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ArjinFerman

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joined 2022 September 05 16:31:45 UTC
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ArjinFerman


								
								
									
								
								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
Tinfoil Gigachad

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 05 16:31:45 UTC
				


				
					

					
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					




they lack the intelligence and positive vision for the future necessary to attract "elite human capital".




Elites don’t demand either of those things




You're mixing up terminology here. The elites are people with actual power. "Elite human capital" are a bunch of influencers with status anxiety, a Joffrey Baratheon complex, and a hate boner for populism.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Moreover, there's an opposing force: depending on who's in charge of the government, it can violate federal law to not act, with a bunch of fun questions when those regulations change after the action or inaction happens




The problem with that idea is that by forcing the doctors to provide treatment, politicians will be taking ownership of the entire scandal. Which can be fine if the treatment is actually good for people, and the odd malcontent is just a result of occasional incompetence or weird allergies. If, on the other hand, it's bad, politicians will have tied their own rope.


The idea reminds me of some Reddit post I saw, where transgenders were gloating that their doctor got around some red state ban by using the ICD code for an endocrine disorder, instead of gender dysphoria. Good for them, I guess. I totally can't imagine how this could come back and bite the doctor in the ass.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Yes, they are being forced to. We know this because the only reason the law even came about is became they double backed on their own promises to release the files to begin with.




That's not exactly the own you think it is. It's hard act outraged about Trump only releasing them when he was forced to by his own promise, when the other party was in a position to release them for years, but didn't, and didn't even promise to.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Now I am curious. Denizens of the Motte: How many of you see children between the ages of 8-12 out and about without a parent in your day-to-day life?




Europe is kinda split on the issue. There are countries that are extremely paranoid about it and people will literally call the cops on you, and countries where it's perfectly normal, and roving gangs of schoolkids are a common sight to see. I lived in both kinds.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Every single question asked by a political opponent has this goal, and yet only this question produces a segfault crash. Also, the opponents are getting a lot of play out of the refusal to answer as well, so it's not a it's not even working to avoid the issue. And also, if this was the case, there should be someone, somewhere who came up with a good answer, and I haven't seen one yet, even in contexts where soundbites aren't a threat (like, say, this forum).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Because the anti-transgender faction, in response to the distinction as initially drawn by the pro-trans faction, was to take social matters of 'gender' and re-cast them as matters of 'sex', thus attempting to undo the exact goal of the pro-trans side, namely that biological sex ought not determine anything in social situations.




They haven't re-cast them as sex, they just disagreed with the goal of the pro-trans faction. Seeing that they can't make a persuasive argument directly, the pro-trans side started playing language games, hoping they can hide the ball long enough to push their goals through.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Ok, what about that memo and the settlements? If he's right, it's a bit more than just Giuffre?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
You have to speak a little more clearly. Is the question itself supposed to be a trap? How? The only way I see it as one is that any answer exposes some contradiction in the ideology, at which point you're admitting the person setting the trap is correct.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


And we don't give the general public access to trucks, partly for exactly that reason. Even in the hoplophobic UK, it is harder to get a cat D endorsement on your driving licence (needed to drive a vehicle over 7.5T) than a rifle permit.




Isn't it weird then that I met a lot more truck drivers than gun owners?




Lahouaiej-Bouhlel had taken a job as a trucker about a year before the incident - it isn't obvious if this was a long-term evil scheme like Atta's flying lessons, or if it was a career decision that created an opportunity down the line.




The point is that if someone wanted to use a truck in an evil scheme, it's trivial to do so. Money is some concern but there are literal subsidies for people who want to get a truck license, and the criteria to get one aren't particularly high. It's the quintessential working class job.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


but the non-murderous trans people you're interested in being nice to understandably perceive misgendering any trans person as an insult to them as a group.




This assumes the Queer Theory worldview to be axiomatically correct, where it's not a disorder, but a valid identity that each individual can put on and off at will, and a refusal to acknowledge could be construed as an attack on the validity of the entire identity.


