I have very much enjoyed reading all of your thoughts and opinions. I can’t say I agree with all that much that has been said here. But I enjoyed the conversation enormously.
I am surprised that no one has addressed what I believe is the core issue here.
It seems to me that no matter where you are on the curve there is always someone else to envy or begrudge their ease and wealth. Equally there are always others who look upon your commonplace spending as extravagant.
I was raised to believe you were doing right only when you were treating a rich man no different than a poor man.
Would this person have dared to stand in judgement of an individual who spent only $12 on his clothes? Certainly not. Would you have read an implied morality into that purchase? Of course not.
Seriously, would it raise your shackels if I saw you buying a $20 CD and I said to you, “I bought my whole outfit for that much!” Sure you’d be shocked ('cause I look so snappy), maybe even appalled, but you wouldn’t get your back up in quite this fashion I don’t think. Probably you’d have laughed and said, “Well, that’s the difference between us, my friend.”
When your friend said, “you don’t know what it’s like to manage this money”, I think he was trying to say, it’s no more pleasant to be prejudged for being wealthy than to be prejudged for being poor.
Personally what get’s my panties in a twist is seeing people drive Hummers, I mean, really now, you need that much car to go to the mall?
The difference is that I know this is MY issue, and I try not to confuse it with my friends who enjoy ease.
It is folly to confuse finacial ease with freedom from difficulties. It’s real easy to say, ‘yeah, I wish I had those kinds of problems’, I for one don’t.
Y’know, until you’ve walked a mile in someone else’s shoes and all.
That and being careful what you wish for seem to cover it for me.
That’s my two cents,
…we now return you to your much more interesting conversation…
Measure for Measure, this expression in your earlier post:
is fine as long as you recognise that there is no consensus about what is “moral” or “immoral” when it comes to personal spending. There never will be; different people will always value different things, and there will always be at least some variation in people’s personal financial situations no matter how egalitarian a society we try to construct. And thus there never will be consensus about what levels of spending are “excessive” or what purchases are “frivolous”. Certainly you are free to air your opinion, but you do need to recognise that other people will then feel equally free to openly criticize your own “wasteful and extravagant” spending, and will feel just as righteous about what they’re doing as you feel.
So why bother? Instead of arguing that certain types of spending are “wasteful” and “extravagant”, why not simply work toward achieving a more equitable societal distribution of wealth (both in our own society and worldwide)? That accomplishes far more in the long run than trying to convince Mr. Rich Friend and Miss Movie Starlet that their personal spending is “wasteful” ever will.
The Federal Income Tax used to be far more progressive than it now is. There’s no reason why we can’t add additional upper-level tax brackets to the current ones to restore that lost progressivity. Then Mr. Rich (now Mr. Not-Quite-So-Rich) will have to be more careful with his money, since he won’t have so much of it. Maybe he’ll still decide to buy that $12,000 suit. Maybe he’ll decide to skip the suit and put the money toward yacht mantainance instead. Who cares? Either way he’s spending less (since he can no longer afford BOTH a $12,000 suit AND the docking fees for his yacht), and more money is now available to fund government programs that aid the poorest people.
Nearly everyone agrees that Americans don’t save enough of their personal income. The economist Paul Krugman has argued that our society ought to consider implementing a consumption tax in place of our current income tax to combat that trend. Under such a scheme, if Yosemitebabe, Alice in Wonderland, and I all go out on a $3000 shopping spree, we’ll all pay tax on our $3000 worth of consumption. No need to argue about whether Yosemitebabe’s state-of-the-art Macintosh computer, Alice’s custom-made designer outfit, or my own premium 10" telescope do or do not represent “wasteful spending”; they clearly DO represent $3000 worth of spending, and under the consumption tax will be taxed accordingly (assuming that we all actually decide to buy the $3000 items; perhaps the tax might convince one or more of us to settle for a less expensive substitution and put the rest of that money into the bank - in which case the tax has succeeded in its goal of increasing our personal savings rate).
