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Culture War Roundup for the week of November 21, 2022

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Two leftist policies where I can understand the power dynamics but not the attitude: open borders for military-aged third-world men, relaxed (or none at all) prosecution on criminals, especially military-aged minorities who commit brazen acts of murder/assault/robbery.

As is always the case, these policies exist because a lot of parties benefit. Open borders is supported by capital, homeowners (keeps housing prices pumping), and leftists who gain the patronage of the newcomers. Criminals also help various parties. They drive out right-wingers (i.e. families). They use a huge amount of services that employ leftists. Like immigrants they become patrons to the left, to some degree.

I can see why these things are allowed to continue, but the above analysis is missing the source of intense passion that these issues receive. I don't think Amazon ever pushed for open borders, they just didn't complain end enjoyed the cheap labour. Homeowners don't go to open borders rallies because they want another point of appreciation. Chesa Boudin wants prisoners released because it's strategic. On these two issues specifically, there is only one source of intense passion: single, college-educated women.

This is confusing. Women are more risk-averse and place a higher value on safety, but at the same time they are advocating for violent criminals and random foreigners. There is also a strong element of hatred towards their own countrymen present in this, which makes sense given the policy but does not make sense given that they're ladies. It's similar to the pit bull owner thing. What's up with this? I've seen the meme around pseudopregnancy before and it fits OK, but it's not clear why criminals and foreigners would be the subject of this affection over anything else.

Maybe if a women feel rejected by or reject their own tribe themselves, they attempt to undermine it in the hopes of getting conquered by a different tribe? That seems overly complicated though, the answer to this should feel simple because it's emotional. Help me out here.

"Why does my outgroup push for obviously terrible things when we all know they don't actually believe the things they say they do?" Bonus: "Let me ask a leading question suggesting the uncharitable answer."

(Before you get indignant at my steelmanning the other side, I'll stipulate that I am not personally in favor of either open borders or lax criminal prosecution. Policy-wise, and probably even politically, I am probably much closer to you than the single college-educated women you so despise.)

Here's the actual answer: people in favor of open borders actually believe open borders are good. They are not nationalists and largely regard nationalism with distrust if not contempt; they believe freedom of movement, and particularly the freedom of people to seek better economic opportunities in wealthier countries, should not be hindered. They largely see Westerners living in wealthy nations as benefiting from a manifestly unfair birthplace luck-of-the-draw, and don't see why Guatemalans or Bangladeshis or Nigerians or Syrians should have to suffer just because they were not so lucky.

They (including even the women) do not think in terms of "military-aged men" (and definitely not in terms of "third-world men") and its implications.

They support lax prosecution of criminals for similar bleeding-heart reasons: they really do believe the rhetoric that fuels "defund the police" and BLM and "disproportionate impact on marginalized communities." They think they are being compassionate to the oppressed.

Stated more bluntly, you are asking "Why do they want to unleash hordes of violent rapists upon themselves?" You are "confused" because you don't believe that their motives are actually what they say they are, and you don't believe that they don't perceive the same outcome (hordes of violent rapists) that you do. Even if what you believe is actually correct, they don't believe that. They aren't endorsing it for some secret unstated reason they won't admit to.

Here's the actual answer: people in favor of open borders actually believe open borders are good. They are not nationalists and largely regard nationalism with distrust if not contempt; they believe freedom of movement, and particularly the freedom of people to seek better economic opportunities in wealthier countries, should not be hindered. They largely see Westerners living in wealthy nations as benefiting from a manifestly unfair birthplace luck-of-the-draw, and don't see why Guatemalans or Bangladeshis or Nigerians or Syrians should have to suffer just because they were not so lucky.

I agree the OP post did seem like begging the question, but I think there is also the possibility of ulterior motives. Some principled leftists and libertarians may think open borders are good for humanity , but probably others see immigration as necessary for displacing white America. If the outcome is the same does the intent matter that much? Maybe but probably not that much.

