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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   11186 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 11, 2025

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FG gestured towards the numerous pride flags. I claimed to have interpreted them as generic contemporary decor. He then indicated the very large flag by the entrance, to which I could only plead a fundamental lack of situational awareness.

Given the proliferation in enemy areas of huge pride flags at the door of every imaginable type of establishment, the misunderstanding should be perfectly normal. In fact I now have to wonder how actual explicitly LGB establishments can now directly advertise themselves as such.

enemy areas

This is, on one level, my actual impression of many places. I live in a blue state, so casual pride flags happen. But once you get above a certain threshold of rainbow density in a nominally public place, it’s clear that there’s a dynamic of deliberate hostility to those of us with other convictions.

Still, I’d not open with that phrase on the Motte. Mistake theory is not altogether dead here, the way it usually is there.

I’ll admit, I’ve seen political signage and iconography on both sides that’s starting to get disturbingly close to the murals in Belfast that demarcate Catholic and Protestant neighborhoods.

Please explain (and ideally provide pictures).

In Northern Ireland during the Troubles (a period of civil war waged by clandestine paramilitaries roughly along religious sectarian lines), neighborhoods in the major cities would have large political murals on buildings and walls that marked the area as either Protestant or Catholic. This is a region where walking into the wrong neighborhood could get you shot.

This is a region where walking into the wrong neighborhood could get you shot.

Well we still have the murals and your chances of being shot have gone way down. Though FYI seeing which colours the kerbs are painted or which flags are on the lampposts is probably easier as there aren't that many murals, you may have to walk a while to work out where you are if relying on murals alone.

You chances of being shot in the wrong region weren't zero, but they weren't massive even at the height of the Troubles. I was on the Falls road (Catholic area) a fair bit even though I was Protestant. Without checking where someone keeps their toaster, or talking to them about schooling you can't tell a Catholic from a Protestant in general just by looking. Hence the old joke about a Jew being stopped by Paramilitaries.

Without checking where someone keeps their toaster

Where do protestants keep their toasters?

In the cupboard as opposed to out on the counter. Popularized by Derry Girls where a Catholic girls school and a Protestant Boys school are attempting to find commonalities.

@Lewis2

https://ce-wp-site-content.s3.ap-southeast-1.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/12/2022/08/13232530/MHROL34Q4K5PCNG5AE53V5QUTI.jpg

Is that really a thing?

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