I reject that view. Like I said, the view I would be endorsing is trans-medicalism. Asking that I pretend a man is a woman is already a tall order, but like I said, if that makes their life somehow more bearable, it's something I can indulge, if the person is otherwise reasonable.


Asking that I pretend that all men, that declare themselves to be women, are women, no matter how they conduct themselves, is deranged behavior, and a request they have no right to make.




Similarly, you may not care about a black murderer's feelings, but you shouldn't call him the N-word in a newspaper article, because it would be hurtful to your non-murderous black readers.




"Nigger" is an unambiguous insult. It's seen this way by people who hear it and are insulted by it, as well as by people who say it. Even when black people use it affectionately between themselves, the core meaning is still an insult, they are just adding sarcasm on top of it, to invert the meaning into something positive.


"Man" is a neutral factual term. It's not being used to insult trans people when relating a story about a trans murderer. It's being used the exact same way  it would be, if the murderer was a non-trans male.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Somehow I doubt there was a "last time" anyone implied that




Well, I'll happily admit I'm prone to reading into things when they rub me the wrong way. Still, that's the impression I was left with.




but can we at least agree that we should first try sifting the ore from the slag before declaring we've struck gold?




Yes, absolutely. I didn't mean to attack reasonable skepticism.




We’d expect repeated third party victim accounts converging on the same powerful clients.




Agreed.




We’d expect at least one cooperating witness able to describe the system mechanics in detail.




Agreed.




We’d expect financial structures that clearly map to services rendered beyond “social hosting.” We’d expect leverage events, like documented attempts at coercion, extortion demands, hush money escalations that can be tied to specific encounters.




I don't know about that.


You're assuming this is transactional, rather than a honeypot meant to accumulate influence and/or enable intelligence gathering. There wouldn't be any hush money demands, if the demand is for getting your people to "penetrate ze cabinets" as it were. I don't know how you expect to tie them to specific encounters either, if they take place face to face.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


it would imply a very weird outlook where ability to change one's social gender is some sort of… revocable privilege?




What's weird about that? I'm skeptical of the science behind Trans, but if it convinced me my view would be Trans-Med: there are people with a disorder called "gender dysphoria" and going along with their preferences alleviates their suffering a bit. As long as someone is a functional member of society and in good standing, I can go along with that. It's not that they're allowed to change their pronouns, it's that they're being indulged, the same way I'd indulge an autistic weirdo like Richard Stallman, or Linus Torvalds. Why should I indulge a murderer, though?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The Nice truck attack had a bigger body count than most mass shootings.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The correct analogy would be if people were stumped about the "what is a sandwich" question. Once you have a definition for a category, you can have a debate about whether a specific instance belongs to one category or another. If it the category really is fuzzy, you'll have actual arguments for why that is, and why a specific instance falls somewhere in the middle, making it difficult to classify.


We've head these sorts of conversations countless times: what is a race, or a species? Does an animal belong to one or the other? What is a planet? Is Pluto one?


What you don't normally get is the Blue Screen of Death when you ask someone to define their terms.




I am once again asking you to Read the Sequences.




I'm yet to hear a good argument for doing so.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Epstein appears to have been a sexual predator who, in at least one period of his life, did engage in conduct meeting trafficking definitions involving minors (to himself).




Well,we're getting somewhere. Last we had this conversation here, I almost had the impression he's just a poor boy that dindu nothing.




But there's nothing to substantiate a baroque, centrally managed blackmail syndicate spanning half the planet. Wealthy and powerful people likely did participate in morally compromising environments,




The problem with that argument is that barring Epstein et all acting like complete idiots, and exchanging emails like "Oi, can you send little Suzy over to Steve's place, he's really dtf some 12-year-olds" without even a figleaf of plausible deniability, there's no reason to expect substantiation. Or am I missing something, and there is some form of evidence you'd reasonably expect to appear in this scenario, that we are just not seeing?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 9, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I was surprised and apparently what this really means is 'they used chamber pots' not 'people were relieving themselves in the halls openly'.




Not being able to argue for the status, the powers that be set out to slander our past. Almost every widely held negative belief that I heard about it, turned out to be inaccurate in the way you described.