During my over-a-decade experience in left-wing politics, I have in fact never, ever seen anone advocate for immigration for "displacing whites" in their own country. For full disclosure, over a ten years ago I was in a British Trot conference (SWP); apart from the whole business giving a good education on what Trotskyism is and why it absolutely is good there are almost no Trots in Finland, I listened to a speech by Tariq Ali where Ali offhandedly mentioned that white people are predicted to become a minority in US in the coming decades and the young British Trots cheered and clapped; then again, even in this instance, it was (at least for the clear majority) not their country that was being spoken of. (I'm not even sure if I should mention this anecdote since it feels like the sort of a thing where most of the replies to this comment inevitably would end up revolving around it.)

In a domestic context, though? Never, and I've had conversations on a wide variety of topics with people at all local levels, really, often with alcohol involved. The whole idea - and the right-wing obsession with this belief - is considered terminally strange.

How many regular people do you think are walking around with an internal plot to “displace white America”?

Everyone who professes a belief in social justice, for one. Among people who control the levers of power, a lot.

I think I believe in social justice as much as anyone and my subjective experience does not include "an internal plot to displace white America."

Do you not think it is desirable for white to become a minority?

No.

I don’t think there’s anything special about whiteness. Certainly not anything that makes us the only valid users of American culture. And that’s what really matters.

Does essentially entirely creating that "American culture" not automatically make them "anything special" in it? Do you also entirely deny HBD and thus believe that solely culture determines destiny?

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I do not. I do not have any particular opinions regarding the ideal racial composition of any country, except that attempts to manage it deliberately are often pernicious.

Well, important people like Biden and Washington Post Reporters think it is good, and while that makes you (in my opinion) a amoderate instead of "I think I believe in social justice as much as anyone" as you wrote, they have the levers of power.

As a leftist mostly open borders, we mostly just don't care, dude.

Like, by the standards of the supposed secret left-wing plan to import a new citizenry to outvote the Old Stock, or whatever, because of the drop in support for the Democrat's among Hispanic voters, there should be some shift in support for amnesty, immigration reform, refugee status, etc., but there hasn't been.

Outside of a few jokes about since Florida is gone, Biden should reverse the Cuban import ban and invited Raul Castro to a state dinner next year, there's been no shift in elected or non-elected support, which seems odd if we're all in on a plan to get rid of whitey.

OTOH, if it turns out we're all bleeding-heart lefties who think America is, has, and always been a land of immigrants where the Old Stock freaked out over being "replaced" since approximately 1776, then there should be no surprise. The Anglo Stock got replaced by the Germans, Swedes, and such who came over. Then those people got scared of the Irish and Italians. Then, those people are currently scared of the Hispanic's and Asian's. In another 40 years, there will be El Savadoran's and Hmong Republican's scaring people about I don't know, Bangladeshi and Cameroonian immigrants taking their jobs, or whatever. As is tradition.

As a leftist mostly open borders, we mostly just don't care, dude.

Then, uh, why is it a flagpole issue? You can take the wind out of the right wing sails by not contesting it. If you don't care and still prevent the conservative position what could the justification be besides spite? And why should people respect someone spiting them?

As a leftist mostly open borders, we mostly just don't care, dude.

Maybe you mostly don't but the influential people driving policy do. Biden said that it's a wonderful thing that white people will be a minority in the US and he's one of the (comparative) moderates. Or Jimmy Fallon's audience cheering when he says that the census shows the number of white people declining. Obviously your views are your own but to say that most leftists "don't care" is just false. They say that they care and the policies that they implement back that up.

because of the drop in support for the Democrat's among Hispanic voters

They favored Democrats by a 20 point margin in 2022. The idea that Hispanics will ever favor Republicans is a cope and Democrats are too smart to think that could happen, though I'm sure they're happy that Republicans think so.

The question is whether the Salvadoran or Hmong Republicans will be similar in their beliefs, both explicit (e.g. policy proposals) and implicit (values or behavioral traits), to today's Republicans or whether the term Republican will come to mean something different. Someone recently posted this analysis by a user from the old forum (don't know if he's on here), and if this is accurate it suggest that even the additional European immigration from outside a vague Northern European cultural sphere already greatly shifted political leanings in the general population, and the Hmong and Salvadorans did and will shift it even further.

