(no subject)

I've been listening to more podcasts recently, and I like the idea of the You Are Not So Smart one, but also I want a rule (in life, not just in podcasts) that if you are studying something anti-social that people do, you have to study the effects. Not just the specific instant responses, but long term effects. Hopefully this would prevent people like David Buss from genuinely saying, in response to a question about warning signs of jealousy that people can look for, "well, if you're being abused, you're in more danger of being murdered by your partner." I do believe that he doesn't think doing terrible things out of jealousy is good, but it's kind of astonishing to me that he can study this and genuinely think being cut off from your social circles or "having your self-esteem lowered" are just warning signs for murder rather than actual abuse in their own right with massive consequences, and it skeeves me the fuck out about his research if he can do this much work on abuse and not know this. THIS IS WHY NO ONE LIKES EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGISTS, BRO.


I am, however, enjoying Amanda Downum's Necromancer Chronicles very much. A+ lots of queer relationships! Well integrated socially too: it's not just one queer couple and a lot of talking about how no one minds, there are lots of past and present queer couples, and people discuss operas featuring a variety of different relationships. And trans* characters! Also ( spoilers for very excellent trope )

Plus complicated politics and magic and people who actually feel like they have long histories, not just in their most deep and serious relationships, but equally in people they've known casually for ages, or unimportant shit they've done, and that kind of thing. Highly recommended.