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ZeStriderOfDunedain

Ze Strider

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joined 2022 September 06 04:34:38 UTC

There Is Always Hope


				
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ZeStriderOfDunedain


								
								
									
								
								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
Ze Strider

				
				
				

				

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					joined 2022 September 06 04:34:38 UTC
				


				
					

					
There Is Always Hope



				

				

				

				

				

					

					

					
					
					

					
User ID: 812


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Every single major company wants to make money first and foremost, true they do want to earn social capital but at the expense of pissing off their investors? And again, this is a billion dollar project, not your standard show.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Would this, in your opinion, mainstream the Third Position on the right? I see many (most?) American right wingers still arguing that socialism has infiltrated their institutions to birth much of the social ideologies that dominate the western zeitgeist today. Maybe Europe will take the "red pill" sooner?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 2, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm deeply suspicious of both too. Blasphemy and Israel are incredibly volatile topics for Muslims, I'm certainly not happy that someone's poked the bear yet again. Perhaps maybe possibly as these incidents pile up, we'll build the wall on our borders after all. Or at the very least, admit that multiculturalism is a failure and brown people probably have to become "coconuts" to fully assimilate in western societies.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Oh. TIL


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of June 12, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
India and China's trade climbed over $130 billion in 2022. They may never become allies as we've seen with the PLA's military incursions beyond the LAC many times over, and given China's friendship with Pakistan. But a begrudging partnership is not out of the picture just yet. I don't think the "India factor" would be a bad enough wedge between China and Russia, even as Russia closes into their orbit. Or put another way, even China realises it's unwise to antagonise India to such an extent.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 9, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I have a feeling India and Islamic 3rd world countries would butt heads with or without Hindu Nationalist politics in India. I mean, didn't they fight 3/4 wars with Pakistan during the INC era including the largest one (1971)? And of course, it's not like the Islamic countries themselves are united in any way, most recently demonstrated by the uptick in hostilities between Pakistan and the Taliban.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 31, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
At this point, Hitler/fascist/Nazi are just political jargons for "a-hole" in the progressive dictionary. I don't believe we have another Hitler of our time that's threatening world peace. The hawks apparently want a cold war 2 with Russia and China. Well fine, but culture wars at home do not achieve any unity abroad.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
We see litters of articles and papers from liberal media that democracy is globally dying. While I don't believe this is happening right away, could most democracies become less so in the future?


The German YouTuber Kraut some time ago had suggested that the political turmoil in liberal democracies is largely a result of the collapse of the USSR and with it, the Cold War consensus of combatting communism which unified various different groups.


I don't think American liberals are particularly holding up democratic principles in their own domain either, with how they deplatform and censor their opponents. Essentially, they're really just consolidating their electoral power while trying to protect the thin sheen of freedom in America. This bias extends across the US establishment. If you look at the highest-earning zipcodes they've all flipped massively to the democrats over the past few decades. Same is true if you look at the Ivy League. Seen in this light, the FBI was merely following the trend when they raided Ryan Kelley's home and other such harassment campaigns will not face scrutiny because a large portion of the US elite agree with the FBI targeting their political opponents. This is why they refuse to let Jan 6 die, it was certainly a riot, but nowhere close to a coup. We know what a real coup looks like from the recent Sri Lankan crisis. In South Korea, gender wars and the excessive divide over feminism has effectively become a major electoral talking point, although President Yoon Suk-yeol is married to a career woman himself who doesn't wish to be addressed as First Lady and has 0 kids with him. The state of the Koreas, one being a depressing totalitarian state and the other being a depressing, hyper consumerist protectorate of the US almost feels like an ill fated destiny. Even in India, the progressive pressure has generated a lot of culture wars of its own, where the ruling BJP's base perceive liberals as being sympathetic to Pakistan while levelling every epithet against India which would also be relevant to their archrival, and have reacted strongly. Couple with that the malthusian growth rates and the neoliberal decay preceding their rise to electoral power from being just another one of many parties in the country. But Russia and China, the "authoritarian competitors to the free world", are both strong societies, I can't imagine something like 1CP being done away so quickly if it was instituted in the US. They don't have to deal with electoral politics and do not have to deal with culture wars. And with an ascendant China, its proximity to China might tempt India to remodify its political institutions to have a shot at uplifting its hundreds of millions from poverty.