In light of this, I don't think the assumption of your argument, i.e. that we shouldn't care about demographic change because incoming populations will politically assimilate, is broadly false: the trappings and names of the past might be kept, there will be probably continue to be Republicans and Democrats well into the future, but the actual content underneath these labels has shifted in patterns largely dependent on the underlying demographics.

Judging by all the cheering at it, possibly the majority of people who would go to see John Stewart live? Or maybe they just had a freakishly unusual audience the day they did the "census says less whites! applaude now" bit.

It's one of the favorite recreational gaslighting tricks they pull. Ever been in one of those Reddit threads asking "what's with all the hate towards white people in this sub", where half the answers are sneering that it's not happening and the other half are saying it's justified because whites are disgusting?

I agree with your steelmanning, and think that you're correct in saying it But I also think there may be additional factors at play. We can go a little deeper to examine why they feel the way they do. For example, it's possible that most of the liberal educated bleeding-heart college women don't live in areas which would be impacted by increased crime, increased immigration, etc. They live in a sheltered bubble, and they're happy to believe the rhetoric as long as the chickens never come home to roost on their personal property. It's possible that women who live closer to the border or in urban centers would feel really different on those policies.

If anything liberals as a demographic are far more exposed to crime than conservatives are.

Conservatives are the more dominant demographic in suburbs and rural areas.

That's also why the crime dog didn't really hunt in the midterms - in actual urban areas, yes crime rose, but it's not 1989 out there. It's closer to the apocalyptic year of...1997. Which I thought there was nostalgia among the non-woke since it was the decade racism was killed before SJWs reignited it, so if it was such a great time, why are VC's on Twitter freaking out about it being as violent as it was when it was the time they have nostalgia for?

Friendly reminder that Twitter—be it bluechecks, randos, or “VC’s”—is a miserable site which doesn’t track the midterms. Or even realistic opinions.

Leftists pine for the days with high union membership, but ignore that paucity of women in the workforce in those days.

Which ideology would, from an era it idealizes, want only things they consider bad and no things they like?

most of the liberal educated bleeding-heart college women don't live in areas which would be impacted by increased crime, increased immigration, etc.

Given that they disproportionately live in lower-to-mid-income parts of eastern megalopolitan cities which have seen disproportionate increases in crime (particularly BOS-WASH), I think we can safely say that this is somewhat disproven, or at least complicated.

Well, if anything, that says something about the criminals issue, not immigration. Or, the criminals issue could be complicated by neighborhoods. I could easily see it being the case that these white women are not living in predominantly black neighborhoods where it's likely the bulk of the crime would be (the true "urban" areas as opposed to the "metropolitan" or up and coming gentrifying areas). Or they simply don't know how bad things might get if their activism achieves it's goal, out of sight out of mind.

Another thought comes to mind as well. What if they DO complain about such populations, but the complaints are coded in a blue tribe fashion. I.e, they don't complain about "crime" and "criminals", they complain about "patriarchy" and "men". They dislike being victimized, cat called, robbed, but they blame their own causes.

Once in a while a nice affluent white lady does end up the victim of these policies, but the response from media and activists is qualitatively different than frat sexual assaults. I would think activist ladies don't even discuss this privately.

Outsiders draw no special condemnation because trouble is expected from outsiders. Those of native culture are held to a higher standard.

or example, it's possible that most of the liberal educated bleeding-heart college women don't live in areas which would be impacted by increased crime,

Seems unlikely, given how blue white people in urban areas are, and how red white people in rural areas are. Look at NYC: All of those white liberal women ride the subway, I guarantee it. And there are plenty of projects mere blocks from all sorts of affluent or hip areas. If anything, the correlation seems to be the opposite of the one you propose.

The people of whom you speak simply do not see non-whites, as a group, as a threat.

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They’ve told us why they believe it

That explains why some hold the beliefs, it does not explain why these beliefs are heavily correlated with martial status.

Because people from conservative backgrounds are more likely to prioritize marriage and more likely to marry young?

What else would be the explanation?

Also, married people will probably just tend to be older than younger ones, and people tend to get more (socially) conservative as they age.

Changing social roles have been known to change peoples thoughts, values, and behaviors. I’d wager there’s a pretty substantial difference between the truly single and the long term cohabiting as well, it’s just hard to track.

