Tag Archives: Worthless

The Bookshelf: Captain Capitalism: Top Shelf

As mentioned previously, Captain Capitalism (ie: Aaron Clarey) has been a large influence for this blog, so when he released his new book, Top Shelf, I immediately ordered it on Amazon.

The book itself is a simple collection of what CC thought his best posts from his 8 years of prolific  blogging. Coming in at 400+ pages, the book has a whole lot of mini-essays on a wide range of topics primarily in the fields of economics, gender relations, bachelorhood, politics, and education.

Having read through his entire archive about a year ago (a lot of reading), I can’t think of any posts that should have been included that he left out. In addition, there were some good posts in it that I forgotten about. The book is very comprehensive.

The essays are all enjoyable, often thought-provoking, and usually informative. This is good stuff.

Everything is written in an engaging manner by the Captain at the top of his game. Read the first page or two of his blog; if you like what you read, you’ll really enjoy this book.

Grammar nazis may be concerned about the grammar and typos in the book. There are a lot of them, as there are in many blogs, and the Captain made no bones about the fact that he left the original typos in. Overall, I found this doesn’t really hurt the book or its readability, but if you’re OCD about these kinds of things, I might as well give you fair warning.

Another problem that comes up is that in converting his webposts to book format the links and the occasional graph are unavailable. You can understand all the essays even without them, but sometimes you know you’re missing something.

Now, the first question when considering this type of book is, why should I pay for something that I can get for free on his blog?

There are 3 primary reasons:

1) Support the author. The Captain has been giving us free content for almost a decade, paying . This of course doesn’t really benefit you directly, so if you’re a strict homo economicus this won’t really be convincing. Although, if the Captain is not working because his website is providing a minimalistic living, he has more time to devote to giving us more posts.

2) Save time. As I said, I read through the entirety of the CC archive about a year ago, it took me about two weeks during a really slow time at work. It required dozens of hours. Top Shelf skims the cream off and gives it to you in a format that can be read in an evening or two. It let’s you get the Cappy Cap goodness without such a time investment.

3) Hard copy format. I find it a lot more convenient and comfortable to read from a book than off a computer screen and Top Shelf let’s you read dead tree-style. Convenient.

Now comes my biggest complaint about the book and something I’m hoping Aaron will fix in his future books:

Top Shelf needs an index.

There are dozens (I don’t know exactly how many because there’s no index and flipping through counting them would be a pain) of mini-essays  in this book and they do not seem to be arranged in any particular order. If I want to find, re-read, or reference a particular essay, it requires a lot of page-flipping. A basic index listing the page each particular essay is on would be handy.

This complaint aside, I found the book well worth it.

Recommendation:

Buy this book, it is worth it. If you like reading Captain Capitalism’s blog, this book is a must-buy.

If you’ve read his blog and for some weird reason don’t enjoy it, then you probably won’t like this book, so I can’t recommend it.

If you’re really broke, but have a lot of time on your hands then you can read his archives instead.

Other than those two exceptions, I’d recommend getting Top Shelf.

Previous reviews for other books by Aaron Clarey:
Behind the Housing Crash
Worthless

Lightning Round – 2012/10/17

Read this post. Ian knocks it out of the park on Happily Ever After.
Related: The boomers destroyed traditional society, now, they reap the consequences.
Related: Childless women are miserably happy.
Related: Twu Wuv and game.

Feminist realizes traditional courtship is pretty good.
Related: 5 dates; what a lucky guy.
(Dude, if you somehow come across this: RUN NOW).
Related: Said feminist was a fraud.
Related: Feminist sex is a fraud.

Manosphere news: In Mala Fide has returned as an archive. It starts well.
More News: Congrats to the Captain.

When civil society dies, people will vote for their own self-interest.

Men are trained to be more afraid of fighting than of being hurt.

Violence is ok if it’s anti-ideological. Only sick people have ideology.

“One wonders if there’s a high correlation between “Angry Radical Leftists” and “Folks Who Don’t Get Math” ?”

Educated women’s contempt for men.
Related: Another article on snark; humour for the mentally enfeebled (when used in excess).
Related: A women mistakes feminist snark for humour.

Florida gets itself race-based academic goals.
GL Piggy comments.
Elusive Wapiti comments.
Related: I agree with France on the no homework thing, but their reason is idiotic.
Related: Education is not scalable.

