Comments on: “Fat”, “Slut”, “Selfish”: a note on the three great fears

By: leapfrog

leapfrog — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 14:04:28 +0000

Did you really neeed Hugo to tell you that - I suspect are really a hermit, and not a successful philanderer at all

By: Utter bastard

Utter bastard — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 05:22:46 +0000

You have no idea how wonderfully helpful this is.
Its a real eye opener, thanks, really, thanks.
As a predatory male, manipulating women by working over thier self esteem, it’s very useful to know that Selfish, Fat and Slut are three keywords that I can now employ in the negative dialogue I normally conduct with women as I seduce them. Thanks to this clever and useful insight, I expect to be able to sucker in, use, and discard more women per month than ever before.

Cheers
UtterBastard

By: Lily

Lily — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 21:22:39 +0000

Thank you so much for this post. Of all the things I struggle with of myself, “selfishness” brings me the least sleep. I have never been called “slut”, but I have been called “fat” and “selfish” and by far I would rather be called “fat”. But by reading your post, I wonder now if I truly am “selfish” in negative manner, because although I prioritize myself over others I think I do serve those who do have a need.

By: julie ann sterna

julie ann sterna — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 08:18:56 +0000

nice

By: Girl talk « Eye Level Pasadena

Girl talk « Eye Level Pasadena — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 17:38:20 +0000

[…] *If you didn’t see his post last month titled “Fat”, “Slut”, “Selfish”: a note on the three great fears, it’s also worth a read. […]

By: Margie

Margie — Sat, 16 Jun 2007 14:43:51 +0000

Just want to congratulate you on really reading these journals … so often when journaling is a part of a class it seems the professor is wanting them for some sort of affirmation that the students read the books that were covered in exactly the way they were “supposed” to and got out of it what they were “supposed” to learn. There was even an undercover “journal guide” at a friend’s undergrad (what to write if you want an “A” kind of thing) and another friend of mine did not like a book her prof wrote and her professor sent her to the college counselor! It has been a solid decade since I was in that position, but from former students everywhere thanks for actually reading what is written instead of what you want to see on the page.

By: Urocyon

Urocyon — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 13:09:01 +0000

Great post. Some of my worst struggles (and self-sabotage) have come from applying the “selfish” label to myself, and I have seen that undermining many–if not most–of the other women I know well. In many cases, “selfish” does seem to be shorthand for “not half-killing yourself trying to please other people”, or even “half-killing yourself but not pleasing anyway”. It can be equally fun when people around you are not so open with expectations, so you end up trying to decipher what they really want and feeling selfish no matter what you do, as nothing seems to satisfy. I have seen parents use their ostensible lack of expectations to keep their daughters, in particular, off balance this way, though thankfully haven’t been in that situation myself.

I must say, I was a bit surprised not to see anyone mention what struck me right off about the “coercion through college fund” thing: the original comment is absolutely dripping in privilege. An awful lot of people not only cannot depend on a parental college fund, they have to work to help make sure there is electric light to study by. (And, as I know well, some of them do not go into “practical” courses of study.)

Yes, as long as they are not harming anyone in the process, adults have the right to dispose of their money however it suits them. At the same time, they should realize that–according to the rules one is embracing to wield that privilege in the first place–their privilege necessarily involves some degree of power over other people, and potential to do harm.

I am having trouble putting all my concerns about this kind of situation into words right now without horrible clumsiness. I can say that, at the very best, claims that one is only exercising one’s own rights while using one’s privilege to coerce even nonrelatives smacks of sophistry.

By: sophonisba

sophonisba — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 21:11:47 +0000

is it OK and unselfish for the parents to then say “OK honey, good luck with that. And you might want to make an appointment with the financial aid office at your college, because we’re taking the college fund and going on a cruise?”

Selfish/unselfish just isn’t a very good axis for this one, because it avoids the real problems with it. It’s their own money; nobody has to support their children once they turn 18. So no, keeping it for themselves is not particularly selfish.

What’s totally assholish is holding up the expectation of college money for years, so that the kid plans his life around being able to go to college with his/her parents’ support, as many kids do, and then yanking the rug out from under them at the last minute because you want to control their course of study, career, and future life. Yeah, you can throw a kid out the door at age 18 and not be selfish — as long as you’ve told them all along, since they were little, that that’s what you had planned. But springing it on them at the last minute to coerce them into an MBA or whatever is beneath contempt.

This is just common sense, really; everybody puts conditions on their financial help, but some of those conditions are reasonable and some are not.

“We’ll pay for college as long as you maintain a 3.2 or better GPA” : reasonable. “We’ll pay for college as long as you keep a part-time job during the school year and a full-time job over the summers to help out”: reasonable. “We’ll pay what we can towards college, but just for four years, so if you take longer, you’ll have to take out loans”: reasonable.

But: “We’ll pay for college if you major in business/comp sci/economics, because we have the right to dictate your career training, and career prospects for the next 50 years”: not reasonable.

If you have a bachelor’s degree from a reputable college in ANY SUBJECT, and you are both presentable and intelligent, you can support yourself in the world without ending up on welfare or in some luridly- and ignorantly-imagined arts ghetto. This is not a secret. Nobody can seriously imagine that you have to be a non-humanities grad to get a good job, so the only reason to be a control freak about your kid’s major is, well, to be a control freak and a jerk.

Normal, non-jerk parents don’t play control games with tuition that way. They just nag their kids until they graduate with a double major, or a humanities major and a comp sci minor, and everybody’s happy.

By: Vacula

Vacula — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 20:00:32 +0000

I think that if you want your kid to be successful in a career immediately after school it’d probably be a good idea to insist that they find a job in school and take on some of their financial responsibilities too. If they need help finding an apartment or buying a career wardrobe after they graduate, do that.

It’s good for both the parent and the kid to know what it really takes to be ready for the “real world” in whatever field they’re best suited for. But expecting that picking the right degree alone will provide a good job seems kind of naive in this job market. If they decide they’d like to pursue a non-traditional career, negotiate some level of personal responsibility on their part and future security on your part. They get a good starter job or internship as a student to help pay for tuition and you’ll help pay expenses if they need to do an unpaid internship or something after they graduate.

I went to a good liberal arts school and many of my friends had fairly practical majors. Many of them had a hard time finding work, while I got something right away with my English/Art Education degree. I had a decent amount of work experience on my resume already, but they had student positions and internships in other states that didn’t directly apply. My mom can’t afford to give me any kind of financial support, but I am able to live at home and reduce my expenses, which gives me a big leg up on getting rid of my loans and starting grad school earlier than I would otherwise.

Parents are often right to be leery of kids jumping into an academic field with no thought of its future application, but that just means both the parents and the student should try to learn more about the real situation before graduation comes. Picking the “top 10 most needed” career can help some people, or lead to a job they don’t like in a flooded market. Parents can be not only selfish but very short-sighted if they push their kids into something based only on their experiences and newspaper career articles.

By: The Chief

The Chief — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 18:00:16 +0000

Yes, I’m sure we could all produce an anecdote about the art history major who became a Fortune 500 CEO. That aside, my question still remains: If it’s OK and not selfish (or at least not a bad kind of selfish) for a college student to pursue a degree in XYZ Studies despite what his or her parents wanted, is it OK and unselfish for the parents to then say “OK honey, good luck with that. And you might want to make an appointment with the financial aid office at your college, because we’re taking the college fund and going on a cruise?”