site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 21, 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.

13
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

They think rigid enforcement of various laws is unnecessarily inhumane. They want stronger norms against sexually aggressive behavior, but they believe it’s a bigoted stereotype that minority men = creepers.

So, in other words, they want fried ice.

But enough with the snark already, I'll present to you an anecdote instead, to illustrate why I think snark is sometimes warranted.

There's a Hungary subreddit, which I generally don't visit because it's yet another SJW hangout. Someone who claimed to be an average young progressive woman, and there was no reason to doubt her, posted an angry rant there about being harassed at a subway station in the Hungarian capital one night by a typical drunk/high (probably homeless) smelly bum. She concluded the rant by stating that she had enough of this fucking country [ruled by evil fascists] and wants to move to the West.

Because, you know, this is something that very obviously would never happen in, say, San Francisco, or London, or Paris, or Cologne. Right? It's just self-evident, after all. Goes without saying.

This is the level many people are apparently on, in terms of grasping basic logic and reality, the connection between cause and effect. Are we to take such complaints seriously?

Secretly? Wasn't 50 Shades of Gray one of the best selling book franchises ever, and didn't the movie make dump trucks of money as well?