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 -
This is where I'm just going to bow out and say, "Not playing this silly game." As I wrote:
But yeah, "genies" have "gone back into bottles" before (what a shitty, loaded metaphor). I made a long list in my last comment and everything.
True enough. It just so happens to be that we don't see a world where the lack of slavery is causing all sorts of real world problems for individuals and societies. Plus all the good moral arguments and everything. Funny that, both those factors cut the other way for the instant question. As I wrote:
No one is asking you to divine the future or mind control the public. To give an example, the Democratic party knows they are deeply unpopular right now. They are putting a bunch of money into trying to figure out what they can do to win the public back. No one has any future knowledge whether they will take any lessons to heart or that it will work, but if the discussion were about whether the Democrats can make a comeback, it's a discussion point to argue how they might. They aren't just sitting around and hoping the public randomly becomes receptive to the same message.
Is there any group out there doing that for abstinence/marriage?
You cherry picked historical examples of cultural shifts to prove the possibility. The theoretical possibility was never in doubt, the question was over whether the odds are high enough to be worth discussing. It's theoretically possible that in the future society decriminalizes murder, but I'm not about to make a writeup exploring the possibility.
That is an example of how the abolitionists succeeded in forming such a winning message that you don't see a counterargument. People did argue that slavery was a societal good (if only because no one wants to be the villain). They argued that back in Africa black tribesman were either lazy or fighting each other, and over here they are productive and safe (so long as they don't provoke the master of course). If you could bring a southern man from the past here he'd probably look at urban black culture and tell you they were better off slaves.
"Sometimes it's hard to tell" is a way to frame the discussion to throw out the need to discuss. It's similar to consensus-gathering but for an argument. I can articulate the reasons why no-fault divorce became popular:
It appeals to the modern liberal belief system of associating or not associating with whomever you want.
People are hard-wired to like sex and believe that contraceptives and abortion allow them to have that consequence-free.
When parents stick together despite hating each other it creates a toxic environment that leads to mental health problems for children.
It leads to needing to prove abuse in order to escape abusive environments.
Arguments for marriage are often rooted in Christianity which is on the decline.
If you want people to marry and abstain from sex the biggest hurdle is going to be primarily those top two arguments. From where I'm standing it looks like those arguments resonate greatly.
No. I just went through a wide variety of things, some which shifted, some which then didn't shift. We could keep generating a very very very long list, but I figured it was better to not have a 5k word comment that is just a silly list.
Frankly, this is bullshit. As evidenced by your statements:
If I had told a pro-slavery person, back when being pro-slavery was ascendant, that mayyyyyyybe they should be sliiiiiiightly open to the idea that it's poooossible that slavery won't stay ascendant forever, would you be there saying:
Would you be there saying:
?
???
My point is not claiming with certainty that premarital sex and single parenting due to divorce is going to exist forever. But at least in my lifetime I'd say I think it's unlikely that any group that opposes this will acquire control of the mechanisms to ever find out what they could do with them. Given that slavery lasted for millennia, the people who said slavery wasn't going anywhere were probably right in all the ways that mattered.
Sex outside of marriage was frequent even when said groups did control those mechanisms. And the advent of birth control means people at least believe they can have sex with no consequences. A quick search suggests only 5% of people want to make birth control harder to get, and only 28% want abortions to be harder to get. About 95% of Americans have had sex outside of marriage, often with someone they did not eventually marry. Only about 35% of Americans say sex outside of marriage is wrong. Only 32% of Christians say it is never acceptable to have sex outside of marriage.
I'm saying that this viewpoint is in a very deep hole and it would take a very dramatic shift for it to happen. Gaining control of those mechanisms to convince people to stop having sex outside of marriage is a chicken and egg problem. Even Republicans don't seem interested. It sounds about as likely as me hypothesizing how many people I could sway to become pro-immigration if I could get a speaking role at the Republican National Convention. Maybe some of the attendees will switch to Democrats at some point in their life, but that's not a reason to pursue that line of thought.
As I wrote:
and
I think the biggest thing you've added is that, indeed, you do think that it's just a fully-general argument, including that you would have used it against slavery abolitionists in 1000 BC, 1000 AD, and in 1864. But yeah, I do listen to/read some libertarians, and I imagine if someone just kept popping up to say, "You're a minority opinion; you haven't convinced everyone yet; it's hard to convince people of things," they'd probably respond with, "No shit, Sherlock." But if you kept popping up to interrupt them to say that, I'd probably get tired of the annoyance pretty quickly.
I kept popping up to say that "Unless you view this as a fully-general argument against any sort of minority view?" is missing a major caveat. I wouldn't consider it an argument against the minority view on a 45/55 split issue. I would on a 5/95 split issue. The degree of unpopularity is the issue here. At a certain point it is fair to tell the tankie that the Communist Revolution of America isn't happening in his lifetime.
In say 1860 someone would have plenty of evidence to predict the end of slavery. The election of Lincoln, Bleeding Kansas, etc. In 1864 there was an entire war going on over it.
1855? 1850? 1845? ... 1776, when the Constitutional compromises were made? This seems like a silly exercise with only faux numerical justification.
I don't deny that there's some amount of vibes, but looking at stats always is biased by what you want to see. We have data spanning the better part of the century showing lower religious beliefs, consistently high rates of premarital sex, and even among the groups for whom opposition to premarital sex should be highest, the issue is unpopular. If someone wanted to make a rhetorical case why they believe abstinence won't gain significant popularity in the next 50 years, I don't know that it gets more solid than that.
What would be the rhetorical claims as to how the trends might reverse? Is there a hypothetical event that might change a large number of opinions? An up-and-coming charismatic politician or political commentator? A point at which society realizes the status quo is unsustainable and agrees to a specific fix? An argument that the trends observed aren't trends at all and the statistics are being misread?
If I wanted to argue that America could become communist, maybe I predict that AOC will finally wrest control of the rudderless Democratic Party. Maybe Trump does a business deal so corrupt that the U.S. decides to burn the system down. Maybe a new strain of covid emerges and the disproportionately vaccinated liberal arts majors inherit the earth. As obviously silly as all of these are, they are relatively defined theories that one can discuss. They propose scenarios and how they might lead to a shift.
Or in the slavery metaphor, a person on some date might make predictions based on whether abolitionists are becoming more popular, the untenable legal conflicts of north vs. south, public outcry over legal cases, etc. Again, the argument is - could they make a rhetorical case for their prediction that a change will happen, were they so inclined.
(Edit to add, because it was late) As to whether someone should need to bring this evidence, I don't know if we have polling on slavery in the 1800s. If 5% of society was abolitionist, a person suggesting abolition will happen would be outside the norm. The average person probably couldn't see a way it might become popular. If 45% was abolitionist, the listener can probably figure out on their own that this is a hot button issue and society's position is shifting based on hearing about events like Dred Scott or Bleeding Kansas.
I wrote here:
Perhaps see also this chain of comments by @FCfromSSC. He focused on porn in the last comment, but also:
But instead, you seem to want some specific predictions of specific mechanisms that are headline-style events. Things like:
These are kind of silly. "I predict that [POLITICIAN] will ascend and promote [THING]." Like, okay? Swap someone/something in there. I'm again not particularly interested in playing that silly game.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link