The difference between those sorts of measures and what you and Evil Captor have been doing in this thread is that increased income taxes, luxury taxes, etc., represent a SOCIETAL decision about how much wealth and how much spending is “too much”, not merely a personal one. No one’s obligated to respect mere personal decisions; the same cannot be said for such a societal consensus. The judgments you and Evil Captor have made in this thread may make you feel all warm and righteous inside, but they alienate other people - including many people who might very well otherwise be allies in your goal of achieving a fairer society. Invoking higher principles of justice and fairness and telling me “we should change things so the wealth in our society is more evenly distributed” will have me working in favor of your proposals and contributing to your causes, even though it will cost me money; telling me “your last $3000 purchase was unnecessary and wasteful” will be more likely to elicit a punch in the nose from me than a contribution to your favorite charity.
Well, here it is, stated explicitly: you’ve got to be Ghandi to have any standards wrt how people spend their money. It’s a very comforting position for those who don’t want others judging them, and for those who don’t want to be bothered to think about such things and form standards … but to the rest of us it really is extremely silly. Of COURSE you can look at ridiculously extravagant purchases and mock them. You can develop standards: social utility, overall expense (that is, nobody NEEDS a music CD, but as a music CD costs just ten bucks, by U.S. standards it is a minor purchase that won’t have much effect on things one way or the other. It’s not a year’s income for ANYBODY.) I’m not saying this is my standard, it’s just a standard that might be adopted. There are others, like Shaw’s notion about productivity vs. consumption.
Now as to the insufficient information notion: this makes no sense as well. No reasonable person meets a person, hears a single fact about that person, then judges them for all time based on that fact even when they learn more abuot them. We change our viewpoints as new information comes along. Frex, if I learned that the popinjay in the OP spent $50,000 a year out of his $250,000 yearly income on worthwhile charities, I would revise my opinion of him upward. I would consider him a very socially responsible person with a flaw: a penchant for ridiculously expensive clothing. (BTW the numbers cited are just stuff I pulled out of the ether, so let’s not get into hairsplitting about how much is enough, hmm?)
Frankly, I see this “You cant’ judge a person until you have lived with them for several years and gotten to know everyting there is to know about them” idea to be very poor thinking. Once again, you’re evading the problem by saying that there’s this great golden horde of info we have to access before we can possibly put our brains to work. Nope. Doesn’t work that way. We go with what’s on the table. The way to counter lack of information is with more information, not with the notion that “We can’t do any thinking at all until every last fact is in.”
Some of us do it (one might say) a little too much.
Like if we were to find out that someone spent some money on porn, we might tell that person that they are a pervert and a degenerate. We could deem that any money they spend on porn is an extravagant waste, because porn has no redeeming value (because to us it doesn’t, see?). Or, we could think that other people have different quirks or priorities than we do, and so perhaps we’d just decide that maybe we’d be better off keeping silent about someone else’s personal spending habits, instead being a sanctimonious pain in the ass.
And Alice in Wonderland touched on this before—we could (well, Alice and I could, at least) get all sanctimonious about spending money to consume meat. We could give many reasons why anyone who spends money on meat, and supports the meat industry is worthy of scorn and contempt. Or, once again, we could keep silent and avoid being sanctimonious pains in the ass.
And in this instance, I think artemis has nailed it so much better: rather than trying to cherry pick which of someone else’s spending is “wasteful,” try to change the government policies or tax laws. Don’t make it so personal. Get your nose out of the individual’s personal business. People rarely appreciate it and it isn’t winning them over to your side.
But previously you said this:
The only mention of gold-plated swimming pools was from the Hearst Castle. So, I can only assume that you meant dumping the Hearst Castle, or perhaps some equally opulent place like it (to be built sometime in the future). And the million dollar paintings? We’ve discussed them here too. The names Van Gogh, I believe, came up. And you clearly state that it’s okay to “dump” the million dollar paintings. You do realize, of course, that most million dollar paintings are by people like Van Gogh. Certainly I don’t ever expect to produce a million dollar painting. So which artists’ works would we be talking about, exactly? Not mine, that’s for damned sure.
[/quote]
I said I never expressed a wish. I didn’t. I said that if getting rid of that stuff turned out to be how we could make everybody on the planet lead a minimally comfortable lifestyle, that would work for me, but that I didn’t really think it would be how we’d wind up going about it. In other words, I said, “We might have to do X in oder to reach goal Y, and that would be acceptable, but I think options z and Q will be more likely to get results.” That doesn’t constitute EXPRESSING A WISH FOR X TO HAPPEN. I honestly do not think the bling-bling of the rich constitutes more than a very tiny part of the total economy. It’s a very small drop in a very large bucket.
