site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022

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.

16
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I predict that the housing market will experience a fall of at least Edited to "about" 20% within the next 6 months. I have about a 90% certainty in this.

You can bet on this, indirectly, by shorting RET etfs, but I think the likelihood of this happening is low. I think it's vastly more likely bitcoin will fall 20% than home prices. Home prices rose in the 80s and 90s despite high interest rates.

and the S&P500 drop 57%. The DotCom crash saw Real GDP fall by 1.6%, unemployment reach 5.9% (a rise of about 2%), and the S&P500 drop 62% (S&P drop pulled from here). I believe that the coming recession (if it happens - see above) will not be as bad as 08 because many of the co-factors that made 2008 so bad do not exist here, but that it'll probably be worse than the Dotcom crash because the Dotcom crash was largely caused by over-speculation on internet companies (hence "dotcom" crash) and low interest rates.

I would not be bearish on stocks , for two factors: record corporate profits, strong consumer spending both domestic and aboard, such as China. Even with high inflation and high interest rates, this will not change much unless there is a major recession like 2008 again. The economy and stock market did well in the 80s and 90s despite even higher interest rates than today. The fed is trying to get unemployment to rise to tame inflation, but this may not be enough to spark a bad recession, maybe only a mild one like in 2001.