site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 21, 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.

Depends on the siege. Some effectively were genocides of a sort. They could even be religious. Anciently Carthage, as traditionally recorded at least, certainly counts. I mean they tore down all the buildings, killed or sold into slavery all the inhabitants, and salted the earth after (expensive, yet actually very effective, at destroying future crop yields). That's like, textbook genocide, right? Though I'd note that one of the aforementioned axes that deserves calling out is the type of 'intentionality' behind it. In a siege, are you, the invader, secretly (or not so secretly) hoping they don't surrender because you hate them, or are you just annoyed that the city is in your way and resisting? And do you view the civilian occupants of the city as unrelated/irrelevant, as hostages to take or to punish if you can't get to the military opponents, or the actual enemy themselves? Did you actually kill lots of civilians, or did you just burn down their houses and leave? Did you encourage rape and looting and murder, or was there an attempt at discipline? (And then there's the Mongols, who would commit atrocities on purpose, but out of pure, heartless political calculus to maintain their reputation and reinforce their rule, which is almost like a third way)

To a significant extent it's a bit of a loaded word, especially due to modern-day connotations that said genocide or pogrom is state-supported or directed, and I think some leftist scholars and activists go a little too crazy in trying to slice and dice and define it (often in overly broad terms) or even predict it in an attempt to stop it internally in its nascent state (I view the "Ten Stages" as a bad example of this). The fact remains, however, that severity, intentionality, passion vs premeditation, causality, etc. all matter when we assign punishment for crimes like murder on an individual level. We see this in a very real way in state sentencing guidelines and the criminal code! First vs second degree murder vs manslaughter sounds, casually, like a ridiculous distinction until you actually attend a trial with all the messy details. Why not attempt to consider the same factors when it comes to group actions, especially if there's a latent implication that other groups or states have a moral duty to intervene at some point along the way? The bystander effect for states is just as real as it is for individuals, right?

I think the use, or even abuse, of the term as a political cudgel is sometimes cynical, sometimes idealistic, but virtually everyone other than the hardcore realpolitikers can probably agree that we can't totally dodge the ideas even if the words are a little fuzzy. So the temptation is there to treat it like a woke, bleeding-heart liberal thing, but that's unfair.

Indeed, I think it does depend on the siege. But also (with notable exceptions) it rarely happened when the besieged surrendered in good order.

Realistically anyway, the only hope anyway is that the attacker's forces are drawn away, starves or that a friendly army comes to relieve them. No defenders ever actively won a seiege, although many skills played for time and got one of the above 3 relief.