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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 4, 2025

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No. Hydro has been around for a long time, and he and Kulak are entirely different people.

Did Kulak eat a ban? I must have missed that, I just thought he got really involved on X / Substack and drifted away.

He made a big post about how The Motte was pointless because the time for debate was over and it was time for violence. Got a 3 day ban and never came back.

Shame; I really liked him. His Rhodesian catgirl bit was funny, and he made some genuinely good points. I still follow him on Twitter and Substack.

Twitter and Substack

this impotent whining for violence is hilarious

I wonder whether it is his actual belief, trolling or just grifting in niche they found. I would put my guess on trolling supported by financial extraction they managed.

Had a look at the Substack link, tried reading what he believes as a pagan, and my impression is "cut-rate Gibbon". Too occupied with "and here is why it's the fault of Christianity that our empire is declining!" and not enough "as a pagan this is why I do things the way I do". I doubt he makes any offering to his picture of Athena, or to Wotan, or any of the rituals pagans would engage in. When he was going "and a real pagan of the past would never do this thing", I was going "Dude, that was exactly the thing they were doing".

He hates Christianity because Christianity places importance on concepts like "mercy" and "forgiveness" and not hating, which he despises. I don't think it's much more complicated than that, and certainly not theologically deeper.

He didn't eat a perma-ban, but he did try to flounce IIRC.

As I recall, Kulak had a flame out post where he basically said "if you guys are gonna be that way [I forget what his grievance was], then just ban me". I can't remember if he did get banned but he did get modded to some extent or other, and I haven't seen him back since.

His grievance was that we talk about things instead of planning to murder our enemies and burn it all to the ground.

He got a timeout for his screed, but he's not banned currently.