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 -
I want a vice presidential debate top level post.
So JD Vance sounded pretty good here overall. If you ask me, both speakers were miles ahead of their presidential candidate counterparts, which is sad. There is probably a lot that can be read from the debate, but I did want to discuss a couple moments making waves on other social media. First I will mention I was surprised to hear JD Vance support nuclear energy, and I will also mention a lot of people were probably unhappy with how he handled the gun control/mass shooting question. But back to the two I wanted to mention
The first such moment originated from a fact check:
Tim Walz responds to his statement, and then a debate moderator comes in with this:
I will cut it off there to not balloon this post. You can read the transcript here.
It seems many blue tribers saw him complaining about a fact check and seeing a win. Why would you complain about fact checking other than if you were lying? This is another example going back to Scott's post about the media rarely lying. Hey, they're temporary asylum seekers, so since they were allowed in with little hindrances to speak of, they're legal. Fact checked. This is an example of why I tend to dislike fact checking in a debate. It introduces an opportunity to use unfavorable framing on an opponent with lawyerspeak on technically true things. Let the candidates do it themselves if they want.
Next up, the January 6th and failure to concede the election:
Once again, there is more to this exchange than that. I said earlier that they had good performances, and I'll go further here and say that JD Vance had a pretty great night. I'd never heard him speak before and he sounded very well spoken, very well informed, and brought up many issues that I so dearly wished that Donald Trump would have brought up, like specifically naming the asylum system and mentioning the partial birth abortions allowed in Minnesota (I noticed Tim Walz's denial was not fact checked). That is to say, JD Vance is competent and might have won against Kamala Harris, representing a return to civil debates and "normal" politicians, despite the "weird" allegations.
But he is really dragged down on this issue. It's lame he has to defend election denial claims in the first place, and leave room for challenging more later. I know many of you have strong feelings on the truthfulness of the claims. I will say this: if someone goes and makes those claims, they shouldn't run again. That is very powerful ammo for the other side. And it's far from the only ammo. I am very disappointed with the rhetoric Trump throws around. His lashing out against Taylor Swift reads as totally pathetic. And it is sad to see someone with as much talent as JD Vance have to try to slip around all this crap coming at him, from both Tim Walz, the debate moderator, and untold amounts of unhappy people on Twitter.
By the way, I also enjoyed this exchange, which I forgot to mention in the original post. My enjoyment was purely because of @naraburns's writeup on the subject:
What's funny to me is that Tim Walz actually got the story wrong, didn't he? Amber Thurman didn't die in any journey back and forth, she failed to go to the hospital for an infection and died in a hospital in Georgia. What an incredible lie. And it makes me wonder about the other examples he mentioned earlier.
Well yeah. Joe Biden lied constantly throughout the 2020 and 2024 election cycles. He never, or rarely, got called out on it. And now the lies continue, only it’s only ever the republicans that get “fact checked”. And now they’re trying to “ban misinformation” online. Does anyone really not see how transparent this all is?
I think what's most remarkable is after 40+ years of having a reputation for having a problematic relationship with truth, Biden got rehabilitated into some sort of Washingtonian "I cannot tell a lie" figure. And people actually went along with it! I've said it before, but I'll say it again. It wasn't until TDS that I really understood Orwell's "We've always been at war with Eastasia" chapter. I remember reading that, and thinking he was just being cartoonishly over the top. But apparently I owe Orwell an apology. I never should have doubted him.
I thought “Ministry of Love” was over the top long ago as well. I too owe him an apology.
Ok no one else is asking so I'll ask. How so? Would you care to clarify or expand on this?
Oh, sure. Sorry wasn't trying to be opaque.
The Ministry of Love is of course the organization that tortures and re-educates wayward citizens. It seemed to me the first time I read it like a deliberately absurd exaggeration to name something the literal opposite of what it is, but "reasoning from names" seems like a common strategy.
See, e.g., "antifa just means anti fascism -- why would you oppose that?" or "why would you oppose 'inclusion' initiatives, you worthless bigot?" or "a disinformation governance board makes you nervous? what, you want incorrect information to spread unchecked?"
It's a common trope that to name something is to wield power over it, for instance Adam names creatures in Genesis, demons keep their true names secret in much of fantasy, and there are plenty of folklore beliefs about the power of a true name.
The inverse also seems true to me. If you can't properly name a thing then you can't control it. Giving something reprehensible a benign-sounding name seems to really short-circuit something in our brains. It becomes difficult to even reason about it properly I think.
Orwell had a deep understanding of how language can manipulate people and I shouldn't have doubted him.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link