site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 5, 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.

9
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Do you really think this is helping you? The obvious deflection, the sneering, what's even the point of it? Acting exactly like everyone in that twitter thread isn't going to convince anyone.

You started it, man. You can't lay on the thick sarcasm like "all perfectly fine", "no rules being violated here", and "definitely no bias" and not expect @Gillitrut to respond in kind.

The fact of the matter is the old Twitter team is literally not in charge anymore. Musk has owned the company for a month and a half. Every tweet you linked happened almost a month after Elon took over. How on earth do you blame pre-Musk Twitter for content that was created and remains up after he is in charge?

Because while he fired a lit of people, he didn't replace everyone, and even if he did, at the moment he can only draw from a pool of Californians. Regardless of management they will have the same bias.

Unless you're implying Elon should have hooked everyone up to Neuralink and control every single thing they do, I don't see how it's reasonable to claim he should be able to rid the company of it's pre-existing bias so quickly.

Hey hey, not all of us Californians are bonkers. Only most of us.

How long do we have to wait, post-acquisition, to start holding the CEO and owner responsible for the moderation decisions of the company he is CEO and owner of?

Funny enough

https://twitter.com/annecollier/status/1600889250761027585

This is from today - looks like the progressive entryists don't just all disappear when the technically formal ownership of an organization changes.

I'd give him 6 months to a year.

Keep mind, I find the project rather hopeless, and will be extremely surprised if he pulls it off. But at that point it will only be his fault.

Now, can you answer any of my questions? Do think company owners have the ability to read minds, and control all employees at once? If not, what is you expectation that the bias should be fixed by now based on?

Now, can you answer any of my questions?

Probably!

Do think company owners have the ability to read minds, and control all employees at once?

No, but they do generally have the ability to issue commands to employees and discipline or terminate them if they do not comply. Are you under the impression if Musk went to his moderation team and said "Take down the tweet doxxing LibsofTikTok" they would refuse? Or... did he just not know Weiss was going to mention it?

If not, what is you expectation that the bias should be fixed by now based on?

The part where fired, like, 80% of the company.

Are you under the impression if Musk went to his moderation team and said "Take down the tweet doxxing LibsofTikTok" they would refuse? Or... did he just not know Weiss was going to mention it?

So if he doesn't personally campaign to his own staff to get every single shitty moderation decision reversed its his bias?

Are you under the impression if Musk went to his moderation team and said "Take down the tweet doxxing LibsofTikTok" they would refuse?

No, but he'd have to micromanage them. So his ability to rid the company of bias does rely on controlling everyone at all times, at least until he finds less biased managers.

Or... did he just not know Weiss was going to mention it?

Possibly, or there was too much other stuff to take care of.

The part where fired, like, 80% of the company

Yeah, but at least in the short term, he can only work with Californians, the remaining 20% is not going to be that much less biased. It sure didn't look like it stopped the ex-FBI Russiagate conspiracy theorist from trying to sabotage the disclosure process.

Because A) all the 3rd world contractors are still using the rules the previous team set up, and B) the exact same thing happened when they did this to Rowling last year.

Believe me, I'd be tremendously happy if Musk's new moderation eliminated this and anyone defending it, laughing at their sudden change of position on "free speech". Hopefully it will, in time.

For how long post-Musk takeover do you think it will be reasonable to blame moderation decisions on previous management? If the tweets are still up six months from now will it still be the previous Twitter managements fault? Or will it be on Musk then?

Absolutely. If that behavior towards us is tolerated in six months I'd call his takeover a pathetic waste of time.