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 -
Raising the Price of Admission
I find myself immensely frustrated by Trump's recent moves to cut down on immigration, especially replacing the EB5 with his new golden ticket scheme.
I've always wanted to move to the States, but by virtue of being Indian, and in a profession with strict regulatory requirements, it was never easy. As of right now, I can't sit for the USMLE if I wanted to, but I believe that is a problem my uni could solve, unfortunately I'm locked into the UK for at least 3 more years and don't have the time to breathe down their necks.
If I wanted to spend $1 million for the old EB5, I'd probably have to sell a significant fraction of my familial assets, and they're not mine yet, I have a sibling and parents to think of. The fact that we even have that much, when my father made $50k at the peak of his career as a OBGYN surgeon, represents a lifetime of my parents being frugal and living beneath their means. My dad started out from scratch, a penniless refugee, and all his life he worked tirelessly to make sure his kids wouldn't have to work as hard as he did. To a degree, he's succeeded. I nearly make as much as he does, but that's virtue of grinding my ass off to escape India. I had to settle for the UK, whereas I'd much rather be in the States.
The EB-5 program already functioned as a high barrier to entry, requiring not just capital but also the ability to invest in ways that met the job creation criteria. By raising the price to $5 million, the U.S. is effectively signaling that it no longer wants "entrepreneurial upper-middle-class" immigrants - it only wants the ultra-wealthy. The problem, is that the truly ultra-wealthy already have multiple options. The US is relatively unique in dual-taxation, and has heavier taxes overall when compared to some of the alternatives. They can buy citizenship in other countries (Malta, St. Kitts, etc.), take advantage of residence-by-investment programs in the EU, or just maintain an arsenal of visas that allow them to live anywhere they please. The U.S. loses out on exactly the kind of people who were willing to put down roots and contribute significantly to the economy while still needing the opportunities that U.S. citizenship provides.
If Trump (or any administration) wanted a truly meritocratic system, they should be auctioning off a limited number of economic immigrant slots each year. That would at least allow market forces to determine the actual value of U.S. residency. A points-based system, like Canada’s or Australia’s, could also make more sense: prioritizing skilled professionals over sheer wealth. A million already strongly filters would-be immigrants. Five is exorbitant, especially if it's a flat sum.
(Let's leave aside the other requirements, such as running a business that creates a certain number of jobs)
Jevon's paradoxmakes us expect that increasing the price of a good by 5 times will not 5x the revenue. It'll decrease it in expectation. If Trump prizes himself as a businessman, this should be clear to him.
Even the abolition of birthright citizenship strikes me as a violation of the American ethos. It was certainly being abused, anchor babies being a case in point, but when even green cards are this hard to get, prospective skilled migrants greatly appreciate the peace of mind that their kids are entitled to citizenship provides.
End it for illegal immigrants if you have to, why lump in everyone else there legitimately? I wouldn't mind people using their visitor visas to get a fast one in being debarred too, but I look at the current state of affairs with great dismay.
At any rate, I'm not an American. I do wish I was, and my impression is that most of you would be happy to have me. Well, I'm used to life being rough, and the UK isn't the worst place I could be. I still think that even from an absolutely monetary point of view, this is a bad plan.
I hope I've made a decent case for why you're not getting much out filtering the immigrants for quality at that point, and the ones who are that loaded are probably not nearly as keen. They're easily Global Citizens for whom nationality is a formality.
Well, I'm still going to see if I manage to figure out the USMLE thing by the time my training in the UK ends, but there must be thousands of skilled immigrants in a similar boat, just noticing a rather significant leak in it. Then they're confronted by a sign at Eliis Island that just any ocean-crossing vessel won't do, they need a yacht. We don't deserve to be clubbed in with those who break the rules.
Have you considered staying inside your home country? Americans overwhelmingly voted to lower immigration - Trump’s policies aren’t a "suggestion" or some miscalculation, they’re the people’s choice. It's quite selfish to continue to game the system in the face of this.
I have to ask - do you not feel uncomfortable coming to a country where the people do not want you there? I know I could not make such a move.
Large portions of Trump votes are likely based on illegal immigration or concerns about inflation, his election isn’t itself evidence that any majority of the US is deeply against having an Indian doctor move here.
And not just any Indian doctor. I think it's entirely fair to say that my values, attitudes and beliefs are far closer to American than Indian.
Hell, even the way I talk, I've been asked dozens of times by Brits if I'm an American based on my accent.
