This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Thanks for the correction, my mistake. By dubious, I mostly mean the former. I doubt there is anything particularly nefarious going on beyond a certain amount of ingroup preference, but the overrepresentation of minorities in the leadership of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales bothers me. I think that people should in general be ruled by somebody of their own heritage and culture, and specifically that Britain is the ancestral home of the British peoples and should be run by and for indigenous Brits. Assuming that the overrepresentation is because of culture and IQ, I don't think that we should be importing people who tend to end up ruling over us at greatly disproportionate rates.
It may be just a temporary moment, but the vast number of major cities that now have Muslim mayors suggest it isn't. I am happy to have guests, but not to import a new ruling class.
(As usual, it's easier to find tendentious factchecks on Google than the original data, so I've just included those).
https://fullfact.org/news/muslims-uk-viral-poster-factchecked/
https://www.reuters.com/fact-check/immigrants-not-ruling-britain-ireland-london-contrary-claims-2024-03-28/
I think it is also fair to see which immigrants come to london to be treated as londe oners, as opposed to immigrants who wish londoners to treat them as migrants deserving entitlements.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=FstMoM-spJU&pp=ygUeZ29vZG5lc3MgZ3JhY2lvdXMgbWUgcm9iaW5zb25z
Given the chance, some migrants would wish to remove themselves from the cultures they left behind, save for food. That they often give up midway and revert to cultural kins is a function of task difficulty on both ends of the equation rather than lack of desire. Sunak and Sajid Javid and the rotterdam mayor can make a reasonable claim to wanting to be part of the new society they found themselves in, compared to the islamists that refuse to even learn english.
More options
Context Copy link
Rather Sunak than Jeremy Corbyn, surely? I see (and would largely agree with) your position, but for Indians especially their political distribution does not appear substantially different than that of natives, and it’s telling that in recent years (as usual) it was the ethnics in the Tory party who wanted to clamp down on immigration while the native wets were largely reticent.
More options
Context Copy link
Sure, I get you. My objection would be that I don't think it's fair to group Sunak with people like Yousef, Khan, Varadkar etc. But that's a relatively minor disagreement.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link