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Back in 1969 at MIT, it was fairly well established lore that many males preferred computers to female companionship. Logically, they got a positive visual response from input. The device did not debate with them and immediately did their bidding. And an extra benefit was bathing and sartorial skill were optional.

Phones and tablets provide much the same feedback mechanism today with the added advantage if something displeases, it can be swiped away.

Larry Niven foresaw a vision not unlike what we have now by introducing Louis Wu as a 'wirehead' who essentially pleasured himself in the "Ringworld" SF series.

One could posit at some point an obsession with smartphones is mental masturbation.

Good article to read. I recommend, as another worthwhile read, Kapuscinski's Another Day of Life

Good reporting from Luanda

Find your meditative spaces. I do the dishes, I drive, I ride a bike, I take showers, I wander around in nature, I sit and watch the world pass me by. Sometimes I think about what I'm doing, or about some unimportant or asinine thing, or nothing at all. Sometimes I'm productive and sometimes I'm not. Sometimes I'm self-actualizing and sometimes I'm not. That's okay. Pressuring yourself to produce is an excellent way to be unproductive.

These spaces are the only times when I formulate truly inventive ideas. They're places where I can let my mind wander and review what it knows and to bridge and connect and construct, and they're places where I feel no stress. I don't want my life to be chaotic and completely uncertain, but I also don't want the structure of my days to consist of anything more than meditative spaces and free time.

More people need to learn to walk slowly.

Indeed. This is a great starting point: http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/1416587098.

In most first-world countries, the Left gradually moved away from (white male) working class concerns, and into more upper-classy concerns like feminism, gay rights and anti-racism. This is the main reason. Right-wingers may shaft the white working class male, but at some level they at least seem to respect him more.

Jim Goad in The Redneck Manifesto laid this out clearly. He as a white working class man in the US feels that liberal and conservative elites both exploit him. However the conservative elites exploit him with a modicum of respect, while the liberal elites exploit him and take a dump on him, accusing people like with with perpetuating racism etc. etc.

Same thing for the UK, I have been in working class pubs complaining that Blair is just too posh and the Labour was hijacked by silver-spoon Oxford kids...

> Aren't you saying that less controversial speech = less violence, amnd then doesn't more controversial speech = more violence? Even if they're not equated, he's saying there's a direct mathematical relationship, right?

I really don't think there is much in society that can be quantified with a "direct mathematical relationship." There's too much complexity and too many factors to simplify it into such a quaint, irrefutable thing when you're talking about people and societies. That said... yes, at least indirectly?

• There is no direct, incontrovertible evidence linking hate speech or propaganda to violence. However, in the case studies presented at this seminar, several common tactics and strategies with regard to the dissemination of hate speech and propaganda in relation to actual acts of violence were identified. Leaders often manipulated core social, economic, and political issues by blaming a single enemy for them all and recasting problems in an ethnic light. (emphasis mine in both instances)
  
• This one is a lot shorter and discusses how "dehumanization" and "othering" can make it easier for people to commit violence.. This one discusses how writers influenced Anders Breivik and possibly helped him to justify his violence.
  
• Whole book on it!
  
  I'm not trying to equate violence with women with widespread genocide of an entire people. But I think it is silly to divorce them completely from one another, and dismiss them as completely irrelevant to one another. They are not the same, but they are not so radically different similar principles can't be applied (sometimes, according to context).
  
  And I agree -- in the end it is always the individual's choice, their personal agency, as to what they do: whether that's committing violence or not. However, in the larger societal context, I can also very easily see how violence is more or less appropriate -- given the individual's context.
  
  Who do you think is more likely to beat his wife? Two men, both of whome had a non-violent parental relationship. Their father didn't beat their mother, but neither were they instilled with very strong anti-violence ideals.
  
  

1. This man primarily views relationships on TV and in the media where wives are beaten. He reads books and articles that promote and normalize wife-beating, offering reasons and justifications as to why it is appropriate. His friends make jokes about how they beat their wives, and tell stories about how they had to at one time or another.
   
