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FirmWeird

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joined 2022 September 05 23:38:51 UTC 

				
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FirmWeird


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I honestly don't understand if this is a disagreement or tough words because you think I'm hypocritical.




Both - my apologies if I came off too hostile. I've recently been somewhat sleep deprived and that may have made my words a bit harsher than would be ideal.




I think big powers and small powers differ, and I think not all parts of the world are of equal importance to foreign politics (I should note that certain areas of Asia as you correctly note are also of high importance in a way yet another civil war in Sudan is not).




As someone who doesn't live in Europe, I got the mistaken impression you were ignoring the relevance of the far larger region of the world which I actually live in. Mea culpa.




"Total consistency" is not the benchmark to grade a foreign policy approach even remotely. It's not just naive, it's counter-productive.




I agree with you here - foreign policy should be tailored to a specific situation and total consistency isn't always the best way to go about it. But that's very much not the case when it comes to proposed norms.




My long-preferred solution is for everyone to stop being forever at cross-purposes and just accept that all of Israel needs to fully integrate somehow, and work on doing that and all of its mess well.




I agree with you here too - I'm on record as supporting a single state solution with full franchise and democracy. I disagree with the idea that they're a good anchor or ally, but I think that's a bit beyond the scope of this discussion.




Back to the point. It's somewhat natural for states, including big ones, to want influence over their neighbors. But despite being a much-maligned word, "norms" actually do work on big states in a way that they do not on small states, since they are more stable, long-term actors.




I even agree with you that a norm against wars of aggression and conquest are a good thing, but your proposed norms just aren't fit for purpose. If Israel can do what they do with the full support of the US without violating these norms then they're just completely worthless. All Russia would have to do to comply with your norms is put on a figleaf and announce that they're donating materiel, training and expertise to the Donbass republic. Absolutely nothing would change on the ground and the war would still be taking place, but your norm would be satisfied due to the loophole that you're leaving in to allow the US to continue to aggressively wage war. China would still be able to reconquer Taiwan, they'd just have to announce they're supporting the faction of Taiwanese who want reunification - and your norm would be satisfied despite the war it was meant to prevent taking place.


Foreign policy does not have to be totally consistent - but that is absolutely not the case for proposed norms. If the US says that wars of conquest are bad and then proceeds to fund, support and profit from a war of conquest then you aren't actually proposing a norm, you're proposing a set of rules which handicap other great powers but don't prevent you from engaging in the proscribed behavior. It is explicitly bad faith negotiation, and the morally correct response for other great powers is to tell you to fuck off. "You don't get to change your borders through military force" is a perfectly fine norm - but it is universal or it does not exist.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Even granting that in this specific case the subject in question is not broadly anti-American




In this case he's actually pro-American - American interests are hurt by your entanglement with Israel and the various blackmail/influence operations they run (ever hear about why the Monica Lewinsky affair happened?), but sure.




that permanent residents cannot have their status revoked for any free speech activity, even including explicit subversion and undermining of our own policy




Yes, this is actually a good thing. Free speech is good and if your policy can't stand up to criticism then it deserves to be criticised. Mahmoud does not have magical powers which mean that his protests against the genocide of his people make American policy less effective - what you're actually saying here is that American policy is so weak, fragile and ineffective that it cannot withstand even the mildest of criticism. You're claiming that the entire US foreign policy establishment is effectively an emperor with no clothes, and that's so much worse than the possibility that someone who is only a mere permanent resident can criticise government policy that I can't understand your position here.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I think this is a little overstated. All ICBMs are "hypersonic" but we've had defenses against them for decades




That's why I said newest round of hypersonics. Yes, we have defences against the older version of the technology - but I don't think asking the Russians to only use the old missiles that we can intercept instead of the new ones we can't is going to work terribly well.




There's also no reason to think that soft-kill systems wouldn't work on hypersonics that I can think of.




Depends on the type of system to be quite honest. Maybe there's some classified technology that will do the job, but there's nothing publicly available to the best of my knowledge.




My point here isn't that hypersonics aren't pretty scary, but I think they degrade existing missile defenses rather than render them futile.




Existing missile defenses are also vulnerable to spoofing attacks and large numbers of decoy missiles - this is just another nail in the coffin.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


If so the only logical response would be to dramatically increase the scrutiny applied to granting of permanent resident status. It is unacceptable that we would be required to import people who seek to destroy us.