Men struggle in marriage; the MSM is almost catching on.
Even the NYT notices it (in Italy).

How the destruction of marriage effects the welfare state.
Related: Bread and circuses.
Related: Is it really a win if the other team forfeits?

40% of every small business dollar goes to regulations.
Related: Thank you ADA.
Related: This guy is a total bastard.

“Nagging begot the Nanny State on Steroids.”

Women spend more on health care. Am I ever surprised.

The moral case for capitalism.
Related: An economics experiment.

Oh California…

The MSM, only a few months behind the Captain. Some day they’ll catch up.

Society is of women, civilization is of men.
Related: Cliques are for high school girls, not men.

The manosphere loves women by saving them from themselves.

SMP is harsh for both men and women. You can’t always get what you want.
As this guy exemplifies.
So does this women.

A man’s virginity is worth 1/100th of a woman’s. Colour me surprised.

Confidence in self-destructive choices.

What she doesn’t see, is that women enjoying womanly things is anti-feminist.

Amanda Todd was the result of a sick society. No legislation or anti-bullying will rectify this.
Related: How our schools train narcissists.

Why some parents hate parenting.

The purpose of psychiatric medication? No riots in DC.

What happens when you screw over a generation.

Science: This is kinda cool. Wonder what Koanic would say about the Denisovans?

Slowly, but surely, the MSM is coming to accept the science.

Fat is not only unhealthy, it will lower your testosterone.

The drug war explained in a single chart.

Only an over-educated, intelligent idiot could possibly believe the deficit is too small.
Only a liberal could believe we have too little debt.
Related: Krugman is a dishonest liberal shill, just like most “Keynesians”.
Related: Keynesianism just means spending.

Some thoughts from Nassim Taleb, an intellectual I actually respect.

Thomas Sowell, another intellectual I respect, shreds Obama.

That is hilarious. How do some people function in society?

Remember, Southerners, Republicans, and conservatives are racist.

4% of Americans get a “free” cell phone from the government.

Oh, for when Britain was free. How far she has fallen.

There has been no warming since 1997.

The UN needs to go.

Walmart gets into banking. Could be a game-changer.

How libertarians and alt-righters feel about the election:

(H/T: Maggie’s Farm, Instapundit, SDA, the Captain, Save Capitalism, Mojo, Patriactionary, Dalrock, the Hunt, GLP)

Lightning Round – 2012/09/12

Congrats to the Captain for becoming independent.

The state has destroyed marriage.

Patriactionary suggests an alternative marriage arrangement.
Related: Vox also suggests an alternative arrangement.

Some fun education news.
Related: Those who can avoid the public schools.
Related: The strike, like most of the public education system, is not for students.
Related: Smash the unions.

Women’s liberation means men’s liberation.

False rape accusations are real and not that uncommon.

“It’s their beastliness abusing my civility that angers me. That moment of realization was when I changed from egalitarian to chauvinist.”

“The Dark Triad man is successful sleeping with women because he thinks like his single mother–he is the wannabe rocker, the aspiring rapper. He is the disaffected ne’er-do-well of a single mother.”

You mean women want to stay home with their kids? Surprising.

A women talks of why she should be disenfranchised.

Don’t be a sheeple.

Fisking Jezebel on video games.

I too hate false humility. It annoys me very much.

Long live the Manosphere.

Traditional Christianity has reopened, without comments.

Roissy on IQ and the death penalty.

Mark Steyn on Sandra Fluke and the decline.

An informative post on China’s kleptocracy and it’s effect on the world economy.

A picture is worth a thousand words.

The US budget visualized.

Epigenetics sounds interesting.

Hehe. That’s pretty entertaining.

Proof psychology discriminates against conservatives.

Inside the Sex Offender cluster.
Related: Are pedophiles people too?
Realted: GLP on pedophilia.

How the internet effected prostitution.

Death by degrees.
Related: More student loans stories. These are almost becoming too common.

Bill Clinton: saying something useful almost two decades late.

The modern welfare state is doomed. Only the US dares talk of it.

You mean tax policy can have consequences?

Advocacy and science should be kept separate.

The Democrats condescend to women. I thin most feminists enjoying being condescended to.

Koch: End crony capitalism. I’m really starting to like Koch.

Discrimination against Christians in Britain.
Related: The DNC does something stupid.