But yes, I sincerely doubt that the average American would be against a foreign doctor who had passed all the competency requirements, and had even gone through training in a Western country.
As a pretty average American compared to most of this forum, I'd be okay with you or anyone else living here only if you did most of the following: got married (ideally to an American), had kids, learned to hunt or fish, started going to church or at least showed up and participated in public events hosted by churches, took an interest in local politics, and participated in traditional civil religion ceremonies (e.g. 4th of July cookout), got and kept a stable job, and generally deferred to the local culture, social conventions, and moral code (e.g. no loud ethnic music or fireworks at weird times, no opening abortion or gender transition clinics, no complaining about halal/no vegetarian food).
If you don't want to do those things, I honestly don't really want you in my country at all, no offense personally. If you must come, I hope you stay in the rootless cosmopolitan containment zones (blue cities).
I think this is how many (most?) non urbanite Americans actually feel but as @WhiningCoil points out, even the reddest red state hobbits have been successfully trained by state education to crimestop when thinking these thoughts, so they make mouth noises about "illegal immigration."
Also, just curious, but since you are transhumanist (IIRC) atheist, isn't the social and political climate of the UK much more amenable to your beliefs and political goals? America has a large population of recalcitrant believers in the imago dei, including not a few members of the elite, who completely oppose transhumanism.
I was just about to say that I tick all of the boxes, except for ever being willing to be a devout member of a church, when I saw that you left open the option of simply participating in civic life.
I can genuinely say, with little doubt, that these are all things or practices I would be happy to do, or at least try, in the case of hunting (I fucking love guns, I want to turn a boar into pink mist with .50 bmg, I also have ADHD so I'd probably have to take meds in order to handle all the waiting around).
Abortion clinics? I'm for abortion being legal, and probably more pro-choice than most. I'm not in the business of opening them, I discarded the family trade of OBGYN.
As a psychiatrist, I also treat gender transitioning as something to be greatly skeptical of. I wouldn't be going around encouraging it, even if I don't really have an issue with trans people and try to be polite in their company.
So I can easily imagine myself settling into a small town, showing up to grill beef steaks with no issues, drinking beer and shooting the shit (and beer cans) with my neighbors and their kids while my own kids, the product of legal and ceremonial marriage, speak to them in English.
The UK will jail you for burning a Koran, and will let the person who assaulted you while brandishing a knife go with bail. It's a state that does secularism entirely wrong, unlike the French, who have the right idea with lacité. America handles freedom of speech and religion far better.
I do not expect to have issues with religious people in the States. I usually keep my religious opinions to myself, except when I'm in an argumentative mood in an online forum with internet strangers. If they don't bother me, I won't bother them beyond not practicing their tenets.
Besides, the bulk of the atheist transhumanists live in the Bay Area. That's my first choice, though I like most of America and would be happy to live there (barring Alaska).
I know you're being hyperbolic, but if you want to pass for being fully assimilated into American gun culture you have to be more nuanced than this. Full auto and .50 BMG are the types of things you do as a rental on a weekend to Nevada. You use them to obliterate a junk car or washing machine. Even with physician money it's just to impractical to do all the time. You'll almost never see this kind of thing at a normal range in the US.
More Platonicly American methods of hunting hogs:
I don't consider hog hunting to be the most American form of hunting though. For me the form of hunting that is most characteristic of the American ethos is elk hunting. Probably with something like a .300 Winchester Magnum or one of the other big 30's.
It was hyperbole. I would like to own at least 2 different rifles, probably an AR-15 chambered in 5.56, and a DMR in something like .338 or .408. If you can't tell, I like guns that go boom. I could tell you more about my aesthetics, I'd kit out the AR with Daniel Defense furniture barring a magpul MOE buttstock, Geissele match triggers, an LPVO with a mounted red dot. The DMR would (ideally) be a Mk-18 Mjolnir, because I love that gun, but I'd settle for a off the shelf AR-10 in 7.62x51 if I had to.
The 5.56 for plinking or at the range, the DMR for the hell of it. If I wanted to go hunting boar from a chopper with a Barrett, that would be a special treat if anything.
I suppose given that you are in the UK right now, I'll accept NATO nomenclature for caliber. There is something decidedly transatlantic about using millimeter based measurements to specify caliber over US customary units though.
I'll have to insist on you describing all charge sizes in the mass unit of grains before naturalizing to the US. Of course actually referring to the volume of a some particular brand of dipper and powder you used and not the actual mass.
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
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link