site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 7, 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.

8
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

respectful way to tiptoe around the conversation over whether Jews control the American government

You've got rather significant US leaders like Donald Trump going out and saying, publicly “The biggest change I’ve seen in Congress is Israel literally owned Congress — you understand that — 10 years ago, 15 years ago. And it was so powerful. It was so powerful. And today it’s almost the opposite,” Trump said.

“And we’re not talking about over a very long period of time, but I think you know exactly what I’m saying. They had such power, Israel had such power — and rightfully — over Congress, and now it doesn’t. It’s incredible, actually,” Trump claimed.

And what about Jewish representation in the Biden administration? Here's a handy source about it: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jews-in-the-biden-administration

The Secretary of State, Attorney-General, Secretary of Homeland Security, Director of National Intelligence, SEC chairman, Secretary of Treasury, both WH chiefs of staff and much else besides, all were Jewish. The President wasn't even mentally there most of the time. I'd challenge that as a matter of fact, the US government was run by Jews during that period. Who else was controlling it if not these people?

Right now Trump is going on and on about how much he loves Netanyahu. He has many Jewish advisors and seems to think that Israel was or ought to run the US Congress, though it's always hard to understand what Trump thinks or means. Would this not have some kind of influence on his Middle East policy, where Israel is located?

But you not only don't want to talk about it but don't even want other people to talk about it?

Should we not be capable of talking about Saudi influence in America? Or Russian influence in America? Or Qatari influence? Those are worthy topics of discussion. If someone wants to make a post about it then they should go ahead. I was always really bored with all the Russia stuff, it got into an arcane lore of who made which dossier when paid for by who... But it's eminently appropriate for discussion.

Turok was being banned for being overtly aggressive and obnoxiously creating imaginary narratives like "The "Woke Rightist" looks at his race, sees a mostly imaginary mass of helpless unemployed drug addicts and demands tariffs so that they can rise to the lofty heights of sewing bras, picking fruit, hauling equipment, and digging ditches in the rain."

That's not what the 'woke right' thinks and he surely knows it. He need only check the MAGA rhetoric from Trump about good factory jobs, or the rhetoric from the right about the need to mechanize dull fruitpicking jobs and raise productivity. Why, they say, should millions of people be brought into the country if AI is going to destroy everyone's jobs? Or the need to have American wealth kept in America rather than sent off in remittances. Or them hating H1Bs as cost-cutting that interferes with developing talent. Or them not seeing the country as purely an economic zone but having responsibility to native citizens. It's an insanely uncharitable and aggressive butchering of other people's ideology.

There's more to 'leftism' (an incredibly broad, nebulous term) than 'uhhh i'm gay and retarded and want free stuff, now give it to me before I torch your country out of resentment for my genetic superiors - I'm still going to torch your country though no matter what you do'. Just making that argument, even in a verbose way, should be deserving of a ban. It's obviously antagonistic and obnoxious.

The Secretary of State, Attorney-General, Secretary of Homeland Security, Director of National Intelligence, SEC chairman, Secretary of Treasury, both WH chiefs of staff and much else besides, all were Jewish. The President wasn't even mentally there most of the time. I'd challenge that as a matter of fact, the US government was run by Jews during that period. Who else was controlling it if not these people?

There is a difference between "The people in power are Jews" and "Jews are the people in power." One is the Motte, one is the Bailey.

I am not sure what you want to say here. Let's use another example: Would you say that there is a difference between saying "The people in power in San Francisco are progressives" and "Progressives are the people in power in San Francisco"?

I think this phrasing is used all the time. It is absolutely okay to say that let's say that MAGA movement is now in power, while also acknowledging that not all MAGA members - even those living in trailer parks - are in power. What is your point?

"Jews being in power" wouldn't mean anything unless you believe they are specifically serving Jewish interests to the detriment of non Jews. Obviously progressives serve progressive interests. The Jew haters have to invent a narrative where all our economic, immigration, and foreign policies are basically an effort by Jews to undermine civilization to explain the "Jewish interests" that Jews are supposedly pursuing.

So you are saying our local Jew haters are to Jews as anti-racists are to whites? As feminists are to men? This kind of overly broad demographic-based not-quite-a-conspiracy thinking is rather common in the US today.

That's somewhat fair, though I'd point out that SJWs and feminists don't have a history of actually committing genocide against their outgroup.

Genocides have a tendency to not repeat, so there's quite rarely "a history" of doing that kind of thing.

"Jews being in power" wouldn't mean anything unless you believe they are specifically serving Jewish interests to the detriment of non Jews.

