It became real when I saw the list. When I saw the rubric.

December 4, 2023 4:20 AM

The Placeholder Girlfriend // a short story by Conor Barnes.
posted by Ten Cold Hot Dogs (50 comments total)

Then she showed me a child dying of malaria. I shook my head and said “Humans should try to be as effective with their charitable giving as they are with their big purchases. We have so much potential to do good in the world.”

Hmm. Hmmmmmmm.
posted by simmering octagon at 4:55 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

"un-self-aware Harry Potter nostalgia"

I think this was the most interesting element of the story to me, because, like, it shows as a red flag to me, one that definitely and immediately affected the amorphous, vague mental spreadsheet I keep of people.

Is the moral about the fact that we all keep those spreadsheets anyway, and we overvalue the concept of actually creating a formal record of those things, when we all do it on some level?
posted by Audreynachrome at 4:59 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

I'm very unclear on how much of this is non-fiction, but it feels kinda like a lot of hard work & personal growth but make it magic intellectualism. I like it, I'm a sucker for sequences where a character goes through video game-esque levelling up. It's very satisfying.

On spreadsheets: it's cold to rate people like she did on an actual spreadsheet.... But gosh I love spreadsheet people and I want to see what other ones she makes
posted by Baethan at 5:02 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

If a lot of fiction is just about imagining a new type of guy, I'm here for the fiction that is about the girlfriend who gives you a weekly analytical report on your statistical performance, improvements and deficiencies. I'm not going to pretend I wouldn't be at least curious.
posted by Audreynachrome at 5:12 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

She was only a 10 lover when I was a 10 lover with her.

and

It was not sweet. It was not the crowning achievement of my winter. It was just done.

flagged as fantastic
posted by chavenet at 5:38 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

The extremely metrics driven girlfriend strikes me as EA aligned as the sociopath-training tutor ( an econ student would be more emotionally stable, heh.)

After all how do you know if your girlfriend is maximally effective in the marketplace of dating if you aren’t measuring it?
posted by theclaw at 5:42 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

I’m extremely interested in fiction exploring the concept of the placeholder girlfriend, but I don’t know that this one really explores how awful it is quite enough, which makes me think maybe it is more autobiographical than fictional? Still interesting though.
posted by corb at 5:50 AM on December 4, 2023

which makes me think maybe it is more autobiographical than fictional?

To me it reads like the fantasy of a tech bro. The magic powers of mushrooms, the "effective charity" bit, the way the main character goes "I can change every aspect of my life through sheer willpower." I don't know anything about the author but it wouldn't surprise me if they were a rationalist*.

*pejorative
posted by simmering octagon at 6:04 AM on December 4, 2023 [13 favorites]

> I don't know anything about the author but it wouldn't surprise me if they were a rationalist*.

I got the same vibe. I keep wanting to think it's self-aware about coming across like a bro and it's poking fun at these tropes, but IDK, there's equal amounts of evidence for and against this theory.

For example, the effective charity bit is OBVIOUSLY satirizing rational bros (right??). But then the "change my whole life through sheer willpower" seems to be played completely straight, and the narrator gets an uncomplicated and perfect happily ever after ending. What?
posted by MiraK at 6:28 AM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

I took the Harry Potter reference as straightforward irony: a person identifying red flags while being, well, a walking red flag.

It made me think of how the most sociopathic woman I know is scrupulous about leaving big tips. My gut feeling is she heard/read that you can tell a person's character by how they treat waitstaff and incorporated it into managing people's impressions of her.

A fully grown adult who ranks their partner out of ten in a spreadsheet is much more likely to be thinking that un-self-aware Harry Potter nostalgia is a bad look, than an ethical or empathy problem per se.

I don't think it's autobiographical. It's a what if scenario that's very aware of make over tropes. In real life it would not be possible to level up, if one were to try, because the sort of person who keeps a comparative spreadsheet of their partners is characterologically inclined to find fault.
posted by Ballad of Peckham Rye at 6:29 AM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

Is it odd that what stuck out the most to me was the nebulous academic status of the protagonist? I thought they described themself as a grad student at first, but then they referred to their tutors as “the grad students” in a manner that implicitly excluded the protagonist themself. Also, that they seem to know that some study and practice is required for learning new skills, and that learning itself is a skill, but instead of learning and practicing how to learn, they just took a megadose of shrooms? Together with the unrealistically short timeline for all the things the protagonist changed about themself, it rather gives the impression that the author has heard of “growth mindset” but doesn’t really understand the concept yet. (I guess what I’m saying is that this story is not a 10 on epistemic consistency? :P)
posted by eviemath at 6:39 AM on December 4, 2023 [5 favorites]

