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.

Following up from the discussion a few weeks ago, Democrats are trying to bring back the border bill from January: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/schumer-says-us-senate-will-try-again-pass-border-bill-2024-05-19/

I said that the bill is obviously something that Democrats want unilaterally, and is no way a compromise or concession that could be offered in exchange for aid or anything else. It seems like this is proven true by the fact that the Democrats still want this as a standalone package.

As to whether or not the package is a trap, I can't see any reason the Democrats would support this unless it furthered their objective of increasing migration. Any alternative explanations here? If it wasn't a trap, is there a reason why Republicans would turn this down?

There are plenty of democrats who aren't in favor of open borders and the issue is a huge political liability for democrats.

Increasing migration is not the same as open borders.

No democrats are in favor of open borders.

  • -14

I should have been more clear. No Democratic elected official is in favor of open borders.

None? Not even one?

Not even one little fella

None? Not even one?

"Open borders" also would mean you would be as happy to take in ones who vote Republican and also Xi and Putin fans, as much as you happy to take Democratic-voting Minorities(tm).

To first order there aren't any immigrant groups who would vote Republican. The US is well to the right of the part of the world which wants to get here.

I'm not sure about "are", but Cubans "were" an immigrant group that voted Republican.

And then the second generation voted Democratic. But they were the last socialist refugees to oppose socialism; Venezuelan refugees just think the revolution was betrayed.

I dunno that that's true. Brown immigrants vote D for transparently self-serving reasons, or occasionally machine politics, and not due to ideological affinity.

There's also plenty of eastern Europeans who would like to move here who would be willing to vote R. Current law just doesn't allow working class immigration except for illegal border crossers.

Some group of conservatives should establish an NGO that flies Eastern Europeans to Mexico, then helps them cross the border and claim asylum. If they could get Russians or Armenians, the immigrants would even have a pretty good asylum case.

I believe you'd find that sword has but a single edge.

More comments