Actually, I have addressed this issue directly twice now but I’m going to do it a third time because your general inability to follow my other arguments leads me to believe the issue might actually be one of in comprehension on your part, rather than a cheap debating stratagem.
Let us imagine that the millions who watch the Oscars could in some way be compelled to spend a small sum of money based on how much they enjoyed the costumes. It might amount to very little on an individual basis – a penny or two per person, because I’m sure for most folks it’s just a casual thing: “Look, we get to watch the people wear the fabulous clothes, and imagine what it would feel like to be wearing those clothes, and also to mock the ones who wear the silly clothes and drool over the ones who wear the sexy clothes. It’s fun, it’s worth a penny.”
Spread over hundreds of millions of viewers, this constitutes a nice piece of coin. Value is being gotten for those clothes. The celebrities, in effect, are sharing the clothes with the audience, even if the audience members don’t directly get to wear them. The clothes benefit a LOT of people, though most benefit very indirectly from them, there’s still a benefit.
Now, when those same celebrities go out and buy a $5,000 pair of jeans and a $1,000 blouse to lounge around the house in, that’s wasteful. Nobody benefits from it but the celebrity, and they get very little benefit from it, because I doubt there’s all THAT much difference between wearing a $5,000 pair of jeans and a $30 pair of jeans, (though I have to admit I’ve never worn a $5,000 pair of jeans).
What’s more, clothes degrade in value very quickly, for the most part.
I don’t know how much more directly I can address this issue, in any event, I will respond further only if you can come up with some new idea.
Look—you’ve made it clear that you thought that Hearst Castle was a “waste” (in that Mr. Hearst built it as his own home). You’ve stated that you’d be okay with dumping the Hearst Castles of the world, and the million dollar paintings. But yet you didn’t mean it?
And people couldn’t still get that enjoyment from seeing someone wear an elegant, fancy design by Rachel Smith, recent Otis grad? At a fraction of the price spent for the high end designer outfit?
So are a multitude of items you buy. So what is your point?
But you don’t have any appreciation for elegant clothing design, or that particular designer’s designs. And you don’t know how much “benefit” these people get from their clothing, how they feel about it, and so forth. You know jack shit. Hell, I don’t either. At least not about thousand-dollar clothing. But I’m not about to tell someone else that they shouldn’t buy them, just because I wouldn’t get anything out of wearing them.
Do you want to explain to Alice in Wonderland how she’s not really benefitting from her outfits enough, even though, (presumably) there was something special about them that made her want to buy them in the first place? How is that your call to make? How do you know that she’s not benefitting from them enough, or that the other people who have purchased these items haven’t benefitted from them enough?
To some people, a cup is a cup. You drink out of them and you can buy them at WalMart for a dollar. To me, because I am into pottery and ceramics, a cup is much more, and I’d easily pay $50 or more for one that I really liked. So, even though you or someone else might not feel the same way about cups as I do, are you going to tell me that I couldn’t possibly benefit enough from an expensive cup?
Then why are you making such a big deal out of it? If you are genuinely concerned about the poor, shouldn’t you be targeting your ire at things which are of actual importance?
Very true - IF such a tax existed, those clothes would be providing social utility that would outweigh their cost. We could take that entertainment tax money and channel it toward improving the existence of the large number of desperately people on this planet. But of course such a tax doesn’t exist. So, how is the ephemeral “benefit” the audience gets from watching rich people strut their stuff on Oscar night outweigh the fact that some of those outfits cost more than a Third-World family lives on for a year? What RIGHT do we Americans have to entertain ourselves via such lavish spectacles when the money could be used to keep people in Africa from starving to death? No more right, in the end, than Mr. Rich Guy has to buy his $12,000 suit, or the OP caphis has to buy a $12,000 car. Or alternatively, just as MUCH right as Mr. Rich Guy has to buy a $12,000 suit or caphis a $12,000 car.
You can’t have it both ways. Societally-sanctioned “wastefulness” is just as evil as the individual “wastefulness” you keep condemning - and it generally has a far bigger overall effect because the dollar amounts involved are so much larger.
