, further complicates things. Gosh, looking at qazwart’s post, I had no idea there was that much diversity.
Others have noted, judging from the bib that Una Persson supplied for Cecil’s article, he, and I assume his advisory board went through 15 sources before Cecil referred to his questioner as a complete dumbshit for asking. What kind of answer would he have provided, without researching any of this and getting this kind of help? squidfood pointed out his brilliant opening with the clever anthropologist bit, I too was expecting something else equally as clever to follow instead of what we got. Had that not been in there, we’d all been talking mostly about what the column was about, instead of that one line. It doesn’t appear it was a good move on everyone’s part to let it go out like that.
Exactly. They didn’t have to pick that question and then print it. It looks like they picked it just to be bullies.
What I’m curious about is whether people object to “complete dumbshit” absolutely, or merely consider it excessive for this particular case but might by appropriate for other situations, e.g.:
or
I thought it was a silly question just because there’s such a wide variance in what straight people like which falls outside the stereotypical ideal for their partners. Some women like boyish guys with soft features and hardly any body hair. Some dudes like women with small boobs and no curves, or statuesque women with angular faces.
It gets ugly when people are having the “hot or not” talk and someone insinuates someone else is a closet case for liking “manly women” or whatever.
It seems that the response given was a symptom of a growing trend where certain questions are not asked because it could offend. This is bad enough when people in general do it but more and more its leaked into scientific study where supposed studies only exist to confirm political biases.
We didn’t get the columns in Australia when i was a kid, but i discovered the Straight Dope in book form when i lived in Vancouver in the early 1990s, and i continued to buy the books up until i discovered the column’s online presence and this message board. Those books, especially the early ones, contain columns going back a long time.
I recognize the unreliability of human memory, but while i recall Cecil being snarky and sarcastic, i don’t ever recall him offering such a direct, nasty insult to his reader in the manner of this particular column. It was pretty unbecoming.
Exactly.
This isn’t the end of the world. I’ve called people, and been called, far worse than “complete dumbshit” right here on these boards. It just stood out like a sore thumb, is all. The first thing i thought was, “Who pissed in your cornflakes this morning?”
'Kay. It is, however, an inartistic insult and lazy to boot. I’m not upset in Ed, I’m just disappointed.
Personally, the problem I have with ‘complete dumbshit’ is that it’s not only below standards for wittiness and snark, it’s also inaccurate. The original question might come from ignorance and a limited knowledge and experience, but it’s not from stupidity, just ignorance. Enlightening the ignorant is a noble cause for which the Straight Dope is typically a shining example. Ignorance can be fixed, and someone coming with a question, no matter how ignorant a question on any topic, should be respected for trying to improve their knowledge and understanding. Cecil’s usual cutting comments typically are in response to snide questions, not sincere if uninformed (and perhaps foolish) questions.
As others have pointed out, simply add the word “some” to all the references in the original question to ‘gays’ and you pretty much have made the question more realistic.