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 -
A couple of reasons why you don’t see that many soldiers in political office anymore:
With a couple of exceptions like Grant and Eisenhower, most soldier-politicians are not career military. Most of them joined because of a big war, did 3-5 years in the military, and then got out and and started climbing the political ladder. You don’t really have that kind of soldier any more. Most people who join the military are either working class and trying to get some civilian job market skills and education for free, or they really want to be in the military. The first type likely isn’t going to have any bourgeoise-class political ambitions anyway and the second is just going to stay in the military for life because they like it. The especially elite units are often made up of the second type.
The really elite units like the SEALs, green berets and snipers tend to select for a certain personality type, they even run psych evaluations to get that personality type. And to put it bluntly, that personality type is “lightly on the sociopathy spectrum”. You need that if you want a guy who can kill 50-200 people over the course of their career without having a mental breakdown, and who can fight in the pretty calm and detached method of modern warfare and isn’t just a Viking berserker. I want to be clear, these guys are (mostly) not bad people or serial killer types, and most of them have very peaceful and mostly pro-social lives outside of the military. The problem is that type of person often comes off as weird, and often comes off as a jerk. If you want a good example, look at how many people (even conservative pro-military types) were kind of disturbed by Chris Kyle’s autobiography. This guy never did anything bad outside of combat and had a stellar service record, but it sounds like it was written by a working-class Patrick Bateman. As much as we joke about politicians being psychopaths, that is not a personality type that really gels well with politics.
However, when you hear "the smart but lazy, you make into officers, as they have the mental clarity to make the tougher decisions", this is what they actually mean. You can't command an armed force (or a nation) if you're not willing to make decisions that can get your men killed, or to be more precise, ones that will outright cost you men. This can be direct, or it can be indirect (letting the CIA create a crack epidemic on your own streets so you can free some hostages means some of your men die, for instance).
If, at the end of the day, you're not willing to painfully incinerate the cutest little girl (regardless of whether or not it's actually her or you), you're not fit to command [and to be perfectly honest, you're not fit for politics either]. And that's just the way it is.
This is a distinction that's lost on many people: it's the difference between Jack Nicholson's character in A Few Good Men and Brad Pitt's character from Fury (referenced above). The difference is, ultimately, that the former was stupid/lazy about it and the latter is not.
This is also why certain tactics are derided as "Machiavellian" despite that being how systems of governance must work to be stable. It is readily apparent that Machiavelli thought in this same way; that's why people are disturbed by his observations even though I find them to be made in perfectly good faith.
That is because Western democracies are kayfabe and the power rests elsewhere. The people in power are all like this, make no mistake.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link