[sudo-discuss] Dystopia News: No-Sex Apartments.

Tue May 21 01:02:34 PDT 2013

G.,

Your personal biases and hang ups are more of a prison than anyone in the
so called oligarchy could construct. I'm tired of these troll posts.

At Rutgers, every undergrad on campus had a twin bed. Almost anyone who
wanted a sexually active relationship, who was capable of social graces,
had one. For two people who want to fuck, you'll fuck anywhere. Don't like
a twin bed? Sleep on a futon or blanket on the floor. I've personally
witnessed five person orgies on a twin bed and on a dorm floor. Expand your
mind. For me, this model you invoke of monogamous sleeping arrangements is
far from my personal nirvana. Being able to sleep two to a bed and having a
good sex life have never been correlated for me.

Furthermore, look how my grandparents immigrant generation lived. They'd
squeeze families with children into rooms not much bigger, and yet had no
problems making more kids.

There's so many fucked up ways that our society and government puts us at a
disadvantage: sexism, classism, racism, and the ugly specter of lowered
expectations. Moral mores and prudery. On and on. But making up new ways
the "oligarchy" are "fucking us" isn't helpful. If you don't want to live
in 200 sq ft, fine, but I would think its a hell of a lot better than
living on 8 sq ft of wet cardboard. If you don't want to eat bugs, fine,
but don't ignore thousands of years of grasshopper consumption by Jews
(locusts and grasshoppers are specifically enumerated as Kosher!) and
Mesoamericans.

If you don't like the oligarchy, fine, but this made up world with your
rules is just your own oligarchy or dictatorship, and I don't want to live
in that world either. These modest proposals are not helping me find how to
better participate at sudoroom.

Matt (the other one, hbergeronx)

On Monday, May 20, 2013, GtwoG PublicOhOne wrote:

>
>
> No-Sex Apartments.
>
> (Creative commons, with attribution to "G.")
>
> In cities across the USA, a new "solution" to affordable housing is
> being promoted: micro-apartments of less than 200 square feet.  New
> York's conrol-freak in chief, Mayor Bloomberg, is promoting them (New
> Yorkers call them "Bloom Boxes").  A developer in San Francisco is
> promoting them.  And developers in Seattle WA are building them by the
> hundreds.
>
> The Seattle apartments were recently covered in a CBS News article, here:
>
> http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57582327/tiny-apartments-are-creating-a-big-backlash-in-seattle/
>
> If you look at the picture, something immediately stands out: a TWIN BED.
>
> As the article says, "...(the) apartment comes with a small private
> bathroom, a microwave and a mini-refrigerator. There's just enough room
> for a twin bed, a neatly hung rack of clothes and shelves."  (There's
> not even room for a desk, so forget about working from home: it's back
> to the plantation for you, worker-bee.)
>
> And therein lies the catch, or more accurately the "nudge," to use the
> Newspeak word for "manipulation."
>
> A twin bed is sufficient for sleeping, but not sufficient for a regular
> sex life with others, much less a stable relationship.
>
> Sure, you can manage it occasionally, but for the long term it's right
> out.  Squeezing two people into a bed meant for one is miserable,
> particularly in the hot summer.
>
> This is one form of "birth control" that won't be controversial with the
> Vatican or other right-wing religious denominations.  I suppose that
> also qualifies as a "feature."  (We won't mention the fact that you can
> carry on a satisfactory solo sex life in a twin bed, lest the twin beds
> be replaced with "stand-up beds" consisting of straps on the wall.)
>
> There's no need for the Oligarchy to make an explicit No Sex rule.  They
> don't have to, when they can just "nudge" the architecture to enforce
> that outcome by "nudging" people who might think to disobey.
>
> Best of all (from the Oligarchy's perspective), there's nothing to
> revolt against.  A revolt against a type of architecture is like a
> revolt against traffic jams or weather: there's no obvious evil-doer to
> hurl ballots and tomatoes at.
>
> The Oligarchy likes micro-apartments because they are more profitable
> per square foot of building, compared to apartments that let you have a
> bed big enough for two people, and a fridge big enough to let you keep
> enough food that you don't have to go shopping every day.
>
> The working masses (that would be us) who are being lined up to live in
> these boxes would do well to recognize that they are also about the same
> size as prison cells.
>
> The only difference is that you have the key to your cell, just like
> inmates in "honor system prisons" for white collar criminals.  That, and
> there isn't a guard staring at you whilst you poop, though I'd be
> careful about the tiny apartments that come with internet and TV service
> included (no choice of carriers either), as the "smart sensors" won't be
> far behind.
>
> Smaller houses and apartments are of course part of a viable approach to
> sustainability: primarily through lower energy consumption and proximity
> to public transport.  Some years ago, a close friend and I came up with
> various designs for micro-houses, from about 160 square feet, up to
> about 400 - 500 square feet.  A building with a 500 square foot
> "building footprint" was sufficient for a family of four.  We were
> designing for the sake of sustainability, and for the ability of
> individuals and communities to build these houses for themselves at low
> cost.
>
> But as with eating bugs, it's one thing to do it by the choice of your
> own free will, quite another to do it by way of getting mercilessly
> milked by the Oligarchy.  Especially when the Oligarchs continue to live
> in 12,000 square foot (and larger) mansions with sprawling lawns on all
> sides.
>
> What the world can't afford, is the Oligarchy.  Darwin, take note!
>
> -G.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> sudo-discuss mailing list
> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org <javascript:;>
> http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://sudoroom.org/pipermail/sudo-discuss/attachments/20130521/4822e13b/attachment.html>