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Supah_Schmendrick


				

				

				

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Supah_Schmendrick


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 05 16:08:09 UTC
				


				
					

					
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 2, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Israel is a state fundamentally opposed to western values that causes constant headache for the west.




I mean, yeah; a state organized around blood-and-soil nationalism premised on a mythic past and present-day military conquest is pretty opposed to the modern deracinated, pacifistic, cosmopolitan western ideal.  A bit surprised that you're in favor of the latter over the former, but wonders never cease!




What about European women's right not to be raped by the migrants IsraAID is bringing into Europe?




Clearly the gentile governments of European nations don't care about protecting that right.  Sounds like a problem with the Gentiles.




What about the christians in the middle east that are being destroyed by the hostile nation of Israel?




Sounds like another failing of world christendom.  You should probably get on that.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 22, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Really if she chose any other option than lifting up the pot and throwing the boiling water toward the officers.




Do cops really have such shitty hand-eye coordination that they can't tell whether a mass of boiling water flung from a pot is going to hit them or not?  It's a one-shot item; once she flung the water she was unarmed!   What was the justification for not just leaving?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 28, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Settlement expansion, supported by the Israeli state, is essentially enough for me to conclude Israelis were never serious about peace with Palestinians.




So the Palestinians get to demand to live in a judenrein society?  When did that become a reasonable demand?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 30, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Reducing the speed limit on all roads to 25mph will reliably reduce traffic deaths




It really depends on which roads you're talking about, and who's using them.  Reducing the speed limit to 25 on the DC beltway at rush hour won't do anything because no-one's going 25 to begin with.  And reducing the speed limit to 25 in rural Mauretania won't do anything because no-one has a car anyway.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 10, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
You are taking insufficient account of interpersonal variance.  I am unconvinced that the differences between the life-experiences of American-Men-As-A-Class ("AMAAC") and American-Women-As-A-Class ("AWAAC") are significant compared to the differences between the rich and poor, beautiful and ugly, normal and disabled/crippled, smart and dumb, low-time-preference and high-time-preference, etc.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 19, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Well, what now? Apparently the left has pushed too hard and too fast and it’s turning the GOP away. Being LGBT isn’t seen as some harmless thing anymore, especially when it seems being “tolerant” means accepting gay drag nuns on crucifixes. The parodies are no longer a parody, and grooming children to accept gender ideology seems rife in schools even in deep red states.




As another American politician said during another of the country's great culture wars: "We are now far into the [eighth] year, since a policy was initiated, with the avowed object, and confident promise, of putting an end to [queer] agitation.  Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only, not ceased, but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, it will not cease, until a crisis shall have been reached, and passed - 'A house divided against itself cannot stand.'  I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half-[queer] and half [traditional/heteronormative].  I do not expect the Union to be dissolved - I do not expect the house to fall - but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other."


No polity can long retain serious moral divisions within itself for long.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 23, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Nationalism which is the english word for ethnos, without ethnicity, doesn't make sense.




Someone tell France that they really ought to be Bretons, Acquitanians, Burgundians, etc. etc.  After all, until fairly recently they didn't even speak mutually-intelligible dialects of the same language, let alone share common ancestry!  The Bretons are Celts, the Ile-de-France folks are Germanic, and the Languedoc is Mediterranean!


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 16, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


How many attempts have been made on Harris's life, again?




Ideally we wouldn't know even if the answer was greater than zero, to avoid inspiring copy-cats.  The press coverage of the Trump assassination attempts is good for transparency and public discourse, but does have costs.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Do you really think this passes an ideological turing test and accurately models the reaction of marginal democrats and independents?  Also, why do you think a 30-year-old sex scandal would hurt Harris when multiple such scandals haven't hurt Trump?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 27, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
If people actually looked at this incident, there wouldn't be a need for too many changes.  The shooter accessed the school through an unlocked exterior door.  That's the first problem. [Edit: this was inaccurate, per KMC below.]  The second problem was that there wasn't security - the shooter allegedly rejected another potential target he was scoping out because there was security present.   That's it.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
If "in line" means "don't claim that people whose kids just got murdered are crisis actors and dox them" then staying "in line" shouldn't be very restrictive at all.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of February 17, 2025
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Two wrongs doesn't make a right, buddy.




Actually they do; tit-for-tat-with-forgiveness is a pretty great strategy for incentivizing everyone to behave.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 28, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


You are the one who started talking about scale, implicitly suggesting that the scale of the Oct 7th attack was what made it sufficient as a justification for Israel killing 43k Palestinians.




