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Comment by Boothroid | Hacker News Reader

Ah but come now, sexual attractiveness is a form of power! And in fact one of the greatest; men will fight and die for sex with women they desire.

On the question of morality I stick to my guns: I think we are all tempted from time to time to ascend to our high horse and start declaiming of our righteousness, but my question to you would be: are you really so pure of morals that there are none that might find fault with you, given the chance?

I'm also struck by the stridency of some of the statements I'm reading on HN. I wonder if this is a cultural thing as to my British ears they sound almost comically absolutist. Perhaps in Europe this kind of forceful speech is less fashionable?

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>Ah but come now, sexual attractiveness is a form of power!

Sure, in a sense. But as I said previously, your sexual attractiveness to a person is not something that you can use to threaten them or ruin their life. On the one hand, you have situations where an attractive woman tries to get what she wants by offering sex. On the other, you have situations where a powerful man threatens a woman who refuses his sexual advances. You only have to think of it from a first-person perspective. Would you rather be coerced into sex, or offered sex in return for a favor?

>to my British ears they sound almost comically absolutist.

I am also British.

In a sense?! Sexual power can be used to bring someone to their knees; to control, to humiliate; I think you do women a disservice if you diminish this fact, and what's more - and in the spirit of bombast - you are arguing against one of the timeless truths of human existence, and a theme that pervades human culture since time immemorial.

You can't control or humiliate someone merely by offering them sex. They can just say "no thanks". If they end up getting controlled and humiliated, it's because they were foolish enough not to do that.

If you are someone's boss, you can control and humiliate them by, say, having them fired. You can't say "no thanks" if your boss fires you.

That is the distinction that I was drawing.

You certainly can control someone by offering them sex - it's a well understood and successful tool used in espionage.

It only works if they accept the offer.

Espionage is a human science and has developed applied human sciences above and beyond what popular American culture has the maturity and insight to comprehend.

Much of this information, if released publicly, would be dismissed out-of-hand as incorrect to anyone who is an upright and decent person.

To the poster below me, the offer of sex can be used as control regardless of acceptance. If a wealthy and attractive person offers you sex, and you are unaware of an ulterior motive, the mere act of offering does factually impact your psychology and changes your cognitive biases. If the changing in these biases is directed, you are being controlled.

I recommend brushing up on your espionage knowledge. This isn't magic, it's intellectual honesty.

You have veered quite a long way off the original topic. It's plainly absurd to draw a comparison between the KGB setting a honey trap and a senior man pressuring a junior woman to have sex with him. The two have nothing to do with one another.

>the mere act of offering does factually impact your psychology and changes your cognitive biases.

Everything impacts your psychology and changes your cognitive biases. In that broad sense of the word "control", we are all "controlling" each other every day, no sex required.

It's not a comparison, it's a juxtaposition and you are tying yourself in knots trying to avoid admitting the truth. Women DO have greater sexual power than men. Some women DO use sex to control men. Young women definitely have an idea of their power in the sexual marketplace. And the idea that we can just decide to switch lust on and off is ridiculous.

>Some women DO use sex to control men.

I did not say that there are no women who use sex to control men. I said that it is not possible to control someone merely by offering them sex. It requires the cooperation of the person who is being offered sex. This is in stark contrast to the kind of power older men often have over younger women.

>And the idea that we can just decide to switch lust on and off is ridiculous.

Who said anything about switching lust off? All you have to do is decline the offer, which is eminently possible.

What about the blackmail potential inherent in offering someone sex?

Edit: I can no longer reply due to the thread length, so here is reply to below post:

To say that someone offered you sex, is to inculcate the idea of a sexual relationship with a person which you would otherwise not be associated with in such a context.

There isn't any blackmail potential in offering someone sex. You can just say "yes, so and so offered me sex".

I do not understand your edit.

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