(BWT, I think the idea of a small “entertainment tax” to raise money for Third-World development would be an excellent idea, and a fine thing to work toward implementing. A nickel, or even a penny, taken out of every movie ticket and VHS/DVD sale would raise decidedly non-trivial amounts of cash for Third-World development projects - and it would be a far more effective way of aiding those people than yelling at the public “Spending $100 million dollars to make a movie is WASTEFUL! We should be donating that money to Oxfam instead!”)
[QUOTE=Evil Captor]
Now, when those same celebrities go out and buy a $5,000 pair of jeans and a $1,000 blouse to lounge around the house in, that’s wasteful. Nobody benefits from it but the celebrity…
[/QUOTE=Evil Captor]
Only because the way things are structured now, we don’t insist on anyone else getting benefit from it (except from whatever benefits funded by the sales taxes paid, of course). But suppose that consumption tax I mentioned in my earlier post was implemented, and Mr. Rich Person’s designer jeans purchase is generating additional tax revenue that society could use to aid the poorer and less fortunate? Then someone else besides Mr. Rich Person IS benefitting directly from that purchase. Is it OK now for Mr. Rich to buy his designer duds? If not, why not?
The only person who can say how much benefit is being derived from that purchase is the purchaser. Obviously Mr. Rich Person DOES think he’s getting thousands of dollars of benefit by wearing those clothes, or he would have gone to the Gap instead and bought an ordinary pair of Levi 501s instead.
The same thing is true of expensive paintings - if there was no difference on some level between an original Van Gogh and a poster reproduction of a Van Gogh or an Impressionist-style painting by a lesser-known artist, the art collectors wouldn’t spend $20 million dollars on a Van Gogh painting.
I think the problem isn’t that there is no benefit being derived - it’s that the benefits being derived are not benefits you personally value (such as excellent tailoring to make the clothes fit you perfectly instead of “just well enough”) or personally approve of (being able to show the world via your clothing purchases that you’re a Person of Great Importance).
Only in the same way that the “value” of a brand-new car degrades the moment you drive it off the lot and it becomes an “almost -new” car. The vehicle still works perfectly well, but the owner has just taken a huge depreciation hit because technically the car isn’t “new” any more. The same is true of designer clothes - they become less valuable on the resale market as soon as they’re worn, but in practical terms they’re still quite functional, and they generally wear better and outlast off-the-rack clothing purchased because they’re better-constructed and made with better-quality materials.
Telescopes, on the other hand, don’t degrade at all. In fact, a really good one with an excellent mirror may actually appreciate in value. The $3000 scope I recently purchased will still be perfectly usable (barring unfortunate accidents, of course) 100 years from now, and it will almost certainly be worth more (in real dollars adjusted for inflation) than it is now. So is my $3000 telescope purchase less “wasteful” than Alice in Wonderland’s $3000 clothes purchase, just because my scope won’t wear out while her clothes will?
(Bear in mind we both could have spent considerably less money and purchased a “less than custom” alternative. Alice could have bought her clothes at the mall or even a thrift store, and I could have purchased a brand-new mass-produced telescope of a similar design for about $700, or purchased a used mass-produced scope for even less.)
Neither of us, after all, NEEDS those expensive items to survive; we just want them. But then, that’s true of most of the purchases everyone in the First World makes. People don’t need CDs, books, a cup of espresso, or an evening out at the movies, either. When you try to criticize other people’s purchases using the justification that they’re “wasteful” and “unneeded”, you fall down a very slippery slope indeed.
The “damage” -if you want to call it that- from buying a $12,000 male outfit is rather diffuse, after all. I am actually less outraged by that particular act than by the suggestion that such behavior should be unilaterally off-limits to moral scrutiny. While pushing this POV, I must concede that I probably was somewhat carried away in this thread.
More generally, I usually tend to prefer victories in the policy front: strategically, it often makes sense to cede the pully pulpit to one’s ideological adversaries.
As an aside, consumption taxes tend to be regressive, although progressive variants can be imagined.
Alice
------- So, assuming Jr. has the outfit - so what? If he has a $12,000 outfit, but donates $120,000 to charities… I think he and his mom are probably in the clear from a karmic point of view.