You're right, I allowed myself to be distracted by you - after all, the original discussion was over whether or not some heated statements made by a random Israeli after 10/7 meant the entire post-10/7 conflict in Gaza was a sinister plot for Israelis to expropriate Gazan land.  So good job; I got snookered.


But even here you're wrong; the unprovoked nature of the 10/7 attack, as well as its breadth and premeditated objectives to deliberately harm Israeli civilians who had done nothing to Gazans, are what justify the Israeli response and anger.  It's not some cold math over how many deaths can be dealt out tit-for-tat, which again is not used by ANYONE in any other conflict because it's manifestly silly and has nothing to do with the actual objectives of either party to the conflict.




I'm sure the objective of Hamas could also be described by them as the destruction of the armed terrorist group that attacked Palestinians - the Israeli state




Nope.  Words have meanings.




If you think it's unfair to demand that Israel restrict itself to surgical operations against Hamas militants




This is what they are actually doing, probably to their detriment.  See, e.g. the analysis of John Spencer, an instructor in urban warfare at West Point.




it's also unfair to demand that Hamas restrict itself to surgical operations against the IDF that would probably result in them just getting gunned down ineffectually.




"Obeying basic laws and norms of war" is not a demand for "surgical" precision.  If Hamas can't measure up to the IDF conventionally, perhaps that's a big sign that armed combat is counterproductive to their political aims.




The 2021 article starts with a description of Israeli police sabotaging a religious observance so that it would not disturb a political speech of their PM




Not a valid basis to wage war or attack random civilians.




then later of Israel seizing the homes of some Palestinians




Interesting way to describe the outcome of a lawsuit, but even taking the Palestinian argument at face value it's still not a valid reason to wage war or attack random civilians.




You (and partially Wikipedia) are doing the same thing here again at smaller scale,




Then you should probably have used a source that actually supported what you're claiming, instead of one that does not.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 16, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yes, it's called nationalism.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 26, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
If some/all of the movement's core assumptions are incorrect, that would poison the entire edifice - e.g. Marxist thought might be the largest published corpus of philosophy or economics ever amassed, but it wouldn't be hard for one person to be more correct because the Marxist edifice is chained to fatally-flawed premises.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Doesn't that just make people more sympathetic to her, and more likely to give her the benefit of the doubt?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 27, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I guess it is good to know that journalists in the UK are as stupid as journalists in the USA.




Or as motivated/biased.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 28, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Historically, no.  America is the country of tar and feathers, riding muck-raking newspapermen out of town on a rail, and mobs smashing up printing offices.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 2, 2024
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I've heard historians argue that the british government's legal counsel had advised that the 1839 treaty could be worked around.  And in any event the UK went in before the invasion of Belgium - Grey's famous speech to parliament is all based upon assumptions and diplomatic insinuations, not any concrete actions by the Germans.  Once the Brits were in, there was no incentive for the Germans not to go through Belgium.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of August 14, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


The problem with drunks is that they commit violent crimes (particularly domestic ones) in a way which potheads don't




At least, not until the potheads turn psychotic.  At that point they're perfectly capable of violence.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 17, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Will you also argue that culture can make a chihuahua into a hunting dog?




It takes culture to even determine that there should be "hunting dogs" at all, and to start the project of breeding them.  We are the product of the cultures of yesterday - who they decided to reward, what traits they regarded as high-status, etc.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of March 27, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


unless there are editorial reasons not to do so.




...like being a school shooter?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 2, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
He's talking about general murder rates.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 28, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


I'd say that there was a few decades there where people were 'made' to conform with the 'living constitution' ideal.




No, people were made to conform with the views of people who used the 'living constitution' interpretational theory to justify their desired policy results.  Seriously, go back and read a lot of the progressive decisions from the Warren court era - it's pure power in there.  Why did Roe find a right to abortion?  Because Harry Blackmun wanted to find one, process and interpretation be damned.  Even retrospectively-sainted cases like Brown v. Board of Education don't hold up well if you look at them just as examples of judicial reasoning.  Brown's whole rationale was based on social-scientific and psychological findings that segregation created "[a] sense of inferiority" which "affects the motivation of a child to learn," and therefore "[s]egregation with the sanction of law . . . has a tendency to [retard] the educational and mental development of negro children and to deprive them of some of the benefits they would receive in a racial[ly] integrated school system."  That's not a legal reason; that's a policy choice.


You can't rely on turning policy and power questions in to legal and interpretational ones.  You clearly have a view on how the country should be organized and run.  Fine!  But argue for the view on its own terms, on the objective level.  Don't divert the argument into legalistic questions of interpretation - that's not going to get you the results you want, and will distract everyone from the actual debate and disagreement at issue.