(H/T: The Captain, Maggie’s Farm, Instapundit, SDA, GLP, VftP)

Lightning Round – 2012/09/05

Roosh discusses living in the moment: why it’s better to die early. He makes a good case for the Smith & Wesson retirement plan.
Danger & Play does not fully agree. I’ll give my take tomorrow.

Oneitis is for Your Wife’s Pussy. Cane knocks it out of the park.
Related: Get married.
Related: The truth about saving sex for marriage. ( 2 & 3).

Danny argues the manosphere should put aside our differences to fight the real enemy. This blog endorses that sentiment.
Related: The manosphere explained.

The social contract is being destroyed.
Related: Western civilization is over.
Related: A mother notices.

Why do people deny the old ways are best?

Dating is not war. At least, it shouldn’t be.

Don’t complain about sheep when looking for a wolf.

Self-deception in graph form.

The state destroys marriage.

Own your house and car anonymously.

Liberal racial hypocrisy.

Legal vs. illegal immigrants. The US immigration system is screwed.

Frost returns, renamed Elihu. Argues that we have no fate but what we make.

Science finds the rationalization hamster.

The Last Psychiatrist questions why 125 Harvard students felt compelled to cheat. Rips higher ed apart.

There terrifying new normal.  Ever notice how mainstream thinkers are always a few months behind the manosphere/alt-right blogosphere.
Related: We are doomed.

Bill is free. Makes me want to quit my job.

Red pill ministry.

A beginners guide to being alpha. I’ve completed four out of the six and am working on the last two. Nice.

Hehe. Some good satire.

Academia: the World’s Leading Social Problem.
Related: The product of academia.
Related: More entitlement.

We’ve reached $16-trillion in debt. Yay?

Wow. If true, this should be the financial scandal of the decade. The fed is in deep. Although, according to the comments it was “only” $1-trillion.

Draw your own conclusions.

Liberal media bias acknowledged.
Related: The media is the enemy.
Related: Some satire on fact-checkers.

Amanda Marcotte criticizes the concept that the people control the government. The tyrannical mind of the feminist laid plain.

I’m having the same experience as this guy. I didn’t really care for him, but the more I learn, the more I like the Romney.
Related: “That’s freedom, and I’ll take it any day over the supervision and sanctimony of the central planners.”

Zero tolerance idiocy.

(H/T: SAG, the Captain, Hidden Leaves, Maggie’s Farm, Instapundit, RWC&G)

Lightning Round – 2012/08/29

Patheos discovers the fruits of feminism and they don’t like it.
Related: Feminists should not lie to young women.
Related: HUS also responds to the Rosin piece that started all this.
Related: The hollow fruits of feminism.

Religion makes you beta. Not overly surprising, given the state of modern churchianity.

Masculinity and civilization.

The Red Pill for the manosphere: Each man must decide which is more important, love or sex.

If you marry, marry someone with a low partner count.

So, your parent’s divorcing decreases your life span by 5 years.
Related: “Parental divorce during childhood was the single strongest social predictor of early death.”
Related: The causes of divorce.

O’Rourke on the baby boomers. Excellent like most of O’Rourke’s stuff.

The real war is on children, not on women.

UMan provides a lessons on what girls like.

Cane with a some great satire on his previous Christian game debate.
Related: More on last week’s Christian game debate.
Related: SCA enters the Christian game debate with an excellent post.
Related: Vox advices has a Christian convert to game.

Why don’t men just get it?

Eye contact is important.

How not to be a racist: hehe.

A great piece on marriage.

Let’s have more teen pregnancy.

Why boys don’t read.

As a conservative who also listens to Rage Against the Machine, I found this to be very interesting.

Once you sell your soul once, it’s easy to sell it again.

Atheists demonstrate their open-mindedness.

And yet the socialists still want to have the government control the US’ and Canada’s resource industry. How stupid can they be?
Related: Socialized medicine in action.

I can’t believe that it took 7 years to find that standing in front of a bulldozer like an idiot makes you responsible for your own death. Stupid crusaders.

The former editor of the NYT admits to the NYT’s bias. Will wonders never cease?
Related: Jonathan Chait also admits to media bias.
Related: The leftist media enforces their bias.

Surprisingly, the NYT writes critically of single-motherhood. Unsurprisingly, the lack of “marriageable men” is blamed.
Related: A personal response by someone raised by a single mother.