I would say that a 10:1 charity/luxury ratio (including all luxuries, perhaps defined within one’s country using average consumption data) would be most commendable. To be a stickler, I would hope that such a person would also invest some effort into charity selection, following the examples of Gates, Soros and others.
So, if I admit having spent $5,000 on art, does that make me a better or worse person than if the $5,000 is on clothing? Just curious, you understand.
And while were discussing my spending habits, what about if I mention as a conservationist measure I donated my car to charity and now I walk and take transit. Clearly, I have no automobile expenses - does that mean I get to spend that $$ on luxury items, or do you nosey parkers have a better use for that money?
Furthermore, lets talk about meat. **yosemitebabe[/]b seems reluctant to go there, but I will. How can you justify eating meat when there are many other viable sources of protein in the world? Don’t you realize that the production of one cow puts a much greater strain on the environment than the production of alternative food sources? Do you realize that the strain limits the amount of foodstuffs available to 3rd world countries?
So - assuming you’ve eaten a burger in your life, and assuming you plan on eating another one, really where do you get off criticizing MY spending? Or, assuming you drive a car or worse yet, an SUV - where’s your logic? Really. I want to hear a justification for your position. Why should I NOT consider you immoral and unethical when you eat meat products when others starve? When you drive an auto, poluting the environment. Pony up fellas. What’s your defense?
First Alice asks, “So, if I admit having spent $5,000 on art, does that make me a better or worse person than if the $5,000 is on clothing? Just curious, you understand.”
This implies she wants my opinion.
Then she asks, “So - assuming you’ve eaten a burger in your life, and assuming you plan on eating another one, really where do you get off criticizing MY spending?”
Um, I might criticize your spending if you asked me to comment on it. Which you just did in the very same post.
But, actually (as it happens) I have not criticized Alice’s spending, despite badgering. I have only pointed out that one’s consumption has a moral dimension and that moral discourse should not be prohibited (subject to caveats stated earlier). This is really a very very minimalist position, but it seems to deeply upset some folks in this thread.
I suppose another point might be amplified: people size each other up all the time. Smart people make their judgments provisional when the quality of their information is weaker. I would characterize my stance as rather ho-hum.
As an aside, the choice between beef and soybeans is also a moral one. I would be willing to discuss this - in another thread. I commend Alice to the extent that she gives serious thought to resource allocation and the responsibilities in the various spheres of her life. If she is interested in leaving a smaller footprint on the planet, a good guide to effective (as opposed to feel-good) environmental choices is here.
Again, if somebody asked, “Is an omnivorous diet immoral?”, I would judge that to be a valid question.
Finally, when you have to repeat the same point 2 or 4 times and your previous arguments go unaddressed, perhaps it’s time to find another playground. So I confess that I am in the midst of some personal thread retirement planning.
$5,000 spent on art as investment in hopes of reselling it for $7,500 in a year or is just another way of making capital grow. $5,000 spent on a painting because you love it and want to see it hanging in your home with no intent to resell ever is pretty much the same as a $5,000 casual wear suit. Seems a bit extravagant. Buy a good quality reproduction, wear some nice clothes that don’t cost so much – you’d be surprised how easy it is to put together casual wear that looks good and so forth for just a couple of hundred dollars – or even much less! if you buy carefully. My wife has made some KILLINGS on Ebay, I tell ya!
Is this kinda like Calvin Trillin’s wife’s idea that money not spent because an item was bought on sale is found money? Having no auto expenses is a good thing in and of itself – I know a lot of people who would GLADLY give up their commute to and from work if they could find a way to do it that didn’t double or treble their commuting time.
Typically, the problem with 3rd world countries is that the people in charge of their governments would turn the place into a desert and everyone living in it into slaves if it meant they could keep sending their kids to Swiss finishing schools and living in mansions, etc. The hamburger thing is a non-starter in that respect. We’ll have to find another solution.
As I keep saying, I don’t have to be Gandhi to criticize your spending. Everyone except starving Third World kids is in a position to criticize and be criticized by others, so for criticism to exist at all, you have to ask: is this criticism reasonable? Does it make sense? Not “Does this person have any right to criticize me?”
It’s not that I think I’m a better person than you, it’s that I think my ideas are pretty much on target here.