I don't think there's anyone who thinks that the Constitution is unable to be changed or updated, but many object to this being done by judicial fiat without giving citizens the chance to have a voice in the process.




Oh but citizens have had chances to have their voice heard!  The fights between gilded age lassiez-faire capitalism and progressive-era "scientific management" were cultural and political fights that reshaped government without constitutional amendment.  The New Deal was mostly a legislative and administrative plan, not a judicial one.  Even the Great Society and the rise of the modern concept of anti-discrimination law was at least as much legislative as it was judicial in origin!  The people keep electing legislatures who pass giant enabling acts, and Presidents who vow to make use of those powers through imperial bureaucracies!


Moreover, there's nothing that requires the courts to have the authority they currently wield; the Constitution is actually extremely vague about courts; and Congress has extreme power over what courts exist, what their competencies are (and, just as importantly, what they aren't), what causes of action exist, what remedies are available, etc.  Even SCOTUS isn't immune from this; it took an act of Congress in the 1920s to give SCOTUS the ability to pick and choose what cases it takes.  Similarly, the ability of the Court to pick particular policy questions out of the morass of any given lawsuit and only decide on them - the basis for the institution's current role - depends on legislative authorization.




Either the Constitution is the solid foundation upon which the Union of states is supposed to operate, and should be treated with sufficient reverence by the institutions involved, or it is not, and we are not held together by anything but historical momentum and a bare sheen of national brotherhood arising from shared history.




Por que no los dos?  The Constitution is a set of rules and a political compromise.  It is also, along with the Declaration of Independence and Gettysburg Address, the holy text of the American civic religion.  However, rules don't exist without people, who insist on being imperfect and quarrelsome things, to whom virtue comes uneasily if at all.  Why should you, I, or anyone expect any set of rules, no matter how well designed, to hold a single shape against the efforts of centuries to game and twist them?  What faith, civic or otherwise, can survive as long as the U.S.'s has without doctrinal drift and corruption amongst the hierarchy and/or laity?  What political compromise has endured, unchanging, from the 1700's 'til today?  It's not for nothing that there are all those quotes from the Founding Fathers sounding ominous warnings that the whole thing could fall apart:


"[O]ur Constitution is neither a self-actuating nor a self-correcting document. It requires the constant attention and devotion of all citizens. There is a story, often told, that upon exiting the Constitutional Convention Benjamin Franklin was approached by a group of citizens asking what sort of government the delegates had created. His answer was: 'A republic, if you can keep it.' The brevity of that response should not cause us to under-value its essential meaning: democratic republics are not merely founded upon the consent of the people, they are also absolutely dependent upon the active and informed involvement of the people for their continued good health."


"While our Country remains untainted with the Principles and manners, which are now producing desolation in so many Parts of the World: while she continues Sincere and incapable of insidious and impious Policy: We shall have the Strongest Reason to rejoice in the local destination assigned Us by Providence. But should the People of America, once become capable of that deep simulation towards one another and towards foreign nations, which assumes the Language of Justice and moderation while it is practicing Iniquity and Extravagance; and displays in the most captivating manner the charming Pictures of Candour, frankness & sincerity while it is rioting in rapine and Insolence: this Country will be the most miserable Habitation in the World. Because We have no Government armed with Power capable of contending with human Passions unbridled by morality and Religion. Avarice, Ambition and Revenge or Galantry, would break the strongest Cords of our Constitution as a Whale goes through a Net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."  - John Adams, To the Officers of the first Brigade of the third Division of the Militia of Massachusetts, October 11, 1798


". . .[T]here is no truth more thoroughly established, than that there exists in the economy and course of nature, an indissoluble union between virtue and happiness, between duty and advantage, between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy, and the solid rewards of public prosperity and felicity: Since we ought to be no less persuaded that the propitious smiles of Heaven, can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained: And since the preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the Republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people."  - George Washington, First Inaugural Address


No, we treat these things with reverance in no small part because of the historical momentum behind them.  And we use them to forge national brotherhood from disparate peoples despite the lack of shared history.  Whether the project is working or not is something for interested observers to judge for themselves.  But we Americans have always been a fractious lot, so a modicum of historical perspective is suggested before drawing any conclusions that are too alarmist.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of November 21, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Thank you for this information.  The neighbor's testimony makes me update slightly in favor of purposeful targeting of LGBT individuals, though the history of violence against his own family still leads me to believe that this was a generally violent individual whose choice of target was a secondary consideration, rather than being an ordinarily-peaceful individual moved particularly to violence by the strength of rhetoric or belief about a single issue.