Hey, slutwalkers…

This is the mainstream article of the week. Read it; it’s awesome satire and highly enjoyable. It’s got all the feminists, and other assorted idiots against it.
Related: Romney sounds like a decent fellow. Between this and the previous piece (read it) I think I might be coming to actually like Romney.
Related: The people who will be deciding the election. Oh my…
Related: The GOP does something right. Oh, yeah.

Student loans are a cancer.

To liberals, the real conservatives are the centrists.

The war on dihydrogen monoxide.

Paul Krugman is wrong? I think it would be more newsworthy if he was actually right.

(H/T: GL Piggy, Troglopundit, Maggie’s Farm, Althouse, Instapundit)

Lightning Round – 2012/08/01

Here’s my first Lightning Round since my return. As well, I’ve changed the dating system; it used to be each Tuesday, but for time reasons I ended up posting them at midnight, so nobody would actually see them until Wednesday. So now they will be dated for Wednesdays. Not a big deal, but thought I’d mention it.

Why do intelligent young men go on killing sprees?

Romney will lose because he’s beta and even if he won it wouldn’t matter. Aurini take on the elections echoes some of my thoughts.

If you are interested in marrying, do not try to impress the woman; invite her into your life instead.

The “demise of guys” is the result of men following their perceived rational self-interest. If you want young men to engage in society, you have to change the incentives so they want to participate.

Being a bureaucrat myself, I think Bill is a little harsh. It’s less the bureaucrats (at least the lower-level ones) than the system itself; again incentives. I’ll try to write more in-depth on this in the future.

The Captain examines the credentialism gap. The idea of learning a bunch of theory when young that you won’t be able to apply for years is quite asinine.

Idiots wonder about why female children become sexualized like it’s something unnatural. Dalrock points out is it’s natural when you remove cultural conditioning.

A tribute to Friedman, a voice for freedom.

Be free.

Printing assault rifles. Boo-yeah.
Related: Why we need the ability to print them.
Related: Remedial history. Hehe.

Roissy posits that the impact sexbots will be a thousandfold extension of the impact of pornography.

Given that I’m trying to start up an online side business, I appreciate this guide from Art of Manliness.

Hehe. That’s funny.

This is hilarious.

Stupid regulations. Also kinda funny, in a sad way.
Related: Opening a lemonade stand.

Haha… The husband would probably be better off if she did divorce him. Although, I question what kind of pathetic man would marry a harpy like that?

Hmmm… Why is Murfreeburo’s opposition to a mosque “bad” while Chicago’s banning of Chic-Fil-A is “good”. Silly leftists.

If Canada’s economy is the envy of Europe, why the hell do the liberals and leftists want to emulate European economic policies?
Related: What Obama doesn’t want you to know about Canada. Do you mean fiscal responsibility can actually be good for the economy? Shocking.
Related: America is kind of awesome.

An oldie, but it’s good to remember how wrong environmentalists are in their predictions.

Remember, if some groups are not capable of passing your tests, you must be a racist. If women can’t you’re a sexist. Both are illegal.

A possible pending food crisis.
Related: Possible economic apocalypse in China.

(H/T: Patricationary, Wintery Knight, SDA, GL Piggy)

Lightning Round – 2012/06/19

Another long Lightning Round today.

Roissy talks on post-scarcity; he’s not positive on it.

Aurini exposes the idiocy of mainstream discussion on demographics.

Patriactionary has a great list of quips.

Athol explains why men running the MAP have power.
Vox explains why most wives shouldn’t worry about that power and why it’s tragic when older women divorce; it’s kind of touching.

Dicipres finds a couple neat studies.

Dogsquat has a good post on the starter version of the approach attitude.

Forney points out the obvious; game’s pointless if you’re a loser.
The Last Psychiatrist explains how self-loathing protects you from stopping being a loser.

The Poet argues against “enjoying the decline”. Wonder how the Captain will respond?

Frost has a post on his father that is both touching and heartrending.
Related: Walsh shows very clearly how important fathers are.

Glorious Bastard asks what is a women?
Meanwhile, Wintery Knight discusses how feminists want to dominate men.
Related: If a feminist makes poor choices and regrets them the next day, the man should be punished.

A feminist admits there’s no war on women because, get this, not all women are the same. My question: why haven’t anti-abortionists started a “war on babies” meme? It seems like it could be effective.

Gender “equality” creates economic “inequality”.

Britain takes a pro-fatherhood stance on family law. Seems MRA’s have had some impact.