I love spreadsheet people

wait does everyone not do this
posted by dmd at 6:40 AM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

‘Course, if this is intended as satire, the inconsistency is probably part of the point. That might also explain the part where the protagonist got good at sex by practicing with one guy, which skills transferred wholesale to the girlfriend, because sex is of course just a single, one-dimensional thing and not at all based on individual preferences or quirks, or involving any significant differences depending on one’s partner’s gender or anatomy.
posted by eviemath at 6:56 AM on December 4, 2023 [6 favorites]

And of course "practicing" sex with the guy is... cheating? Wouldn't that lower her own self-rating in the game she plays inside her head and/or count as revenge? Which points to this story being super self-aware! But then I also thought that her "emotion" coach was totally clued into what was happening (unbeknownst to the narrator) but in the end they're dating. So... *not* self-aware then?
posted by MiraK at 7:05 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

I don't know anything about the author but it wouldn't surprise me if they were a rationalist*.

You know who else unironically likes Harry Potter?

Effective altruists.
posted by kaibutsu at 7:10 AM on December 4, 2023 [5 favorites]

Which points to this story being super self-aware!

Or the fantasy of some dude who recently graduated from UofT with an honours degree (requires writing a thesis, but isn’t a grad student), who is a bit of a stan for the mushrooms and EA tech bro culture - unintentional rather than intentional satire. That was my impression on reading the story, but also it seems like the author is probably younger, maybe queer, and coming from fandom writing, in which case I would not want to be unfairly uncharitable in my assumptions. The intentional satire reading is also a possibility.
posted by eviemath at 7:18 AM on December 4, 2023 [2 favorites]

It made me think of the equivalent process in WoW - when you level a toon to maximum, and when you get there, you realise the endgame isn't worth the bother, and decide to just wait for the next expansion
posted by Cardinal Fang at 7:37 AM on December 4, 2023

<table>
<tr><td>poster</td><td>Jessamyn</td><td>Cortex</td><td>(Mod on Duty)</td><td>(your name here)</td><td>...</td></tr>
<tr><td>...</td></tr>
</table>

Actually I'm not witty enough to pull this off... (Reverend John, Wittiness: 4.2, Dance: -10, Looks: 3)
posted by Reverend John at 7:43 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

One of the rare occasions when something would look better in raw LaTeX...

\begin{tabular}{cccccc}\toprule
Poster        &   Wittiness &  Dance &  Looks & Dopeness & Smartbrain\\\midrule
Reverend John &   4.2       & -10    &  3     & 14       &  7\\
\bottomrule
\end{tabular}

posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:59 AM on December 4, 2023 [7 favorites]

If the other shoe dropped, I didn't hear it fall.
posted by Hogshead at 8:28 AM on December 4, 2023

Oh. Oh no.

I am a spreadsheet person. My wife has suggested more than once that it might be ASD; I haven't looked into it. A FWB once called it "weirdly pro-social sociopathy", which doesn't feel quite right either. Here's a small sampling of some of the Excel files you can find on my computer:

• The recipient of every one of the thousands of greeting cards I have sent over the past eleven years, along with the date the card was sent, a brief synopsis of what was written in the card and details of anything included in the card (birthday money, for example, or Pokemon cards for my nephew).
• Every hike I have gone on dating back to the start of 2015 (I hike a minimum of 52 times a year); the date, the location and whoever was accompanying me.
• Every pie I have made going back to 2015; the date I made it, the type of pie and whether I shared it with anyone. It took me an embarrassingly long time before I thought to refer to this as my "pie chart".
• A list of all of my friends who like to receive baked goods, along with all of their preferred mailing addresses for receiving packages, their allergies and any non-allergy releated dietary restrictions.
• Everyone with whom I've had sex since 2008, along with the dates it happened. I take some comfort in the knowledge that I have not instituted a rating system here.
• My daily weigh-ins.
• An absurdly detailed list of every experience point expenditure I'm planning to make for my LARP character for the next three years.
• A list of all my friends noting who likes receiving Valentine's Day cards and who doesn't.

I also keep everything in my calendar. There has been a lot of discussion in the emotional labor threads about the mental load of caring enough to notice things but we have computers now; make a system. Wash the dishes every night. Get a reminder every ten days to wash the household linens. Schedule a notice one week before each friend's birthday to send a card (two weeks if they live internationally). You only need to notice something once, then you can extrapolate how often you'll need to address it and put it in the calendar with a recurring notification. Now you have a system. Systems are more reliable than having to re-notice something every single time it comes up.

