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srslyTrying2hlptoday at 2:26 PM1 replyview on HN

I'm currently reading Foucault's history of sexuality, and the reason you might want this is because population!

Obviously we are facing a population crisis, and we will need more bodies for the factories and retirement homes. Or at least this was the idea in the 1800s. We might have morally coated it with religion, but biopower is a real thing.

The current hypothesis is that the ever evolving LGBTQ+ is a way to sell niche products to these groups. You can imagine that with every new gender, there is a facebook ad and amazon order to be sold.

I don't really believe this, I'm an anti-realist and I think continental philosophy is BS... but this is a classic. Also, there are sooo many ways our sexual taboos are all about economics. Once you see it, you cant unsee.


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mindslighttoday at 6:51 PM

I'm wary of reasoning that boils down to using utilitarian arguments to back up moralistic fundamentalism - especially when there are so many other things that would achieve similar results but continue to go unaddressed. We could start with making sure every child has abundant access to food and healthcare so they grow up as healthy as possible. We could address the economic treadmill wherein two incomes have become de facto mandatory, causing many straight women who want kids to put it off indefinitely. And if increasing our population is a desirable goal, we could even use public money to outright subsidize the cost of caring for kids. Never mind America-first policies like immigration to increase our own population at the expense of other countries.

> You can imagine that with every new gender, there is a facebook ad and amazon order to be sold.

This is veering off into conspiratorial thinking land. Of course there is an element of truth to it. But that same element of truth applies to basically every other meme as well.

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