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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 10, 2025

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I guess that woman debating Sam Seder is getting more attention, but it pairs well with this other guy who "shredded" Sam Seder.

https://x.com/IamSean90/status/1898979265615409509

In this clip, Sam basically fails to articulate a single moral principle beyond "Well, that's just what our society had decided is right and wrong" and when dude says society can change it's mind over time, Sam's only meek response is "Please don't".

Pair this with lady who points out this whole "melting pot" narrative undermining the Christian European roots of America, and Sam comes off as a guy who's left hand is constantly working to change society (through mass migration and media control) to match his preferences, and who's right hand just shrugs and goes "I donno man, things just happen to be the way I like them because of society or whatever man."

There was a story sold to us growing up that we can accept immigrants who want to work hard, and by working hard make America a better place, but that they will assimilate and the America we experience will not meaningfully change. People will experience diversity of shopping and dining experiences with zero externalities. This story, broadly, got widespread support. This story has also been exposed as a complete falsehood. There is little assimilation, and towns are becoming foreign countries out from under their native residents not in generations, but in election cycles. And the response from our ruling class is basically "Fuck you, you suck, your standard of living is too high and you vote wrong, so we're replacing you on purpose and there is nothing you can do about it." We get a bunch of unprincipled and self serving "America is only an idea man, and ideas can change" rhetoric. But change can cut both ways, and people are waking up to the fact that they are faced with America being changed into a completely foreign country out from under them, or being changed back into a more explicitly Christian European country.

But one way or another, the change is coming. Clinging to the status quo is no longer an option.

I'm not shocked more people are nakedly ethnonationalist. It's the gold standard for all of human history, lots of the world currently still is, and it's the only meaningful alternative being provided to "Just let infinity third worlders have your legacy because you suck". I personally don't think legacy Americans have the vitality or institutional capacity to stop it, though I sincerely hope I'm wrong. The project is going to take a lot longer than another 4 year Trump term.

In this clip, Sam basically fails to articulate a single moral principle beyond "Well, that's just what our society had decided is right and wrong" and when dude says society can change it's mind over time, Sam's only meek response is "Please don't".

Pitiable performance indeed, and the fact that we still have such debates is even more pitiable.

Morality based on divine command is, historically, extremely late development (and it is debatable how effective it was). 2000+ years ago, if someone asked: "Why shouldn't I rob, rape and kill my fellow citizens of my city?" the answer was not "Zeus forbids it" or "After you die, Zeus will torture you forever in Tartarus".

The answer was, TL;DR: "Because good person does not do such things, and you want to be heckin' good person" and "If you are caught, you will be crucified/impaled/skinned alive/fed to wild beasts".

The answer was, TL;DR: "Because good person does not do such things, and you want to be heckin' good person"

Putting aside whether Christianity triumphed because it was distinct in its focus on morality (Julian the Apostate certainly thought lacking this focus on charity was a weakness of traditional religion), it was often "you would be a bad member of the clan/city/people". You either insulted your worshipped ancestors or the very kin you needed to survive.

Sam Seder's ideology suffers from coming at an incredibly individualistic time and encouraging those tendencies more and more.

I don't blame him that much for speaking up, he was dealing with a debate-bro in a format ill suited for it. But it is a legitimate problem when your ideology simultaneously attacks all things that impose duties on people, push them to live their best lives and then have to turn around and try to jerry-rig some new commandments without many of the tools we've traditionally used for that and without admitting what you're doing.

In fact, if we're going to criticize people's performance, the debate-bro allowed Sam to say ludicrous things, like imposing one's beliefs being mainly a feature of theocrats. That is a ludicrous thing to grant given how the secular supposed-cosmopolitans act when they feel they have the whip hand. Ultimately, there's no escape from needing to have a set of values for a community. What you'd hopefully do is shrink the size of communities but everyone is going in the opposite direction.