Yes, there are a lot of arguments around that, for instance like arguments related to pro-Israel foreign policy, which is more specific interest in line with US Jewish diaspora as opposed to general public interest.

This is also nothing new, there are a lot of politicians who promote their ethnic, religious or tribal interests over general interest. This is the whole point of contention with identity politics - be it black leaders promoting policies like reparations from white people, native American leaders clamoring for various concessions or even feminists requiring sex-based privileges like sex based quotas in various institutions etc. What's strange with saying that and why should Jews be exception? If disproportionate number of key government positions would be held by Ilhan Omar and Somalis, I would not find it strange that they would promote pro-Islam or pro-Somali policies.

"There are a lot of arguments around that," yes. And that Jews are biased towards wanting to support Israel is of course pretty obvious. But that is only the tip of the iceberg of "Jewish influence" arguments.

It sure gets discussed a lot for something you claim you are not allowed to discuss.

But you not only don't want to talk about it but don't even want other people to talk about it?

Since I explicitly said I think it should be allowed to talk about it I guess you misread my post.

You said you think this shouldn't be allowed while other people like Turok are being banned for a different matter. You're happy with both but not just one of the two.

"Apply the same low bar consistently. Let people have an actual conversation with actual disagreement."

Yes, but I'm advocating for the bar to be lowered, not raised. I think raising the bar leads to slippery slope effects where more and more topics become verboten. That's most of the point of me leading with the forum I moderated spiraling downwards, listing what I appreciate about kiwifarms, etc, even while discussing the chilling effect every space inevitably acquires against people not in the status quo audience.

We've had the "the opinions expressed here are so repugnant, that I should not be expected to be civil" argument here before. Sorry, this isn't that kind of place, if that's what you want 4chan and KiwiFarms are still open.

I don't consider the "chilling effect" a valid complaint. Not when every other forum on the internet either bans disagreement outright, or approves of the kind of hostility against it's outgroup that we stamp out no matter who it comes from.

We've had the "the opinions expressed here are so repugnant, that I should not be expected to be civil" argument here before. Sorry, this isn't that kind of place, if that's what you want 4chan and KiwiFarms are still open.

I mean, you don't even have to be all that polite here and be ok as far as the moderation goes. The bar is really quite low.

How is it actual disagreement if Turok is tilting at windmills with these stories about what he imagines, or likes to imagine that other people think:

In a country where 38% of liberal women aged 18-29 identify as LGBT, you, dear reader, may find yourself drawn to the “BASED” subculture. I’m not asking you to stay away, just to see it for what it is. It’s not Crémieux, it’s not Razib Khan, it’s not Steve Sailer. It’s people like Natalie Winters, whose response to the Trump-Musk feud was, “this whole thing is proof of why we shouldn’t vaccinate children.”

If you are 'based', actually you're somehow like Natalie Winters and the idiot foil in a long story he made up? 'Don't stay away' he says, not necessarily, just know that you're weird and low class?

"The "Woke Rightist" looks at his race, sees a mostly imaginary mass of helpless unemployed drug addicts and demands tariffs so that they can rise to the lofty heights of sewing bras, picking fruit, hauling equipment, and digging ditches in the rain."

The issue isn't disagreeing about facts in the world, or disagreeing about some prediction or analysis. It's not disagreeing about what should happen, or proposing some interesting idea. It's him conjuring up imaginary people who think silly things and sneering at them from a supposedly objective point of view. How is this legitimate disagreement?

I wouldn't use Turok as an example of much. Even as someone of a similar political persuasion he posted in an obnoxious and inflammatory way. When it comes to moderating, moderating for tone is vulnerable to wording things in a certain way that it flies under the threshold for moderation even though you could reword what they said into a rule-breaking comment without adding anything inflammatory to it. Turok often imagined what his opponents believed, but I don't think he was hit for that, he was hit for his tone. He could have delivered the same content and not gotten hit by the mods had he put even a little bit of effort into following the rules.

You can't insult someone, but you can accuse large groups of having negative traits with almost nothing to back it up. You can deliberately misinterpret everything and make strawman arguments. And then when someone responds to point out how bad your claims are, not even from a moral purity perspective but from strawmanning perspective, they get hit by the mods if they don't do it right.

None if this is a claim that the mods are bad, just a claim that this style of moderation invites a certain type of arbitrariness - "Why was this comment moderated but not that?"

I think Clementine was arguing that this problem can be fixed either by more moderating or less moderating, giving a responder more slack to call something stupid when it is stupid.

Oh his Natalie Winters comment was obnoxious I refuse to defend that one.