site banner
PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   13024 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 16, 2025

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.

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Apparently, the UKGBNI is set to completely decriminalize abortion in England and Wales when performed by the woman (not when performed by a doctor). According to Reuters and BBC, under existing law abortion by a doctor is legal up to 24 weeks and a woman can perform an abortion on herself with prescribed pills up to 10 weeks. In contrast, the new law—approved by 73 percent of the House of Commons—appears to permit abortion right up to the point of birth when it is performed by the woman.

Text of the law (on pages 108–109 of the PDF; part of a much larger bill):

Tonia Antoniazzi, NC1

To move the following Clause—

Removal of women from the criminal law related to abortion

For the purposes of the law related to abortion, including sections 58 and 59 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 and the Infant Life (Preservation) Act 1929, no offence is committed by a woman acting in relation to her own pregnancy.

Member's explanatory statement

This new clause would disapply existing criminal law related to abortion from women acting in relation to her own pregnancy at any gestation, removing the threat of investigation, arrest, prosecution, or imprisonment. It would not change any law regarding the provision of abortion services within a healthcare setting, including but not limited to the time limit, telemedicine, the grounds for abortion, or the requirement for two doctors’ approval.

Now, I am pro-choice and also one of these much hated Singerians who think that babies do not have more of an intrinsic right to life than other mammals of similar cognitive capabilities.

However, I also recognize that society really values babies, to the point where having surplus babies which nobody can be arsed to take care of is not a thing in the Western world. Thus babies have a large instrumental value.

I think if you have a fetus gestated to the point where it is viable outside the womb, with a skull and everything, then there is no way to get rid of it without giving birth to it or some surgical intervention. Killing it will not change the fact. Thus, it seems reasonable that society would ask a woman that she does not kill her pregnancy at this point.

Singerians who think that babies do not have more of an intrinsic right to life than other mammals of similar cognitive capabilities.

seems like a very short term view to have. maybe you can argue that a baby is currently as cognitively capable as a gorilla, but within a year or two there is no comparison, a toddler that babbles dwarfs the gorilla in this realm. do you / singer not take this into account?

does peter singer even believe in intrinsic rights? utilitarianism is not really a rights based philosophy. if singer can be summed up as "actions should be judged by their consequences in terms of maximizing the satisfaction of interests and minimizing suffering", its not immideatly clear why or how rights are needed except for expediency.

even the idea of an "intrinsic right" is somewhat of an oxymoron. a "right" is a human construct. how can a human construct be intrinsic?

The problem with protecting the potential of personhood is that it starts even before conception.

If two people (of suitable fertility and biological sexes) have PIV sex, then in the ancestral environment, this has some probability of setting a chain in motion which will result in the creation of a person -- a being with the cognitive capabilities typical of a human. If instead they use some form of birth control, this will drastically lower that probability, so from the point of preventing a person to come into existence, it will be fractionally as bad as abortion or infanticide. (Being anti-birth control is still a position some people hold, but it is mostly more about being anti-sex.)

But we do not even have to stop there, because people having PIV sex does not just happen randomly. If birth control is bad because it prevents the creation of persons, then so is not asking out people on a date. (This is now very contrary to the RCC, which views abstinence as praiseworthy.)

The person too busy with Warhammer to date, the person who uses birth control, the person having abortions whenever she gets pregnant and the person who just murders her babies are all preventing new persons from coming into existence despite there being a potential if they made different choices.

The person too busy with Warhammer to date, the person who uses birth control, the person having abortions whenever she gets pregnant and the person who just murders her babies are all preventing new persons from coming into existence despite there being a potential if they made different choices.

I do not have a high opinion of NEET Otakus(which is what I consider warhammer fans to be, regardless of the japanese-ness of warhammer- it's nerd shit and that's that). Otherwise eligible men who are too busy with videogames should quit the gaming and start dating seriously. Married couples should be having regular sex unless medically contraindicated.

Religious and clergy are different, of course, but every society in history has had to deal with a class of men that would prefer cheap sexual vices(in our case, porn), gambling(on sports in our case), and entertainment(mostly videogames today) to marriage. The RCC has not, historically, had a high opinion of this class, and most societies in history have attempted to discourage it.