Now I'm not saying culture wars will end democracies, but its probably a symptom of decadence in democratic societies combined with the rise of social media highlighting our differences with millions of our own countrymen. Maybe I'm young and only speaking from my own limited experience? Curious to know what others think.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of May 8, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
On the pseudo-theological note, and apparently to jive with the Neely debate, this twitter thread about George Stinney Jr's execution popped up in my TL. Now whether one believes teenagers should be tried as adults for violent crimes is a moral quandary I won't get into for the moment. But it's very telling how it's become accepted fact that Stinney was an innocent black boy wrongfully arrested and convicted of rape and murder of two young white girls by a racist court, even though the South Carolina Judge who vacated his conviction 7 decades later made it a point that her judgement pertained to the procedure, not his guilt (or lack thereof).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of April 24, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
This sums it up, really. 15% of Gen Z's are apparently queer, but I think they just saw the biggest zeitgeist in society that also comes with a very easy ticket and went about seeking validation and care they never received at home elsewhere. Many socially maladjusted folk join online subcultures because of this too.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 9, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Can geopolitics also be culture war? I'd argue yes.




Not so much that it should matter in actual policy formulation. These remarks seem to solely be pointed at a domestic audience, just like their MEA Jaishankar's remarks vis-a-vis Ukraine which seem to be increasingly pro-Russia rather than neutral. There does seem to be a populist streak to it.


But the new world order is supposedly emerging as western influence in global politics is increasingly under challenge, not by the Third World but only by China and Russia. They're well aware that the US cannot contain China's influence anymore, they're hedging one superpower against another, not themselves. It's also worth noting that much of these countries are only "united" in their hostility towards the west, but if they wish to take authority over their own fates and become power players that matter, they'll have to confront the internal strife and frustration that plague them through no fault of the west. You're responsible for all your historical achievements but your current failings have to be pinned on an external force? Not how it works. I still see the future power dynamic looking like this: the US shall remain dominant in the west, China in the east, India remaining a distant third, while the rest of the world won't even be in the race.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yeah, looks like every political tribe has some level of "intersectionality" mentality hoping that the "smart outsiders" would support them.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 3, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Indian Americans have a tendency to overcompensate to try and "fit in" to the vogue but it backfires and they just come off as jarring, that's how you get the Mindy Kaling types going over the top woke than anybody else that even her white liberal comrades had to keep their distance after Velma. And then you have the constant race warring on twitter between mainland Indians and Black Americans... yeah after that if someone told me the "real" founding members of the KKK were actually Indian, I'd believe them. There were some LARPers but more than a handful of handles that I follow and know are actually Indian (usually HinduNat) were spitting slurs I doubt any Klansman has heard since the last century.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Tolkien Untangled is cool, would definitely recommend newcomers to the monumental lore.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 19, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Oh and almost forgot, was this related to the brawl? I don't see it mentioned in the article, so a coincidence?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of May 29, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
A big part of it is really just hypergamy, it allows them to become extremely choosy. I've met so many young liberal men who are displeased with modern feminism. I do believe that decades of affirmative action and the expansion of the dating pool for women via dating apps has finally taken its toll, and as more men become partnerless or end up with a less desirable partner, they're going to agree that society has had "enough feminism". I do not see a solution to this, even if we were actively working towards pushing for policy designs to raise the TFR like "three child policy" and improve male SMV through "masculinity training" like China is currently doing, I'm not optimistic about their scale of impact.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of January 30, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Your points are convincing, alas, it doesn't matter if they are. Rowling is a TERF, and as per intersectionality worldview, she has to be every other reprehensible thing you can think of: a Nazi anti-Semitic bigot, a pro-slavery racist, yada yada. I think it was the Dr Drew episode with Ben Shapiro, Segun Oduolowu and Zoey Tur, apparently Ben would've been against the civil rights movement if he was alive at the time and the evidence of this was his supposed hatred for transgender people. BLM has to be pro-LGBT too in order to "fight intolerance". Feminism has to be pro both for the same. All rally against the evil white man and the white adjacent man to fight oppression. The success of Hogwarts Legacy might rile up many, but it is a "you lose even when you win" situation. That so many people like this horrendous, bigoted IP whose main series revolved around a Wizarding War against Wizard Nazis and this game that allows you to play as a transgender hero and whose lead designer was pressured to quit for what he'd said on his personal YouTube channel, would be cited as evidence that we have a long way to go in our noble fight against intolerance and hatred. They're all compromised, including infamously politically incorrect IPs like GTA and Saints Row, but the woke crowd shall continue to pretend that they're still bigoted and sexist and racist as the companies let them have mile after mile.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of December 12, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
So uh... there's a wikipedia page about the recent suspensions, and it's dubbed the "Thursday Night Massacre". Three letter agencies involved in the generation of such pages? I'm genuinely asking.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 12, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
A lie repeated over and over becomes truth, that adage is self evident too, given that there is no evidence that Goebbels actually said anything of the sort. This my favourite rebuttal of this myth. An excerpt to add on to what you've described in the 2nd paragraph:




Furthermore, if rape or sexual harassment were indeed motivated by the desire to feel powerful, then one would expect them to be less common among those who already feel powerful, and that they would more often go against the power gradient rather than along it; that is to say, raping or sexually harassing someone more powerful would have greater appeal than sexually abusing someone less powerful.