2. This man primarily views non-violent media relationships. He reads books and articles that talk about why wife-beating is bad and inappropriate. His friends make non-violent jokes, and tell stories about how they worked out their conflicts with frank discussion and openness with their partner.
   
   Sure! #2 can be off his rocker and beat his wife because he's an asshole, or he's got a mental illness that predisposes him to violence. #1 can be so disgusted by what he saw, he vows never to touch anyone violently again. But I think those kinds of reactions are outliers, and the vast majority of people in situation #2 are less likely to engage in violence, and the vast majority of people in situation #1 more likely to engage in violence.
   
   And the thing is with #1 -- any one of those factors is certainly not enough to cause people to "go out and be violent." If society's only problem was that people make violent jokes that laugh at instances of violence, I don't think we'd have half the problem we do. But because all of those factors in #1 exist, in some more than others... it results in a lot of influence, influence that is difficult to see (especially in individualistic cultures).
   
   > But the former is punishable by law and the other is an unfortunate but necessary byproduct of living in a free society.
   
   I don't advocate banning any kind of speech. I don't advocate locking people up for "hate speech." I don't advocate any punitive measures whatsoever, unless that person crosses into physical violence or crime against another. If someone thinks their violent, racist, sexist opinion belongs out in the wild, fine. That is okay with me.
   
   However, I do think it's very, very okay (preferred, even) for society to call that for what it is, and label it as unwanted/unnecessary/bad. I don't understand how it is preferable to throw your hands into the air and say, "welp, that's the way it is." That is essentially what your argument advocates to me?
   
   I think this is because you've conflated/simplified a lot of the positions against hate speech and violence speech with people who do want to ban hate speech. It's not black/white or all/nothing -- there are a great number of nuanced positions in between "ban all things that make people slightly uncomfortable" and "people can say whatever they want without consequence." I completely understand where that comes from -- there are definitely people who advocate banning and punishing hate speech under any and all contexts, and it's not exactly a minority position. I think entirely dismissing the role of hateful speech in an argument prioritizing free speech is equally incorrect, though.
   
   > To even imply that humanity, or a society, or even a single individual can "move past violence" is absurd, to me.
   
   I agree with you if you mean "moving past the urge/capacity/ability to commit violence is absurd." I cannot agree if you mean "moving past the willingness to commit violence is absurd" -- especially in an individual.
   
   ----
   
   Not relevant to the above, but I was reading the one PDF I linked and I saw this, which caught my eye. I think it makes a very good distinction about when and where hate speech can/should be held legally accountable. If we're in the midst of a genocide and you are calling for people to cull more people, shit yes that is hate speech for which you should be held legally accountable. On the other hand, the song on the radio case... not so much. I think most instances of "hate speech" currently fall under the song on the radio case, and so legislating and punishing is not the appropriate reaction for a society that values free speech.
   
   > Prosecutors at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda believed Bikindi’s songs constituted incitement to genocide. But on December 2, 2008, the judges handed down a decision that made an important distinction between the role Bikindi’s music played in heightening tensions between groups and acts for which he was legally culpable. Although the judges argued that “Bikindi’s three songs were indisputably used to fan the flames of ethnic hatred, resentment and fear of the Tutsi,” and that broadcasts of the songs “had an amplifying effect on the genocide,”3 they concluded that he had little to no control over any radio broadcasting at the time and could therefore not be held directly accountable for the effects these songs may have had on the violence.
   
   > However, they did find Bikindi guilty of direct and public incitement to genocide for hate speech he broadcasted while driving through the countryside during the genocide. Over a loudspeaker, Bikindi had asked people standing on the roadside if they had killed the Tutsi there and if they had killed the “snakes,” a term understood by everyone to mean the Tutsi.4 The judges wrote that “it is inconceivable that, in the context of widespread killings of the Tutsi population that prevailed in June 1994 in Rwanda, the audience to whom the message was directed, namely those standing on the road, could not have immediately understood its meaning and implication.”5 They sentenced Bikindi to 15 years in prison.