Us? He's protesting against Israel, not the US. Those are two separate countries, and the Israelis have done objectively more harm to the US and US interests than the Palestinians ever have. How many US navy ships have been bombed by Palestinian fighter jets?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
That interaction really struck me as more significant than a lot of people think. Sam Seder can't argue against that woman because what she's asserting are the core tenets of the vampire castle's doctrine, just from the other side. If he tried to say that America isn't based on white supremacy/european identity, he would instantly be accused of endorsing a racist, nativist right wing narrative, and he can't just take the standard approach for dealing with this argument (getting her fired and ostracized) because the vampire castle is no longer in a position of authority and power. These weaknesses in modern left wing thought have been there the entire time, it's just that nobody was able to make use of them outside anonymous and underground spaces where people don't lose their job for saying Malia Obama is more privileged than a redneck in a trailer park with a family tree consisting entirely of meth addicts and alcoholics. I'd hope that the left takes this as a chance to reform and deal with the terrible state they've gotten into, but I think it's more likely that existing left wing power structures are going to self immolate and lose the support of their base so they can cheerlead for the deportation of people like Mahmoud Khalil instead.


Also, if anyone is unfamiliar with the term "vampire castle" I'm referring to an essay by Mark Fisher which you can read here https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/opendemocracyuk/exiting-vampire-castle/


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Before we engage in fantasies of mighty Russian army reaching the English channel like the last three years never happened




They'd just let the British leadership know that the start of the conflict would involve an oreshnik hitting them and the Brits would immediately surrender when they learned that it wouldn't just be poor people dying.




The current situation is the equivalent of the entire US being halted in Tijuana during an attempted invasion of Mexico (and indeed, having to fight the Mexicans in Arizona two years into the war).




If we're going to adopt that metaphor then you would also have the entirety of China and Latin America supplying advanced munitions, satellite targeting data, ammunition, "trainers", training and equipment while also sanctioning the US' economy and preventing any chips from TSMC getting exported. It's actually entirely believable to me that the US would struggle to take territory in those circumstances - and at the same time, when that support came to an end, the US would be able to bulldoze their way to Chile without much difficulty.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Those NATO arms also erased vast quantities of Russian invaders and their hardware, making Russia even less of a threat to NATO than they were before the war.




It is generally agreed that the Russian army is stronger than it was before the war started. A lot of the corruption and dead weight was forcibly cleaned out by actual combat, and they've made multiple advances in weapon technology in the same timeframe. Their missile technology has advanced to the point that it is superior to NATO technology (there's no NATO equivalent to the Oreshnik) and their soldiers have substantially more experience on modern battlefields than NATO troops, and against NATO weaponry to boot. Even on the manufacturing side, they're producing substantially more shells and ammunition than NATO is, especially if you include all their other allies. If Russia wanted to invade and take over the entirety of Western Europe the only way to stop them would be nuclear. Have you seen the pathetic size and readiness of most NATO militaries?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
And substantially less militarily equipped. Vast sums of arms and ammunition (and plenty of "trainers") were sent to Ukraine to be destroyed or sold on the black market. Sure, there are more nations in NATO, but the USA is making loud noises about leaving and the military investment just isn't there. NATO being larger doesn't even rise to the level of a refutation of RandomRanger's point - bigger is not always better.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Defensive technology is simply too good. Even Houthi rebels have ballistic anti ship missiles.




I agree with your overall point but I think you have this mixed up slightly - the problem is not that defensive technology is too good but precisely the opposite. Anti-missile technology hasn't advanced to the same degree as missile technology, and there's now a significant advantage on the offensive side. There are only hypothetical defence systems against the newest round of hypersonics (which the US doesn't even have), and this is going to cause a major shift in wars - it means that incredibly expensive floating targets protected by sophisticated anti-missile systems can be taken down and defeated by far less expensive offensive technologies.


What makes this even worse for any nations who invested vast sums of money into expensive and now obsolete-against-peer-competitor technologies is that those expensive technologies now have political constituencies who will aggressively advocate for more money to be poured into them, preventing any kind of adaptation or shift until serious consequences have already shown up.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Do you have any actual evidence that he was lying or just insinuations?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


and also because Israel comments often feel more like bait than legitimate attempts at discussion




Bait? I'm being completely earnest here, and it seemed to me like you just ignored the Israel question and went on a tangent because it completely destroys your main argument.




Sure, they took a little more land from Syria recently, but that's whatever, they didn't even fight over it.




See, you don't actually care about these norms at all. "Yeah we come down really harshly on gaining new territory via conquest but Israel doesn't have to abide by those rules because... umm, they just don't, okay!" is not a norm that anyone will give a single shit about. Why should Russia or China care in the slightest about this supposed norm against wars of conquest when your moral condemnation passes silently over Israel and gives them a pass to exterminate an unwelcome ethnicity because of their stated desire for more lebensraum? Why can't Russia, China or 1930s Germany simply claim the same "that's whatever" exemption Israel does? And if you want to say that Israel didn't even fight over it, do you want me to go get some evidence of Israel's frequent military interventions in Syria before the fall of the Assad regime?




But their behavior falls far short of "expansionist wars" by most measures (I guess they've invaded Lebanon a time and a half? Is that what you're referring to?).




