site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 20, 2024

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.

8
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I am a hlynkian right-wing progressive, and I don't recognize any of you as such.

Politically, my preferred outcome would be to exalt White bisexual antitheistic males above all others and make this identity the pass to being treated as aristocracy. I don't want meritocracy, equality of opportunity, judging the content of someone's character. I certainly don't want any retvrn. All I want is progressive stack with me at the top, laughing as I kick those below.

Aesthetically, I subscribe to everything my enemies love. Promiscuous girls with tattoos and one side of their head shaved make me go crazy. Some of my favorite sci-fi series are Ninefox Gambit and Gideon the Ninth (the same number in the title is not a coincidence, because nothing is ever a coincidence — the author of that reference is hardly a tradcath himself). I adore skyscrapers and strive to spend as little time in nature as humanly possible.

Does this describe anybody else here? And if it doesn't, you are not progressives with a palette swap, as alleged. And does this describe anyone anywhere at all?

  • -55

Hlynka’s framework doesn’t really mean anything, it’s nonsensical, internally contradictory and deliberately designed primarily to include literally all his political enemies.

The core grain of truth is captured much more effectively by Scott’s own ‘blue tribe’ designation, which includes for example neoreactionaries, much of the dissident right and many urbane conservatives of the more centrist persuasion.

On the dissident right, “racist libs” is a longstanding accusation toward eg. racists who supposedly aren’t sufficiently hostile towards feminism or gay rights. But there too it’s largely a form of in-group policing, much like SecureSignals’ exhortation that any reactionary who isn’t sufficiently hostile to Jews isn’t actually a “dissident rightist”.

to being treated as aristocracy

Because aristocracy is a hereditary status, I don’t think it’s possible to have one without women. And - at least depending on the test you propose to verify bisexuality (top or bottom?) - there are probably far too many eligible men to qualify.

And does this describe anyone anywhere at all?

I don’t think your ideology is wholly unusual. A milder version (sci-fi techno-futurist social liberalist anti-democracy) has its supporters in Silicon Valley. I suppose Peter Thiel is gay rather than bi, but he comes close.

Does this describe anybody else here?

All I want to do is to live in a civilized and functioning society. I have nothing against nativist sentiment (except in as much as it affects me) but do not demand that this place be peopled primarily by my co-ethnics (drawn broadly or narrowly), however I want it to be a safe, peaceful, well-managed place. Somewhere the weak are cared for but the strong are celebrated. Somewhere where the best have (many) more children than the worst. Somewhere people marry young and happily, and stay married. Somewhere where the streets are always clean, where the people are fit and healthy, where the buildings are beautiful, where crafts are celebrated. A beautiful society, full of beautiful people, who live well, who drink but not to excess, who spend lively evenings singing on the piazza, who prioritize friends and family above work, but who work hard. Who live in cities that are neither full of ugly glass towers or sprawling McMansion suburbs, but instead draw from Haussmann’s Paris and Regency stucco London; cities of boulevards and parks and six-story buildings built in traditional styles, symmetrical, with high ceilings and large windows. I abhor the mob above all else; among all modernity’s ugliness democracy is perhaps the most grating institution.

I have few views about other tribes, sexualities or identities except in so much as they may or may not make such a vision more difficult to achieve. I happily work and am friends with people of many identities from around the world.

Does this make me a conservative?

What is internally contradictory about Hlynka's thought, at least in the sense that it is significantly more internally contradictory than all other political ideologies? (All political ideologies except pure selfishness are internally contradictory to some extent). I'm not very familiar with his ideas, but from what I've seen out of his opinions the one that is most controversial here is that the alt-right is a form of progressivism, and while to me that seems like it's going too far, the milder version - that the alt-right and the woke are very similar - seems obviously true to me.

Both alt-rightists and wokists are people who see themselves as victimized minorities that are oppressed by an evil hegemony and are fighting a righteous political conflict against it. Both are obsessed with race, gender, and sexuality. Both primarily care about culture war issues and do not have much to say about more engineering-esque aspects of policy like, say, energy infrastructure. Both despise the liberal/moderate-conservative mainstream. Both are suspicious of voting and attracted to more direct kinds of political action. Both are attracted to various kinds of socialism, communitarianism, and redistributionism - wokes generally favor economic socialism for non-whites and non-males, whereas alt-rightists prefer economic socialism for "real Americans" (generally meaning "hard-working" middle-class white people). Alt-rightists often favor some sort of sexual socialism on top of that, they dislike the sexual free market as much as wokes dislike the economic one.