I do not have a girlfriend rubric but while I have never actually written out the list I do mentally categorize basically everyone in my life into one of four categories:

• Problem Solvers
• Not Problems
• Problems to be Solved
• Problems to be Avoided

These categories are somewhat porous; I recognize that a person who is normally a Problem to the Solved may situationally become a Problem Solver (my childhood was a long exercise in moving my parents between these two designations) or vice versa. Moving a person from the Problem to the Solved column to Not a Problem feels good, but in terms of sheer relief I find it's hard to beat moving someone from Problem to be Solved to Problem to be Avoided.

All of this came about as survival tactics during a weird and often scary childhood. I've spent some time in therapy examining whether I'm still well-served by them but in frankness I'm happy with where my life is at right now and all of the people whose opinions I care about seem happy with how I do things so I haven't felt much incentive to change. 

Anyway, my tl;dr review of the FPP is that I'm in this picture and I don't like it.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 8:33 AM on December 4, 2023 [79 favorites]

Parasite Unseen, I'm frankly in awe. Keep being you: I wish I could.

Ballad of Peckham Rye said, It made me think of how the most sociopathic woman I know is scrupulous about leaving big tips. My gut feeling is she heard/read that you can tell a person's character by how they treat waitstaff and incorporated it into managing people's impressions of her.

Does it matter? If she's still treating the waitstaff well, whether she's doing it because she feels it's the right thing to do or because it's her genuine desire, the waitstaff are still being treated well, so it's a win-win. YMMV.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 8:47 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

/reads over thread

/updates spreadsheet
posted by MonsieurPEB at 8:47 AM on December 4, 2023 [8 favorites]

The essay is weirdly appropriate for my annual deep dive into Christmas-themed rom coms. Now we just need one of the background characters to be Santa Claus in disguise.
posted by TrishaU at 8:47 AM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

I thought that having Evil Girlfriend's thesis be about autonomist feminism of the seventies was absolutely perfect. There was a time when I hung out with a lot of humanities grad students. I was not a grad student because, fundamentally, I could not afford to earn that little for that long.

Man, those people were assholes. Just the worst. They were incredibly terrible to me in front of each other because that was a way to show each other that they were powerful and smart - they'd be nice to me in private and make me the butt in group settings. They were terrible friends to each other in a really hierarchical way, all kissing up to the smartest and meanest one and being progressively crueler to the less talented and less mean, or often just to the youngest and least self-confident.

And of course all their theses were about awesome left wing things.

It was only a few years out of my late twenties, but at the time it felt like forever. I think I've mentioned this on here before, but the only nice one was also the only one who went on to have a good career.
posted by Frowner at 8:48 AM on December 4, 2023 [14 favorites]

Does it matter?

Not to the person receiving the money. It matters that she is a horrible person in other ways, and shows of generosity may make some more fundamental problems with how she treats people take longer to detect.
posted by Ballad of Peckham Rye at 9:11 AM on December 4, 2023 [6 favorites]

Does it matter?

Yes, most certainly. There are plenty of people who like to be seen giving vast amounts to charity, while at the same time exploiting their own customers / staff / family / friends.
posted by Cardinal Fang at 9:11 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

I got $10 on this story being the author's public processing of the fallout from having kept a spreadsheet on a partner in the past.
posted by keep_evolving at 9:30 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

I thought it was pretty funny, though I think it pulled its punches giving the protagonist a new better girlfriend at the end.

The only satisfying response to such a spreadsheet would be to delete all the data, and leave on the one remaining sheet YOU ARE A WORTHLESS PIECE OF SHIT, BURN IN HELL ASSHOLE in giant red letters.
posted by emjaybee at 9:37 AM on December 4, 2023

Does it matter? If she's still treating the waitstaff well, whether she's doing it because she feels it's the right thing to do or because it's her genuine desire, the waitstaff are still being treated well, so it's a win-win.

It doesn't matter to the waitstaff, it matters to your shorthand evaluation. The point of the evaluation is as a datapoint for how people treat the powerless people who can't harm them - if people are artificially gaming that because they've realized that being seen treating these people badly *can* harm them it is no longer useful as an evaluative technique.
posted by corb at 9:44 AM on December 4, 2023 [2 favorites]

Here's my alternate ending:

That night I got coffee with my new friend. When her hair fell in front of her eyes, I moved it back. When she asked if everything was okay and I told her it was good now, I could feel the warmth of her happiness radiate across the table. Empathy: 7.5. No, a solid 8. I started to reach for my phone, then thought, no, I'll update the spreadsheet tonight when I get home.
posted by snofoam at 9:46 AM on December 4, 2023 [6 favorites]

GCU Sweet and Full of Grace, would looking better in raw latex be net positive or negative?