Syria, Lebanon and Palestine. If you don't think that what happened to Palestine counts, then Russia and China can simply adopt the same strategy and conquer new territory in the same fashion.




Anyways, this has nothing to do with the value of lives and everything to do with the balance of world power + avoiding mega-wars.




Asia's population is almost 7 times larger than Europe's - a total war that impacted the entirety of Europe would barely even be a regional conflict by Asian standards. China alone is a far larger player in the real global economy than Europe is - the TSMC fabrication plants getting destroyed and Japanese shipping getting interdicted due to conflict seems to me like it would have a far larger knock-on effect than anything Russia or the US would do to Europe. It seems like you agree with that, but I got the opposite impression when you claimed(seemingly, my apologies if I misunderstood) earlier that "in Europe" rendered a conflict more serious than elsewhere in the world.




I don't think we have some kind of moral duty to police everyone, though I do think we can do some smaller things to help keep stuff stable.




The US is currently aiding and abetting Israel's aggression, and actively working to prevent peace in the region. You're right that there's no moral duty to police everyone, but there is a moral duty to police those who you shower with mountains of blood and treasure. As for keeping stuff stable, I have good news - with Trump and Elon Musk demolishing both USAID and the NED, a lot of places around the world are going to be substantially more stable (especially Latin America).




So do I hold big states to a different standard than small states?




So it's fine to be an aggressive, expansionist power, you just can't get too big. Would you be fine with Russia's invasion of Ukraine if they instead simply loaned all their troops and equipment to the Donbass Republic? After all, you can't hold small states to the same standard as large ones like Russia.




I don't think such a world-view is possible, not with total consistency.




I oppose wars of aggression and conquest no matter the size of the states in question - I am an advocate for peace and believe that peaceful co-existence is not just possible but an ideal worth striving for. Total consistency with no pretzels needed! Of course, actually adjudicating whether or not a given war is a war of aggression can be tough in some circumstances, but you get that issue with just about any world-view.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I think if we're all being honest there is an actual difference between wars of aggression by a major world power and in Europe than elsewhere in the world.




I don't think that. What, exactly, makes the lives of people outside of Europe worth less than those of Europeans? Why would it be more acceptable for China to invade my nation than it would be for Russia to invade Poland?




It doesn't fit the expansionist mold, and expansionist wars by major powers are the most dangerous kind, the kind we want to discourage.




Ok, so what about Israel? They are explicitly waging expansionist wars with the backing of the US, a major power. Why didn't you address the core point of my comment and instead go onto a tangent about Iraq? I mean, I agree that the Iraq war was a terrible idea, but what does that actually have to do with the west's full-throated and enthusiastic support of expansionist wars by heavily militarised ethnostates?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Those are some nice additions. I think there are a few other US supported wars of conquest as well, but I just stuck with the most belligerent violator of said norms I know of.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Make it crystal clear that there's a rules based order and if you just cross boundaries in a war of conquest we will not make it easy.




Are you sure about this? The US' current policy is that if you cross boundaries in a war of conquest, invade other nations, bomb their hospitals and murder their children the US won't just go out of their way to make it easy for you, they'll make boycotting you illegal and declare criticism of your actions a public health crisis while supplying you with vast quantities of money and advanced weaponry. If you actually want to send that message, would you be fine with declaring Israel a rogue state and applying the same sanctions on them until they return to the 1948 borders?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


The first step to authoritarianism is creating a climate in which dissent is punished.




Are you going to seriously sit here and post about how terrible it is that people aren't bringing up their political opinions or views due to fear of retribution from Trump, and then claim that this is the start of some creeping authoritarianism? Have you been in a coma for the past two decades? You're describing a kind of pressure and chilling that doesn't even reach ten percent of the pervasiveness of social justice culture as some brand new authoritarian threat, but if you actually took your stated position seriously you'd have been cheering Trump on in the hope that he could smash "woke" culture (if that is the case then I applaud your consistency).




Instead of being afraid, more of us need to speak out for the values of democracy. It is harder to suppress voices this way. And people who are threatened by Musk and Trump especially need to be supported.




"Values of democracy" - could you please tell me what those are? Because your post seems to imply that these values are just "uncontested rule by the managerial class", and I don't think "democracy" is a good word to describe that.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Well I do apologize (sincerely) for the rudeness, that’s never my intention. But I do think people often feel that propaganda doesn’t work on them even though it would, or even though they don’t notice it already doing so.