Yes, your analogy to Democrats and rural whites is exactly correct, though I don't know for sure what their precise thinking is. I would add abortion as well; if you think abortion is wrong, you will vote for the anti-abortion party, even if the other side will better serve your economic interests, because only an asshole would do the opposite. And see article I linked earlier re value rationality.

This sounds pretty good: women are more caring than men, and all they're doing here is caring.

However, and this is related to the 4chan poster who claims this is pseudopregnancy, is that these things are advocated for in a way that doesn't strike me as coming from a place of compassion. It looks a lot more like hysteria. When I see these ladies get on the mic they are always speaking in terms of how much they hate the patriarchy (i.e. their own men), not how great Haitians are. Let's also remember that these are the same women who have done their best to eradicate any trace of all-male space on at university because masculinity is toxic and men are rapers. They say that even one woman assaulted on campus is too many, while offering complete foreigners a huge amount of leeway on the same topic. It makes sense: they're on the side of the foreigners. But why?

"Why do they want to unleash hordes of violent rapists upon themselves?"

To feel something besides alone?

'compassion' and 'hysteria' of sorts can totally coexist though. Like, let's say you saw a brutalizing a , or your enemy saw a brutalizing a - they'd be both motivated by 'helping the innocent person not be harmed' but also hysteric about it.

The "hysterical" component is simply the zeal that accompanies a conviction in one's own righteousness and the evil of one's enemies. Radfems screeching about the patriarchy are not much different than Puritans screeching about witches. MAGAs and wokes suffer from the same malady, however much you want to ascribe it to some particular component of female psychology.

To feel something besides alone?

That would be the uncharitable projection I was alluding to. I know Dread Jim and Vox Day and their ilk write a lot about how deep down, women are turned on by the idea of being raped by alpha males, but consider the possibility that when women "care" they are actually caring (however misguided you think they are) and not just following some opaque hypergamous programming subroutine.

MAGAs and wokes suffer from the same malady

Disagree. One prefers hostile foreigners to their own, both want to make it illegal for the other to be in power. Not symmetric.

Radfems screeching about the patriarchy

Here's where it's weird. I wrote in another comment that women making excuses for rapey immigrants is in heavy contrast to the decidedly less rapey white men they've given no quarter at university for the last several decades. What gives besides friend and enemy distinction?

The simplest answer is that they are wrong about relative prevalence of rape.

Or that you are. From NIJ

About 85 to 90 percent of sexual assaults reported by college women are perpetrated by someone known to the victim; about half occur on a date.

If a college woman doesn't know or interact with any illegal immigrants, then she is exceedingly unlikely to be raped by one. Even taking your assumption that those men are more likely to rape, the base rate of interaction is so low as to make it practically irrelevant. [Rainn tells us](https://www.rainn.org/statistics/campus-sexual-violence#:~:text=Male%20college%2Daged%20students%20(18,of%20rape%20or%20sexual%20assault.&text=Female%20college%2Daged%20students%20(18,of%20rape%20or%20sexual%20assault.) that college women are less likely to be raped than similarly aged women who aren't in college. Those women who aren't in college, in turn, are probably exceedingly unlikely to be raped by a college student.

So this is closer to a class issue than a race or a gender issue, even if we accept your framing.

Sure, that’s possible too- I wasn’t trying to address the issue of who’s doing the raping. Just pointing out that the possible solutions to ‘feminists are really attached to importing rapists’ include ‘they believe what they say they believe, including incorrect statistics about the prevalence of rape’, and that this is a more likely explanation than ‘they all want to get raped’.

Here's where it's weird. I wrote in another comment that women making excuses for rapey immigrants is in heavy contrast to the decidedly less rapey white men they've given no quarter at university for the last several decades. What gives besides friend and enemy distinction?

I'm not sure if you're being insincere or if you just have a very broken theory of mind for your outgroup. It's not complicated; I'll say it again. They actually believe what they say they believe. They do not believe immigrants are "rapey"; they believe immigrants are oppressed marginalized refugees. They actually believe white men at their university are privileged and rapey. It's not some secret code you have to crack to figure out why they treat one differently than the other: they told you. Your interpretation ("You know immigrants are more likely to rape you than your white classmates, right?") might or might not be correct, but that is not their interpretation. They aren't just pretending not to understand and hiding their motives: they believe different things.

