Comments on: Republicans Are Douchebags

By: dhill

dhill — Mon, 01 Dec 2014 16:19:13 +0000

Looks like a war of sexes.

By: dhill

dhill — Mon, 01 Dec 2014 14:28:54 +0000

Apropos “bro”, did you know that, doctor Ernesto Guevara’s nickname is basically “bro”: “During this period he acquired his famous nickname, due to his frequent use of the Argentine diminutive interjection che, a vocative casual speech filler used to call attention or ascertain comprehension, similarly to both “bro” or the Canadian phrase “eh”.”

Report comment

By: dhill

dhill — Mon, 01 Dec 2014 14:17:11 +0000

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/generous-states-charities-lean-republican/story?id=17030246

Report comment

By: dhill

dhill — Mon, 01 Dec 2014 14:13:36 +0000

@Anonymous: You missed a comma after “other”.

Report comment

By: noahluck

noahluck — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 21:27:53 +0000

Yes, it was driven by gender. Among the first:
50 male Republicans: 80% correctly predicted
50 male Democrats: 40% correctly predicted
20 female Republicans (i.e. all of them): 20% correctly predicted
50 female Democrats: 94% correctly predicted

So name still has some predictive value in this subset within gender. If we fiddle with the thresholds on a per-gender basis we can improve the result.

Now of course you probably expect that the remaining effect is largely driven by race, and you’d be right about that, too. But then all we end up saying is that (in this sample at least) Republican names tend to be male Anglo names, and that Democratic names tend to be everyone else’s names, which mostly undermines the original argument that political tribe was *like* ethnicity and gender. Rather, it mostly *is* ethnicity and gender. Very unfortunately so.

Report comment

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 13:31:45 +0000

So calling someone a douchebag is an expression of envy, and objecting to being caled a douchebag is blindness to one’s own douchebaggery.

That clears it up.

Report comment

By: Ian Osmond

Ian Osmond — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 13:25:21 +0000

I have NEVER seen “douchebag” used to imply ANYTHING about dating success. A “douchebag” is arrogant and has a sense of entitlement — the douchebag is described by the saying, “He was born on third base, and thinks he hit a triple.”

The other part of “douchebag” is a callousness to the misfortunes of others, even shading into a troll-like enjoyment of hurting others.

I just asked my wife for her definition of “douchebag”, to see if we were on the same page, and she said, “An entitled asshole who doesn’t care about the feelings of others.”

So we have characteristics of unearned privilege, such as being born to a wealthy family, being unaware that such privilege is unearned, and therefore believing that they genuinely ARE better than other people, and therefore not finding any importance in people that they consider “lesser” than them, even to the point of finding their discomfort amusing.

Obviously, those statements don’t describe most Republicans, but they are failure modes of personality more associated with conservatives than with liberals. A person who DID have those characteristics would be more likely to find an individualist philosophy attractive than a communal-based on.

Report comment

By: Liskantope

Liskantope — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 03:32:19 +0000

“Pick-up artistry” was probably the wrong word for it and could only perhaps apply in a very broad sense of the term. At the time I couldn’t think of a better term to use to refer to the mildly sleazy, double-entendre, lines-to-use-when-hitting-on-girls nature of his remarks. I don’t really know much about what’s involved in serious PUA, so I can’t speak to that.

Anyhow, I’m not sure of the best way to refer to it, but that type of humor in my experience is a reflection of a very particular subculture of heterosexual male culture, which is also associated with stereotypical frat culture. I don’t think it really affects my initial point either way. Of course, it’s hard to conclude much about the portrayal of Schmidt from these quotes out of context; I sort of want to re-watch some New Girls now too!

Report comment

By: peppermint

peppermint — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 02:44:51 +0000

There are two biting racial slurs for Whites. The most common one is ‘racist’. Less popular is the sexual slur ‘cumskin’, referring to the stereotype of effeminate White men, and the fact that Whites are supportive of gayness.

Report comment

By: Daniel

Daniel — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 02:28:22 +0000

As a gay guy, this doesn’t really apply to me. I’ve been known to say “that guy is really attractive, why does he have to be such a douchebag?” or rather “my brain identified you as a potential mate based off visual cues, but then you signaled traits of the outgroup so I can no longer consider you a potential mate.”

Report comment