site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 28, 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.

16
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Speaking in the late thirties, here, and yes, single. Among my close friends group, only one of them is married - and he still had to swim against a heavy current to find someone. The other two that could be married aren't for other reasons - one just doesn't want to get married after watching bad experiences with divorce, another isn't for... reasons? Despite looking. (If I had to guess, it's due to his work schedule.) My brother, younger than me, isn't married and hasn't been looking for years. (When the topic got brought up, he implied heavily that the juice isn't worth the squeeze and they'd bring little to the table, so why bother?)

This is pretty universal from where I'm sitting. The only guy I work with(older than me) isn't married and never has been - my boss is divorced. I can't do a full poll of all of my co-workers, but I know of at least one other guy around my age that's looking and can't find anyone. And one woman who's painfully good looking IMO, who's also single and has no plans to get married.

People seemingly keep trying to fall into a just-world fallacy as to why this is happening, mostly centered around male responsibility and fault. Not just here, but elsewhere. 'Just take a shower, just be well-dressed, just be well-mannered'. I doubt that'll change any time soon.

https://flowingdata.com/2017/11/01/who-is-married-by-now/

This is from 2015, so it's likely slightly lower, but by 40, 81% of men were married.

So yeah, you're in a bubble. Hell, in 2015, you at 33, 70% already were married, so even at worse, let's say only 75% are married by now. Also, divorce has actually gone down since the peak a few decades ago, because the millions of couples who married in 1960 and hated each other by 1964, were able to get divorced.

Sure, there are issues with marriage, but the vast majority of adults in America, end up married by the time they hit 30, at least once.