The atrocity you’ve never heard of; when the allies forcibly migrated  conquered foes and forced them into slave labour.

Fox has some good news on the black community. If more of them escape the hell of public schooling, there might be some improvement in their lot.
Related: Bribing the natives not to destroy their own homes.

When diversity hurts those it supposedly helps.

A discussion on measuring happiness. It’s good if you can get over the overly flowery language.

Mainstream economists discovers the obvious.
Some (only some?) mainstream economists are stupid.

The young are the new helots. If they knew what was good for them, they’d join the Tea Party.

The pathologizing of grief.

A libertarian wishlist.
Related: A nice bit of libertarian satire.
Related: Some people do not understand libertarianism at all.

If you want to remove the influence of money in politics, remove the power from politics.

(H/T: SDA, IP)

Lightning Round – 2012/06/12

Welcome back to the Lightning Round, we’ve got a large one today.

The emotions and our genetic drives of red-pill nihilism are just as enslaving and meaningless as blue-pill delusions. In a somewhat related post, Roissy talks of how players lose the ability to find divine love in their quest for meaningless sex.

Feminism is the ideological justification for female childlessness. No matter how much utopian ideologies may ignore it; choices have consequences.

Apocalypse Nowish gives one of the clearest, most straightforward explanations of how the banking system and the government are colluding to rob you.

In surprising news, a study shows government size and economic growth are negatively correlated. The Captain had already pointed out what could have been.

In related news, it seems Americans lost 20 years of wealth  between 2007 and 2010, and everybody makes less except seniors. Related: We are becoming a rental generation and the government refuses to learn from past mistakes.

But, Fearsome Pirate has hope that progressivism can be smashed, while Zero Hedge calls us to have courage in the fight against the tyrants.

Some are not so hopeful. Noting that in fact, Canada is actively destroying itself.

Zero Hedge says bring it on, the solution to our problems is collapse.

The Captain asks “Is it me, or is there something wrong with everybody else?”, and concludes it’s everybody else. Red-pill thinking requires a certain amount of arrogance.

Wintery Knight points out that young Christians are abandoning the fight in an anti-intellectual compartmentalization of the faith. Will S comments. If Christians give up on changing the culture, what then do we have?

****

Much has been written on Christian relationships in the manosphere in the last week:

Athol notes that the Bible was written for when men were all alphas under the law, so it recommends beta behaviour, but when culture betaized men, this created hardcore mode for Christian men.

Dalrock points out that the celibate boyfriend is non-biblical. All Christian relationships should be geared towards sex as soon as possible, within marriage.

UMan coins the phrase girligious and notes that Christian marriage has the advantage of a “a rule book written thousands of years ago” in our battle to preserve traditional marriage.

****

I knew men committed more suicide, but I never knew it was quite this bad. One possible cause could be that boys are persecuted by the public schools.

Wintery Knight points out the lie that homosexual couples are as good for raising children as straight couples. Related: A homosexual Mormon enjoys a happy an fulfilling heterosexual marriage and family.

Some people still blindly defend the worthless university system and encourage the degree bubble.

Every time I doubt the Conservative Party (and voting in general), they do some small thing that encourages me.

Ummm… No. Chivalry is for ladies, and there are few ladies nowadays.

(h/t: Instapundit, SDA, Wintery Knight, Save Capitalism)

Lightning Round – 2012/05/29

Mentu writes one of the best posts I’ve read on Christian game, a must for budding patriarchs. Read it now. I think I’m going to start learning game now.

Also, for patriarchs: a great list of things to teach your son.

Increasingly worthless. Related. Related to the related.

The state as God produces some odd thinking.

As an example: the left goes into the vapours whenever someone thinks about even touching their internet privacy, but you’re crazy if you don’t want the government forcing you to reveal personal aspects of your life for the census.

They sold themselves to the state under the social gospel and are reaping the rewards.

I wonder how common this actually is. Am I a sock-puppet?

I’m sure someone on the manosphere will object to this. Assuming any Quebecers are actually part of the manosphere.

Men’s centres are not welcome; men are too irresponsible and not educated enough on gender issues to have them.

The punishment for false rape accusations should be brutal.

Hehe.

Mugabe as UN tourism ambassador. About what I’d expect.

Sometimes you worry about the next generation.

(h/t SDA, Althouse, Smallest Minority)