Can and do. But why ignore the rich? Shouldn’t they benefit from my intellectual largesse as well?
You missed the whole point of my analogy. Whether or not the tax exists, the VALUE is there – value for millions of people. A $12,000 casual suit has very limited value – probably only for the owner.
I don’t remember any discussion of rights here. Sounds like a hijack, or an attempt to segue out of a losing argument.
Now you’re talking about the utility of various kinds of social spending. Once again, off the trail of relative value.
I agree. But without addressing issues such as kleptocracies and Third World attitudes about kids, it would be money wasted. We’ve tossed a lot of money into the Third World already with very little result.
Obviously, but why do I have to agree with him? Especially when I don’t.
The only thing that makes the original “worth” $20 milliion is the hope that it can be resold for $21 million. Frex, I understand that some museums actually hang very high quality reproductions in their public galleries now, to avoid theft and environmental damage to the original. Obviously, very little difference between looking at the reproduction and the original, as an aesthetic experience.
The problem is that I have always worn cheap clothes and have found them quite comfortable and durable, and cannot conceive of tailoring and materials being good enough to make a difference between a $50 outfit and a $12,000 outfit. Perhaps I am just ignorant. But I dont’ really think so. There might conceivably be a $500 casual wear outfit that’s worth every penny, but … $12,000? My eyebrows remain raised.
The issue of widespread poverty is not one that will be solved by getting rid of bling bling. This does not mean that we can’t look at ludicrous spending and laugh at it.
Ultimately, I do it out of respect for the truth. If something is wasteful and extravagant, it may not be all that useful to say it is, but one ought to be able to say it. If I were to go through the streets of Calcutta eating one bite out of a hamburger for every step I take and then incinerate that hamburger to ashes under the eyes of starving Indians lying in the street with barely the strength to lift their eyebrows, I think people should be able to say, “He certainly is wasteful and extravagant” about me. Probably they will say other things as well.
I never proposed that criticizing the lifestyles of the rich and famous will solve economic inequity, but getting people thinking about them might just get them on the track that leads to the more productive sort of thinking you cite in the rest of your thread, hmmm?
Actually, this is a pretty good point. It should be noted that I have an adult website, which I presume is why Yosemitebabe brought it up. Now, if you knew nothing else about me, you’d assume that it was what I call a “teen sex pussy” site – one of those annoying sites that clogs your browser with obscene popups whenever you visit it, and whose main content is pornographic photos and videos. You’d also assume that there would be very little content available for guests, just a tour to get you hooked.
You’d be wrong on all counts. No popups on my site. The guest portion consists primarily of essays and movie and hentai reviews (mostly of maisntream movies – my most recent review was of “Sign of the Cross”) and it’s huge. There are R-rated images from the movies and some R-rated photos, but no XXX stuff on the guest portion. The member portion consists mainly of fiction and articles. It has XXX illustrations where appropriate. It’s very different from your average “porn site” and doesn’t make as much money, but I’m comfortable with it and it does bring in some money.
When people hear I have an adult site, they assume it’s a teen sex pussy site and I’m OK with that, because it’s a reasonable assumption given just that nformation – most adult sites are teen sexy pussy sites. You’d have to learn more about my site, probably by visiting it to realize how different it is from the others. If you did so and declared it was no different from a teen sex pussy I’d think you were an idiot, but that’s about it.
When I hear that a rich person has spent $12,000 on a casual suit and that’s all I know abut them, I make certain assumptions. That’s natural. If I get to know them and learn they actually are doing great work for the poor, or are enablign great advances in science and technology, I’ll reform my opinion of them, just as a reasonable visitor to my site would reform their opinion of my site. If I stick to my original response no matter what, I’m an idiot. But I don’t blame myself for my original opinion, just as I don’t blame people for raising their eyebrows at an adultl site. People form opinions based on what’s on the table – what else can they do?
Not that I’ve uttered a criticism of it, and not that I have anything against it, per se. But if you think you can “rationalize” some of the stuff you’ve got on that site away by saying that it’s not a “teen pussy site,” then you’re seriously deluded.