You're defining "potential" very oddly here. Babies have the potential for sapience in the sense that, if things run their natural course, they will soon become sapient. There is no reference to probabilities or odds here--a baby in a very dangerous environment, with a 90% chance of getting killed before they turn 1, still has just as much "potential" for sapience as a safer baby. Similarly, someone under anesthesia has the same personhood no matter the caliber of the doctor operating on them.

If birth control is bad because it prevents the creation of persons, then so is not asking out people on a date. (This is now very contrary to the RCC, which views abstinence as praiseworthy.)

Eh, this is a misrepresentation. The RCC views abstinence outside of marriage as not only praiseworthy but necessary - all sex outside of marriage is sinful. But, regarding "not asking someone out on a date", the whole idea is that God has an individual level plan for everyone to use their gifts - we need not all follow the same path. The point is to actively follow the path God has set before you and to do so faithfully. Perhaps you aren't meant to ask someone out, marry them, and procreate. Perhaps your role is more monkish. If you're playing too much Warhammer, you have to ask yourself if you're being slothful, negligent in your duties, or complacent and self-indulgent. I think you might be right that God isn't pleased with incels - who stew in their imagined slights by imagined women. But he isn't displeased with those who have actively chosen a celibate life (be they clergy or otherwise) - so long as its done with care, intent, and intention.

As an aside, I really do like your deconstruction of birth control as "fractionally as bad as abortion or infanticide."

This entire line of argument relies heavily on some very specific definition of 'personhood' that I can't tease out from context. Would you mind?

In the context of the original comment, I am going to point out that a baby is not a potential person. A baby is a person. A gorilla will never be a person, and it will never be a potential person. But otherwise nice thanks, a pretty good way to take it into account.

a "right" is a human construct.

The United States is based on the idea that rights are bestowed by our Creator, but then I suppose Singer probably doesn't subscribe to that model.

The US is based on this idea yes. But the idea "rights are bestowed by our Creator" is not correct on its own terms. If those rights were bestowed by our Creator, then they would have had those rights. But they didn't. So they fought a war to get those rights. Saying "we actually have these rights, King George is just going against God" or whatever is unfalsifiable. Those rights didn't exist in a material, verifiable, empirical sense in 1770. And if the war was not fought, then those rights would not exist in a material, verifiable, empirical sense.

Hence the position that "right" is a human construct. It exists not as intrinsic, regardless of the claim, but because humans make it exist.

Ah, yes, the "unalienable rights." Each year someone quotes that magnificent poetry. Life? What "right" to life has a man who is drowning in the Pacific? The ocean will not hearken to his cries. What "right" to life has a man who must die if he is to save his children? If he chooses to save his own life, does he do so as a matter of "right"? If two men are starving and cannibalism is the only alternative to death, which man's right is "unalienable"? And is it "right"? As to liberty, the heroes who signed the great document pledged themselves to buy liberty with their lives. Liberty is never unalienable; it must be redeemed regularly with the blood of patriots or it always vanishes. Of all the so-called natural human rights that have ever been invented, liberty is least likely to be cheap and is never free of cost. The third "right"? - the "pursuit of happiness"? It is indeed unalienable but it is not a right; it is simply a universal condition which tyrants cannot take away nor patriots restore. Cast me into a dungeon, burn me at the stake, crown me king of kings, I can "pursue happiness" as long as my brain lives - but neither gods nor saints, wise men nor subtle drugs, can insure that I will catch it.

  • Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

I just commented on this. A man drowning in the Pacific has the right to life in the sense that he should live. In this sense we have rights even if they are not respected, upheld, or even known of by anyone.

Its a beautiful book, isn't it?

https://www.themotte.org/post/1208/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/259175?context=8#context

One of my favorites, my only complaint is his hard on for boot camp that makes it take up so much of the book (and after that's done he decides to go to OCS for even more training!).

The word "right" is confusing because it refers to

  1. Things people deserve and should have. E.g. if I have the right to free speech, that means I should have free speech. This is unalienable and arguably bestowed by our Creator.
  2. The realization of #1. E.g. in this sense I only have the "right" to free speech if the government recognizes that right. This is the kind of "right" that people fight for and the kind they're referring to when they say they want rights.

We can argue about whether category #1 actually exists, or is just something that people define into existence, but the discussion will be hopelessly confused without this distinction.

The United States is based on the idea that rights are bestowed by our Creator

I believe that only applies to certain inalienable rights.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats