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 have a very smart friend who is also a talented decoupler, who could easily be a very quality contributer here if dealing with Culture War issues didn't make him bleed from the eyes. He is literally the only person I know whose Facebook posts about politics did not make me lose respect for him. Over the years, we have had a number of conversations about contentious CW topics that flirted with the border of Adversarial Collaboration, long detailed discussions handled with fairness, civility, and mutual respect.
Until the topic of student loan forgiveness came up. That discussion was unusually heated. He seemed almost frantic, heated about PPP loan forgiveness hypocrites and just not giving the expected degree of decoupled consideration for arguments about how the loan forgiveness was an overall terrible policy. He seemed personally invested, felt personally attacked, in a way he hadn't in conversations about abortion or gun control.
The thing is, my friend is a teacher. Education is a big factor in his identity. He has taught maybe a thousand students who might benefit from the forgiveness plan. Attacks on that plan are an attack on his class identity. Politics is the mind-killer, and it is a sad fact that a rationalist's Art is most likely to abandon him when he needs it most (or, rather, he will fail the Art). And so my arguments sparked an uncontrolled emotional response that was missing from other, less identity-laden topics.
The second thing is, I've been on the other side of that coin, back when we had our multi-day deep dive into the gun control literature. Gun control hits me emotionally as an attack on my class identity. When I hear a gun control proposal, before I hear a single specific detail or spend a second considering merits, some lizard part of my brain interprets it as "Fuck you, your father, your father's father, and your father's father's father". (Does the word "father" still mean anything to you?) I've begged off having spontaneous discussions about it in person, even with close family, because I don't want to spike myself into rage and other unpleasant feelings. During that deep dive, my excellent friend was so calm, fair and rational that he overrode that concern, and I ended up learning a lot and having a great time.
And I'm thinking about this now, because I notice a similar reaction to the trans discussion downthread. The idea that my children might be brainwashed into taking evolutionarily self-destructive choices, and I can't even attempt to oppose it without facing the full wrath of the modern State, kindles a pre-rational, animal panic/fury response. I find myself getting heated to an unusual degree just thinking about it. I don't think I'm particularly "anti-trans". I was willing to be accepting two decades ago, when I first learned it was even a thing. But something about the thought that the phenomenon might hit my kids triggers an atavistic survival instinct. That reaction doesn't trigger when I consider my son dressing like David Bowie, or my daughter playing sports. It doesn't happen when a peer goes trans. It triggers at the thought of one of the two corporeal incarnations of my DNA and memes getting sucked into a fraught psychological memeplex, and particularly at the thought of them being medically sterilized.
Imagine an alternate world where any time a kid expressed suicidal ideation, government employees would firmly nudge them towards euthanasia, and would jail you as a parent for protesting. That's roughly the level of emotional hit - some part of me considers this an existential threat.
But what are the odds? 0.3%? That's not that much worse than the odds of childhood cancer, or other kind of unexpected death that a healthy mind doesn't overmuch worry about, and deals with gracefully if it comes. But now it's apparently something more like nearly 2%? That hits me in the Papa-Bear-Who-Wants-Grandkids-In-Space-Forever. And it seems very likely that a lot of that is social contagion or could otherwise be wildly reduced with a minimal degree of skepticism towards youth fads.
So, two points. One, I think it might behoove activist types (assuming we're not in pure conflict theory) to try to notice when one of their pushes is hitting this sort of reaction and figure out a path to undermine or alleviate it.
Secondly, a question for the community: What gets you fiercely activated, beyond what you can rationally justify? What CW issues feels like molten hot war to the hilt, where your instincts fight to throw aside all reason and charity? Any thoughts about why?
Thank you for articulating this. I long suspected that something like this was the case, but my friend group is fairly thin on people with any negative reaction to trans issues. (Not surprising, considering my partner is trans.)
Sadly, I think that in spite of me recognizing the edges of this phenomenon before your post, I'm light on ideas on how to route around this.
Part of it is that I believe there are other forces much more likely to "psychically castrate" your offspring than trans ideology. Almost my entire friend group is queer people, and none of them have plans to have biological children. Even my old college friends who are in long term relationships or getting married have no plans for children. My sister is dead set against children (and that was before she learned about the heritable medical condition she has.)
The birth rate is low in the Western world, and the trends depressing it are bigger than any one object-level fight in the culture war. Sterility and the end of legacy is the water we swim in and the air we breathe. Lack of issue is the curse of modernity. The trends in Bowling Alone and since the advent of the internet are only making things worse. We are slowly becoming Japan.
I understand that imagining your own child becoming a modern trans eunuch touches a nerve. I don't necessarily think it's healthy to focus on one relatively unlikely source of "castration" when society is full of these kinds of pitfalls and in much more likely forms like feminism and certain kinds of environmental activism. Parts of Western society have become a nihilistic death cult, waiting for the End and unwilling to propagate itself into the future with offspring.
I was hoping to dig into your 2% figure here, but the linked page didn't really break things down the way I hoped.
I'd speculate that the 2% figure is a bit misleading though. There's a big difference between 2% of youth using alternate pronouns, and 2% of youth becoming de-sexed eunuchs. What percent are on puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and undergo surgeries? I would suspect it's much lower than 2%. That might be a small comfort for a parent worried about the worst case scenario for their own child, but even if your child comes out as "trans" it might not be the end of your bloodline.
I'm reminded of my dad constantly checking if the front door was locked growing up. It was like a ritual to alleviate worries for him. Never mind that if an intruder was truly determined to get into our house, the front door would hardly work as a deterrent. I think it is a mistake to focus your worries too much on one angle of attack, especially one where the "average" case isn't as bad as you're imagining (insofar as a lot of "transition" for younger people is purely social.)
You should also think about whether you'd be okay with your children being "psychically castrated" in other ways as well. It would be disappointing obviously, but would you still love your children if they came to you at 18 and made it clear that they have no intention of ever having kids? Could you be happy living in the doomed world where your kids decide they would rather travel the world and party their 20's and 30's away, instead of having children or starting a family?
I think this comment is pretty much spot on. The fight over the effects of puberty blockers, the surgeries et al are a kind of a proxy battle for a war that's already been lost. Even if the kids aren't being literally sterilized, they're being culturally sterilized by the waters we're all swimming in and the sociocultural forces at work are so large and complex that they're impossible to compress down into something that can be fought against in a way that puberty blockers for minors can be, so you get these vicious fights that are sort of stand ins for these abstract and borderline unopposable forces. I fully expect fertility rates for western countries to hit well below 1.0 before the close of the 21st century.
Have we really made the transition from “they’re not recruiting your children” to “so what if they are?”
It's more "They've already recruited (most of) your children, it's just a matter of degree now".
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
It's less "I am generally deeply worried about trans issues" and more "When the topic of trans kids is brought up, I have a disproportionate emotional reaction, let me dig in and try to understand where this is coming from."
Some people get extremely apoplectic about racism in a way I don't understand either.
Generational greavences are always like this.
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