Some people, a lot of people, would have a full knowledge of what’s on your site, and they’d happily and eagerly condmen it for what it is. They’d feel totally righteous in doing so. They’d KNOW that it was OBVIOUS that your site had content that was pure, unadulterated, USELESS. With no social utility. Not that I’m saying that, mind, because for one thing, I don’t care, and for another thing, I was raised better than to assume that everything I don’t get or don’t agree with (or offends me, as the case may be) is useless to everyone. But you must realize that many, many people would.
But that’s okay with you? It must be, because that’s precisely what you do with these other people. And you rationalize it away and think that it’s so obvious to everyone. When it’s not. But you’re so blinded you won’t see that.
You filter everything through your Evil Captor Bullshit-filter, and assume that it’s equally obvious to everyone else why you are righteous and right and your judgments. And that’s where you are treading into dangerous hypocritical ground. And you are so unbelievably, pathetically deluded about how people might view your site, (and also your various and sundry spending habits, eating habits, etc.) that it’s pretty hilarious.
Bolding mine. The crux of it. YOU cannot conceive of it, therefore, no one else should justifiably either.
And YOU cannot concieve that anyone would look at the entirety of your site and deem it useless (and in some cases, even offensive or harmful), so therefore, poof! It’s settled and you should be in the clear? Wrong.
Yeah, perhaps you’re just ignorant. Not that I am defending the $12,000 suit, but then again, I might just be ignorant, so I’ll keep my yap shut. Besides, perhaps it’s none of my business.
That’s simply not your call to make.
Buying a $5000 painting may do many things. It may keep that artist in ramen for the year, for one thing. It may give that buyer so much enjoyment, and may give anyone who visits their house so much enjoyment (and later, to the museum that they donate the painting to) that it is several times over worth it. But you judge it as “extravagant” anyway? You know JACK SHIT.
During some of the art sales/shows I participated in, I’d have a lot of sales and I was pretty pleased with my earnings. And I needed the money for a lot of stuff, practical, “socially useful” stuff. But I’d end up pissing sometimes as much as half of my recent earnings on fellow artists’ stuff. Why? Because for one thing, I loved their work and I wanted to own it. Not something similar but cheaper, but that specific work. For another thing, as an artist, I knew how important it was to buy artists’ work—to support them with cold hard cash. And so that’s what I did with my money, even though I really should have spent it far more “usefully” and in a far more “justified” way.
But that apparently is totally beyond your comprehension, so in your mind, it’s “extravagant,” right? Once again, the world as seen through the Evil Captor Bullshit-filter.
But not everyone WANTS TO DO THAT. Maybe they’d rather spend their money in a way that supports fine artists and fine tailors. Maybe they see value in supporting artists. Maybe they see the difference in a finely cut, finely tailored outfit that will last them a long time, is made out of fine fabric, and fits them to a tee.
Maybe they’d find that more socially useful to spend money on some artists work and on fine well-designed garments, than to go looking for bargains on eBay and spending time, energy and money on a (in their view) socially USELESS and in some cases, HARMFUL “adult” site.
Hey, it’s their money. They get to decide what is the more righteous or useful way to spend it. Not you.
And this, coming from the (in some people’s minds, NOT MINE, I emphasize) the pornographer who spends time and energy and MONEY producing a socially useless and even harmful pornography site. One shouldn’t throw stones in glass houses.
I think this needs to be highlighted specifically:
“Where appropriate”? That’s rich. To many people, “XXX” illustrations are NEVER APPROPRIATE. It’s completely OBVIOUS to them that XXX is never appropriate.
That’s all some people would have to see. That, and the fact that you have images and content that are classified as “bondage.” That would be enough, would always be enough, no matter what else you had on the site, no matter how you explained that it wasn’t a “teen pussy site,” for many people to feel 100% totally righeous in condemning the content you’ve put on that site, and condemning you as well.
Well yosemetebabe, I give up. Not because I’ve lost the arguement - becasue the arguement is not worth having.
What’s the point in discussing moral behaviour with people who refuse to point their condescending finger at themselves? None - that’s what. How easy it is to criticize the habits of others without taking a stern look at your own habits.
I’m sure these folks think that their behaviour is beyond reproach - obviously it’s not, but they feel it is. Any further discussion with these two would be a waste of bandwidth.
I am sure many people—including many women and femnist groups—would find it highly amusing to know that someone that could be classified as a bondage pornographer is giving sanctimonious morality lectures here!