Thank you. And you're perfectly right when you say that people often feel that propaganda doesn't work on them, but I think you're overestimating the effectiveness of it by far. Propaganda isn't going to turn someone like me who goes out to protests in support of the Palestinian cause into someone willing to go bleed out in the sand to protect Israel, but it doesn't need to do that to be effective. It has a bigger impact in the way that it shapes the issues that I focus on - I haven't been paying attention to all manner of low-level corruption scandals in my home country even though they ultimately have a larger impact on my life than what's happening in Ukraine or Israel.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't really advocate for leftist economics on here terribly much but as someone who is technically a leftist I take the same approach to open borders that Bernie Sanders used to before the vampire castle got to him - open borders are a tool used by the wealthy to drive down wages and make living conditions for workers much more precarious, because that shifts the balance of power to them (desperate workers are more willing to put up with abuse, low pay, etc).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


The claim @FirmWeird is making that Starmer started something is straightforwardly false.




I agree with the rest of your post, but I just want to clarify that I wasn't saying this was the start of all foreign election interference. I was making that claim in a more limited context (the current slapfight), which is why I then went on to say that the US did not have clean hands and that the supposed norm was broken a long time ago. My apologies for being unclear!


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
What an incredibly rude and insulting statement - I actually did take offence. I don't post many details about my personal life here, but I am actually the sort of incredibly contrarian person who wouldn't have fallen for it - which isn't necessarily always a positive thing and has caused me issues in my life before (I have self diagnosed myself with ODD in the past). Besides, the powers that be DO want me to die for Ukraine or Israel - and they haven't succeeded so far. Please don't project your own personal failings and moral weakness onto others.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Any military where the basic troops are only given their weapons for the first time in active combat is so incompetently run that fighting to the death against the conscription officers in my own home would give me better odds. Being shipped to the front line and given your weapon only when you get there is a death sentence in a modern battlefield and if that's the strategy we have already lost.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yes, absolutely. Sorry, that's just an editing mistake (accidentally removed the only sentence where I actually named Israel). I don't think there are any other potential candidates, however - the health issue one specifically has no other comparisons.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


How could conscription cause they state to lose "all legitimacy" when the aforementioned crimes against the people barely dented it?




None of the things you mentioned involve those people having to give up their exceedingly comfortable lives. Caring or doing anything about those issues causes you to lose your job, family and entire social life - and if you have any responsibilities or dependents, that means you aren't going to be doing anything to mess up your ability to put food on the table, nor are you going to spend countless hours researching obscure political stories that are heavily suppressed by major respectable institutions. Throw in the trends towards social alienation, isolation, bowling alone etc


Conscription isn't like that. Conscription actively steps into people's lives and completely destroys the comfortable existences they thought they had. In a healthy society where people have real attachments to the nation, trust in its leaders and an understanding that their loyalty to it will be rewarded, this won't be a big problem. But for vast swathes of modern western populations this just isn't the case. Social trust and cohesion are in the toilet, nobody has kids they want to fight for, huge numbers of men don't even have girlfriends to miss and there's even a growing contingent of men who actively despise women and wouldn't want to fight for them at all. Speaking for myself personally I'd rather frag my commanding officer before I even got out of basic training than go die in the Middle East for Israel or in Ukraine for nothing. I don't think I'm alone, and I believe my life is worth preserving (from my perspective, not universally) - when you look at how many people are miserable, lonely and depressed I really don't see conscription working out at all.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Just to clarify, the entire Russian collusion conspiracy theory has already been dealt with and completely discredited. Trump is not a Russian agent and the entire debate has been done to death over and over again - the source of the entire claim is a combination of opposition research purchased from the Russians by the Clinton campaign and 4chan /pol/ trolls making fun of a conservative anti-Trumper who was relentlessly bullied online by people who read his son's book about indulging in a piss fetish.


Besides, we know that Trump actually is a compromised agent of a foreign power, and we can see what that compromise leads him to do:


    

  1. Deport people who protest against this foreign power
    2. 

  2. Deliver vast sums of blood and treasure despite ostensibly promising to shut down foreign aid
    3. 

  3. Have his underlings declare criticism of said foreign power a "health crisis"
    4. 

  4. Make sure that important evidence of serious crimes which implicate said power and would have a negative effect on their reputation remain redacted and unpublished.
    5. 



Trump has done none of these things for Russia, and while he hasn't treated them as The Great Satan that a lot of NATO-types believe they are, he hasn't been an obsequious lickspittle either. He's treated them with the respect due to a nuclear power that has their own interests, but that's just good statesmanship and negotiation rather than him being compromised.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Elected leaders should be respectful of the elected leaders of other countries, even if they privately hate them.




This is just tit-for-tat - the Europeans violated this first, with Starmer sending staff over to campaign for Kamala and Zelensky doing it in person. I agree that the norm of not interfering is good, but it was broken a long time ago (and it isn't like the US has clean hands here either).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 24, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
As someone frequently accused of being a Russia apologist, I have to disagree - people living in Crimea should be voting in Russian elections, not Ukrainian ones. If Ukraine doesn't want to let the people in the contested regions vote, they're simply making the implicit case that those regions are not part of Ukraine.