Then the question is why do they choose to believe things that aren't true and are trivially easy to disprove.

No, the question, or rather the offer is: then disprove them. "My enemies are wrong and believe untruths" is what everyone believes and carries no information.

Agreed, but my OP focused on a subgroup:

there is only one source of intense passion: single, college-educated women

Married women from the same demographic, especially with kids, believe these things to a much lesser degree. Do you think that being single makes a woman more likely to buy into this stuff, and why might that be?

From election polling, and - 'married men: 39% D, married women: 42% D, nonmarried men: 45% D, nonmarried women: 68% D'. (I'd argue a lot of that is just women being more influenced by social ideas, and 'progressive ideas' are the background and are winning, so younger women adopt those)

Your explanation seems wrong though

I'm not married to my explanation, but "women more easily convinced" doesn't seem right. Why aren't they convinced by strong borders? Pretty good arguments for that.

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Married women from the same demographic, especially with kids, believe these things to a much lesser degree. Do you think that being single makes a woman more likely to buy into this stuff, and why might that be?

You're asking why college students are more radical than older, married people with children, and yet somehow making it a question about women.

To be fair, the polling (sibling comment) shows a much stronger difference in party voted for than married vs unmarried women (26% absolute) than married vs unmarried men (6% absolute), although op's explanation still seems wrong

Near group/far group

What is the analogous far group for red?

Apparently women.

You seem quite confident that women feel the exact same fear or distaste as you, but channel it into completely different policy. This might have something to do with taking gender studies on 4chan.

Consider the the possibility that women frame the issue differently than you. They are not afraid or threatened, and think of sympathetic migrants and unjust sentencing rather than drug trafficking or recidivism.

Red uses women against blue?

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People, and especially women, are good at self-deception.

To that end, we can see that they most likely really do believe that they believe all of the things amadan says they do as reasons for their actions.

To feel something besides alone?

At the same time, we can also acknowledge that there's probably something to your guess here.

“Women want to be raped rather than be alone” is a spicy enough take to demand some fucking strong evidence. I’ll settle for literally any, though.

Women love rape. There’s nothing that gets a woman’s motor going like forcibly holding them down and having your way with them. Degrade her verbally, pull her hair, smack her ass, choke her.

If you’d spent much time with women you’d know this.

Boring troll is boring. Banned for a week, probably permaban next time.

ETA: Threw flaming shitfit in DMs. Permabanned.

https://twitter.com/extradeadjcb/status/1443219177733607432

https://extradeadjcb.substack.com/p/10-you-can-save-her

Not exactly what you said, but closer than the other guy

“My angel wife is gonna drag me to heaven, I just do whatever she tells me”. It’s miserable to listen to, you can tell it absolutely desiccates their poor wives

This gender dynamic stuff is really difficult (and cringe) to discuss properly because it's a game where talking about the rules is an instant loss.

First of all, she specifically wants to make breakfast & wear heels & tidy up for Christian Grey, a charming chiseled bazillionaire. And this is perfectly understandable: if she’s going to surrender, it should be to someone worthy, who will take her somewhere worth going. It would be humiliating to do this for some pothead, some clown who just wants her to scrub his unrinsed dishes. There’s dignity (for men & women) in swearing fealty to a righteous King, but not a petty bureaucrat.

So while your statement is correct for a certain type of person, talking about it is disqualifying because now there's a chance you're just miming something that's support to be natural. Or you're not that type of person at all, in which case it's revolting for you to be thinking about this at all.

This gender dynamic stuff is really difficult (and cringe) to discuss properly because it's a game where talking about the rules is an instant loss.

You can talk about it here! You just need to be very precise, write lots of long sentences, etc. See ilforte's posts about jews - lots of detail, context, arguments, etc.

I think the implication is that would still count as an instant loss--from the perspective of a woman reading it. Talking about the game is unsexy.

I observe that their support for immigration is related more to hating their own men than it is loving these other men, which really changes the whole thing.