There's something similar on stalking as well, its often not due to any consciously learnt behaviour as it is an act of impulse and primal instinct.


I think that while most(?) people do take this as fact, despite the efforts to "unlearn" the supposed entitlement have yielded no tangible results, a part of the effort is to regurgitate this trope that "men in power" is always a bad thing, even dangerous and predatory towards women.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Israel-Gaza Megathread #3
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
On the topic of Zionism and Jewish influence in American media, I came across a twitter long post that scrutinises the notion that Zionists effectively decide American foreign policy. There are three main highlights of this post.


    

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    The State Department and the Pentagon are far more powerful lobbies, and their support for Israel is given only begrudgingly.
    

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    The increasingly high volume public statements that Israel is the only liberal democracy in the Middle East and therefore deserves American support actually signal the weakness of the Israeli lobby.
    

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    Israel receives atrociously large aid packages because it allows Congress more latitude to manipulate through the budget process, and much of the aid actually ends up in the pockets of defence contractors or are credits to purchase American arms.
    

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I can't verify all of these statements since I'm writing this before heading to bed, but I think this is the first time I've heard someone who isn't implicitly pro-Israel take the issue of lobbying and scrutinise the claims of actual Israeli heft in the American elite. One of the replies to the post brings up an article about Pentagon backed groups in Syria fighting CIA armed militias. It's very interesting to me how intra-American rivalry between various lobbies spill over in warzones, particularly the Middle East.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of April 24, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Extremist politics online is mostly just virtue signal to seek any kind of validation. I remember seeing a map on twitter which geolocated most racists online. I can't speak for its veracity nor do I remember the exact source, but it produced some interesting results. Apparently, upwards of 70% of online wignats live in India, Brazil, Mexico and Philippines. Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised after the twitter race war between Blacks and Indians.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of April 3, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't think much is going to change besides some aesthetics. I do suspect Tory Indians will end up deporting the grooming gangs to signal to the more right coded voters that they're the 'right kind' of minority. Stoking the immigration debate and other culture war issues is a neat way for the party to distract the public from the mess the country's found itself in in the last 10-15 years. Then going on to sanction Russian oil just two years after formally withdrawing from the EU. And it turns out, importing subcontinental issues like Kashmir was not wise. It snowballed into everything from the Modi-Boris leaflets in Batley and Spen to Leicester to Khalistanis vandalising the Indian High Commission a few weeks ago apparently to protest the Indian government's crackdown on insurgents in Punjab, prompting Jaishankar to make more abrasive statements about western hypocrisy just months after he took a shot at the west for 'preferring Pakistan's military dictatorship over India while Russia stood by them' (obviously in reference to the 1971 war and genocide). You can't expect multiculturalism to succeed whilst also signaling strong stances as the 'correct stance' on divisive issues that have historically escalated into conflict.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yeah, by "red pill" I meant if the European right will become less committed to upholding capitalism. I agree with your 2nd paragraph too, I once spoke to a paleocon from Minnesota years ago and he'd propounded the view that the alt right movement is largely Jacobin in its visioned role of the state. Which may be true, but yes, they probably don't care what political or economic system they need to employ in shaping their socio-cultural agenda. I just don't know what kind of comeback the right would do in the US, nearly all big businesses generate a lot of social capital by espousing liberal values which show no sign of going out of fashion anytime soon. Perhaps they'll just wait until the free markets "correct themselves"?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of October 2, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Spend an hour reading the "decolonization" tag. They are telling you what they are, and like Noah Smith I am getting "sort of negatively polarized against these people."




With all due respect, I'm surprised more people didn't see this coming earlier. "Decolonisation" in its best form has always been one of those failed movements that inadvertently made way to more radical elements that are far less subdued in their hostility towards so called "western values", given the volatile nature of these polities and all around frustration stemming from within due to a lack of economic growth. It's like if the Ashraf Ghani government tried to "decolonise" and is shocked to find himself shaking hands with the Taliban. China did not really "decolonise" either, not any more than Japan or SK did, as much as they claim to be the alternative to western hegemony. The reality is the vast majority of Chinese in all major cities very much live as a westerner does. I'm sure both the government and the general public is well aware of this, though they may not publicly admit it.


That video of Hamas parading that woman's body and accounts of rape, child murders, etc., and several big Muslim names playing apologia, including a liberal Muslim journalist who used to write for Indian Express, might just be the straw that breaks the back for the hard left's camaraderie with 3rd world nationalisms.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 3, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I suspect it's because most of the calls for boycott had very little to do with the writing, technical and mechanical aspects of the game but JKR. Nevertheless, I'd still remind folks that the game was lowkey woke. Congratulations! You too can be a Black transgender pure blood wizard Nazi!