Digital Gay Life?

concupisys

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listen dude: you are fully entitled to your opinions, no matter how strongly for or against an issue.... what you are not entitled to do is to disrespect others or take people's words out of context just so that you can make yourself seem as though you know what you're talking about.... remember: you don't speak for everybody here.... you can only speak for yourself, and others are just as entitled to disagree with you (respectfully) as you do them.... if you aren't prepared to do that, i suggest not starting threads here....
 

Smaccoms

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hmm.... i can't say that your statements have been as direct and concise as they should be; hence you have confused people and then personally insulted their intelligence because you are not making your points clear or being very accepting of other people's points of view.... if that's the kind of BS i must learn to accept if i'm going to live my gay life outside the digital realm, i don't want any part of it....

I try to be as clear and concise as I can. I have started to revise with that specifically in mind since you've mentioned it; I do wish to be understood. I think it is unfair of you to accuse me of trying to manipulate other people, however. That is not my intention.

listen dude: you are fully entitled to your opinions, no matter how strongly for or against an issue.... what you are not entitled to do is to disrespect others or take people's words out of context just so that you can make yourself seem as though you know what you're talking about.... remember: you don't speak for everybody here.... you can only speak for yourself, and others are just as entitled to disagree with you (respectfully) as you do them.... if you aren't prepared to do that, i suggest not starting threads here....

I think part of the problem is that this subject of study (Social Psychology) is composed of many theories. It is half fact and half opinion. Would you not agree? It is a difficult subject to discuss to begin with for this reason.

I think part of my problem specifically is that I'm using terms and definitions I've decided upon in my head, but haven't been agreed upon in the discussion. For example, we never discussed whether or not sexuality is a part of someone's overall identity and the implications of either/or possibility. Is it that sort of thing which you are referring to?
 

B_bxmuscle

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http://www.lpsg.org/283963-new-left-redux.html

The Situationist International Text Library/The Society of the Spectacle


I just posted the above thread in LPSG relevant to this subject. Left theorists 50 years ago noted how ever more of life is not lived, but what they described as "represented" via technology. The second link is to the online text of this very notion as laid out by Guy Debord's "Society of the Spectacle" in 1967.

There are plenty of people who vilify the old New Left to this day, but your point about "gay" life is proof to me about how much of what was said 50 years ago is even truer in the age of "virtual reality."
 

concupisys

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i can appreciate your wanting to get more factual and statistical data regarding this subject, but that kind of thing won't happen on here unless you post a third party's study results as an external link or attachment.... on the forums, EVERYTHING is up for discussion; that's just the way it works.... studies and focus groups are done in clinics and offices around controlled groups of people who have been pre-screened based on their demographics and a controlled flow of discussion and questions.... around online communities, it's just a big free-for-all discussion, and you have no control over who puts in their hat or what demographic they happen to fall in to.... as an OP to a discussion, it's your job to moderate and ensure that things stay on topic, that people are being respectful, and that you engage your followers and contributors.... otherwize: you are doing nothing but enabling a big pissing contest.....
 

Smaccoms

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Your basically saying the OP is the host of the party.

Are you also saying it's wrong of me to discuss fact-based sciences without backing up every single fact via third parties? Otherwise, it is only appropriate to exchange opinions? This seems quite foolish to me. This draws too strict lines in discussion. It seems to treat all individuals as if they know no facts whatsoever. I find it quite insulting.
 

concupisys

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both fact and opinion are perfectly welcome, but the topic of this thread is (as far as i know) not something that has been 'studied' within the gay community.... essentially though, knowing that there are not broad studies done on this topic, opinion and hypothesis are more or less all we have to go on.... for that reason, it's not a good idea for the host of the discussion (or anyone else for that matter) to question the intelligence of a person who is really just trying to express their take on a topic or issue... if you want something more factual and statistical to come out of this topic, why not create a survey and have us all fill it out?
 

Smaccoms

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Just because the specific subject hasn't been studied doesn't mean scientific evidence from the broader subject can't be applied to it. This is why it's not all opinion and hypotheses. Social Psychology most definitely applies to this subject. Culture is intermingled with the development of the human consciousness, and therefore how we identify. How gay people identify today is therefore undeniably linked the culture we live in. This draws a connection from the digitalization of the gay lifestyle to social psychology itself. You cannot isolate the problem because it requires context, which is the culture it lives in. The framework is there; the problem is no one has built the house around it.
 

B_bxmuscle

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both fact and opinion are perfectly welcome, but the topic of this thread is (as far as i know) not something that has been 'studied' within the gay community....

The OP and this responder have been exchanging comments about develops within "gay" circles. I should have been more explicit in my post about how these develops are in my view just one manifestation of a much, much broader trend -- the declined of lived life centered around an array of personal connections and interactions between real people in the physical world and their replacement by what is now called "virtual" reality in which images generated by technology increasingly defines most peoples' lives and aspirations.

It's now not unusual to discover that some people avoid direct person-to-person inaction in conversation in favor some form of digital exchange as their basic norm of exchange. My 23 year old cousin tells me that many people her age at her office don't even say good-morning when they arrive at work anymore, but txt or tweet it as they arrive at their desks. It is the replacement of lived life by virtual life, or what the New Left analyzed as "spectacle" via technology decades ago, that should be grasped here. The decline of social circles the OP is discussing is but one manifestation of this.
 

Smaccoms

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It's true. On the phone, poeple of my generation and younger sometimes don't say hello or goodbye. To the older generations, it doesn't make any sense at all. Here in the Mass, people dont talk to strangers unless they've been introduced somehow. It's fairly common in the younger people, especially at my college. The fact we both go to Umass isn't enough for a lot of them. It's weird.
 

concupisys

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agreed, bx.... where this got confusing actually started just based on the title of this thread.... are we talking about digital GAY life or are we talking about digital life in general?

Smaccoms: now might be the time to edit your inquiry and start a new thread that specifies what it is you're trying to get across better.... given that this light is only being shined on this conversation 5 pages in, you have managed to confuse one heck of a lot of people....
 

Smaccoms

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concupisys, in order to discuss this topic, you need to discuss everything I explained above. I didn't realize it wasn't considered common knowledge. I suppose this was foolish of me. I must confess, I am unsure of a proper title. I fear my opinion of myself is that I'm awful at titles.
 

D_PooNaHoe

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I think that life in general is being lived out more and more digitally and it probably has nothing to do with being gay or straight. Now get off your damn computer and go cruise for cock. I live in Texas and I could find a guy willing to suck cock faster than I could find a woman. You have nothing to complain about.
 

concupisys

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it's not just the title that is misleading or confusing.... it was as though you started the thread under one set of parameters, and then expected responses from a different set of parameters.... think of starting a thread like writing an online profile.... depending on how you represent yourself in your title/handle, your profile text and your photos, you will ultimately get different responses from different people.... by being direct in everything and injecting your personality in to that to boot, you will ultimately trigger the kinds of responses you're looking for from the people you want to respond to you....
 

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^^^^wow! Teach me your ways!

Maybe its just where I'm at but every bar in town has a fairly healthy herd of gays. And the gym..good Lord man, it's a meat market. Just because they don't have a big sign around their neck that says "GAY" doesn't mean they aren't out there mingling. You just have to put yourself out there too and work that shit. Chances are the public gay community won't show up on your doorstep, know what I mean?
 

B_bxmuscle

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How much have you examined this topic of interest bxmuscle? I'm very intrigued.

Well, I too started noticing how more people I meet out and about were really avoiding dealing with, meeting up for conversations, having old-fashioned dates, or even talking on the phone. Instead they wanted to text, email, web-cam or do anything except real-time and real-world exchanges. Except when they wanted to hook up for sex. Then 2 yrs ago I met a 20-something guy who asked for my number at a club, called me, accepted my suggestion that we meet up for drinks, then told me when we meet up how he was totally shocked that I asked him out; he thought I was just gonna suggest that he come by for sex; as if suggesting two people meet, talk and get to know each other was shocking! That's when I knew something had shifted in the culture.

Meanwhile, although I'm too young to have been part of the New Left, I was aware of what I believe to be it's powerful critique of what it called the alienating effects of affluent capitalism, how and why it fosters a systematic breakdown of human connectedness, dating back in the 1960s. I went to grad school specifically to study it though eventually shift into French history. Key to this perspective is the uses of technology -- not technology itself, which can be used for good or ill, but its organization and uses within systems designed to maximize profit controlled by huge and powerful trans-national economic organizations. That old New Left critique is the source of the idea of life a "spectacle" generated by technology and passively consumed by consumers vs. a lived reality.

Fast-forward to the digital age, and this process in its infancy in the 60s is fully developed now.