(I think I would lose points for how hard it was for me to get my \underbrace into my \table.)
posted by adekllny at 9:52 AM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

The happy ending is they start dating an econ student. Clearly satire.
posted by phooky at 10:07 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

I keep wanting to think it's self-aware about coming across like a bro and it's poking fun at these tropes, but IDK, there's equal amounts of evidence for and against this theory.

The guy’s blog is written in full-on rationalist/EA in-group language, so I think we can put that question to rest.
posted by mbrubeck at 10:09 AM on December 4, 2023 [10 favorites]

I love spreadsheet people.

I am a polyamorous person currently in a long-distance relationship with a person, A, whom I love very much. I posted this to Facebook this morning:

A. has a very active dating life. I have trouble keeping track of names. Which leads to snippets of conversation like this:

A: Two people asked me on dates today.

Me: One sec, let me get my spreadsheet open.
posted by Well I never at 10:45 AM on December 4, 2023 [2 favorites]

I do not have a girlfriend rubric but while I have never actually written out the list I do mentally categorize basically everyone in my life into one of four categories:
Problem Solvers
Not Problems
Problems to be Solved
Problems to be Avoided

I fucking love this. Thank you for it.
posted by Well I never at 10:49 AM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

I feel like if your idea of Ambition: 10 is to spend a year training so that when you break up with your girlfriend she'll feel bad, you need a bunch more points in Imagination, Perspective, and Self-worth.
posted by aubilenon at 10:49 AM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

The story was fun but the real revelation was Parasite Unseen's beautiful lifeways. The spreadsheet in the story was cold and self-serving. Parasite Unseen's are all warm and courteous and probably make them the greatest friend/relative to have and a fun person to be. The systems are beautiful. It's a whole self-help manual in a couple of paragraphs.
posted by Don Pepino at 11:59 AM on December 4, 2023 [23 favorites]

this story was plagarised from twitter
posted by lalochezia at 12:11 PM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

^har!
posted by Don Pepino at 1:26 PM on December 4, 2023

How can you be in a relationship when you're also outside of the relationship in order to observe and keep score?
posted by tommasz at 1:33 PM on December 4, 2023

GCU's table, as markdown:

| Poster        | Wittiness | Dance | Looks | Dopeness |
|---------------|-----------|-------|-------|----------|
| Reverend John | 4.2       | -10   | 3     | 14       |

posted by Pronoiac at 2:15 PM on December 4, 2023 [2 favorites]

I like how we pretend our social media profiles aren't the spreadsheet.
posted by MonsieurPEB at 2:31 PM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

I don't think this is a very good mefi post. It only has 14 favorites.
posted by AlSweigart at 3:35 PM on December 4, 2023 [4 favorites]

Dang, that's way more Dopeness than I ever thought I could achieve! I'm going to go to bed happy and get up tomorrow and be my Dopest possible self! Thank you, my most excellent tabular pals!
posted by Reverend John at 9:41 PM on December 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

"My favourite writers were not chill. They were fucked up. I remembered that my girlfriend’s favourite writer was Sylvia Plath so I got really into her husband and the people Plath admired and considered better than her. "
posted by kandinski at 10:04 PM on December 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

I mean, I'm not not a spreadsheet person. The ones I keep for myself are usually fairly bare-bones, and often eventually abandoned, but I've been known to appreciate a good spreadsheet at work. I think Parasite Unseen's list is quite inspirational.

Still, time and place, you know.. . Ultimately it's not about the data you track, but about the meaning you read into it. I'm all for tracking stuff - sometimes, if you feel something is off, it's good to have data to look at for clues, and not just vibes. Sometimes a look at the data reveals that the problem is not actually very mysterious and there are obvious solutions. Sometimes it doesn't, but that doesn't mean the vibes are baseless, just that the solution is going to be less obvious. Tracking is not always going to yield actionable insights, but it's often useful enough.

Rating however? Rating is reading meaning into things, in a way that to me often feels pretty forced, and inflexible, and misleading. I'm a teacher, I'm doing enough of that for work. The benefit is debatable, and it's hands down my least favourite part of my job. I'm not doing any rating unless I get paid.
posted by sohalt at 1:20 AM on December 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

> Dang, that's way more Dopeness than I ever thought I could achieve! I'm going to go to bed happy and get up tomorrow and be my Dopest possible self

.... wait, if this is Jason Mendoza's rating system (and it sounds like it might be?) the highest score is 8 and any number above that is a lower rating because the scale goes back down.

Sorry!!
posted by MiraK at 2:54 AM on December 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

You did get a 7 in the "smart brain" category which is awesome, Reverend John ;)
posted by MiraK at 11:04 AM on December 5, 2023 [1 favorite]

Mod note: Parasite Unseen's comment and this thread have been added to the Best Of blog!
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 9:02 AM on December 9, 2023