site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   28578 thread views

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
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Why did it take 20 years for Reddit to turn a profit? Looking at another heavily moderated forum in the past Twitter! How often did it turn a profit? Why did these companies keep on getting funding at ridiculous valuations? Maybe it is a way of doing sentiment engineering at scale through various behavior modification tricks with Likes, upvotes, retweets. Maybe that was the purpose? Not turn a profit but to modify behavior to do social engineering, maybe that is more valuable to the owners?

ast Twitter! How often did it turn a profit? Why did these companies keep on getting funding at ridiculous valuations? Maybe it is a way of doing sentiment engineering at scale through various behavior modification tricks with Likes, upvotes, retweets.

TBH I'm kind of inclined to dout that the reddit board as an organism is "smart" enough to do that, except in the broadest sense. Like, with as much data and control as a social media site has, I'm pretty sure I could be way more effective at pushing my own ideosyncratic policies than any existing social media site actually does. Reddit at it's most ruthless just sort of vaguely boosts leftism in the exact same way that tumblr and pre-elon twitter did. Probably because if anyone in particular starts trying to press a view hard, there's too much disagreement on the specifics to get very far. Just imagine a world where, for example, the entire board of higher-ups at facebook were monarchists, including Zuck. They definitely have the power to make monarchism a credible political subcurrent in america... but I think they would sincerely fail to advance the cause of a particular monarch. Zuck would want himself, of course, but members of his board might be crypto-orleanists, or avowed bonapartists. In the process of promoting monarchism more generally, they'd have plenty of latitude to advance their own causes, in the end causing self-interference and averaging out.

Reddit’s financial history is pretty interesting. Yes, it lost money for 20 years, but Condé Nast (or rather AP, the parent company) kept selling off small pieces to VC firms and other investors, which meant that both (a) they didn’t lose any money on it and (b) the book value of their stake kept increasing.

When the company webt public in 2024 they made $2bn from the IPO; they still own about 25% of the company. And throughout their 18 year ownership, even though Reddit didn’t make money, Condé Nast’s losses on it were minimal as they slowly sold the company off piecemeal.

Controlling the minds of normies is extremely valuable. Elon Musk didn’t buy Twitter for the money. He bought it to use it as a mouthpiece and more importantly to keep it from being used against him

This 1000 times is why I despise social media. Nobody is getting real conversation on social media because it’s curated to funnel your mind down a path leading to the pre-approved opinion. I mean propaganda is so pervasive in the modern west that I think we’re as bad or worse in terms of propaganda and psychological manipulation than the worst totalitarian regimes of the last century. Stalin put out propaganda, sure, but it wasn’t nearly as pervasive as what we have. He had radio, newspapers, and posters. He couldn’t steer private conversations, he couldn’t delete crime-think from social consciousness. He could chill things by arresting obvious and loud dissenters, but that is much more limited than what social media does via AI and deletion. Our propaganda machine hides and people are lead to believe that they are having neutral conversations.

He couldn’t steer private conversations, he couldn’t delete crime-think from social consciousness. He could chill things by arresting obvious and loud dissenters, but that is much more limited than what social media does via AI and deletion.

I think this is an least partly overselling our AI panopticon overlords. This might be true in online spaces, but those aren't everything, and even then offshoots of sites challenging moderation policies are common (Bluesky, Truth Social). And they have almost no power over IRL discussions and actions -- despite attempts made a decade ago, seem to have overreached and receded. To hear Reddit tell it, there basically aren't any Republicans anywhere in the US, and nobody shops at Hobby Lobby. And there are people that cloister themselves to the extent they believe this, but as it turns out the levers of political power aren't particularly beholden to Reddit dog walkers mods.

It’s not just social media, but regular media, education and control mechanisms like the ability for you to be fired for saying something online, or convincing others to shun friends and even family who say things that the regime doesn’t like. Americans are saturated in propaganda and unless you’re paying attention you probably don’t even notice it.

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