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.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Sure, since 2000, campuses really doubled down on social justice.
But that is only half of the story. The other half is that MAGA has fully embraced anti-intellectualism.
Granted, the wokes were certainly not great for intellectual honesty. They had some topics where they had ideological blinders -- anything related to women, race, DEI. Any genuine intellectual had to either learn Kolmogorov complicity (like Scott Aaronson) or be an independent and contrary figure (like Scott Alexander).
From what I can tell, MAGA has little use for intellect. Take the previous Republican president, GWB. He was also not an intellectual giant (though likely smarter than his opponents painted him as). But his policies were written by smart people in conservative think tanks. I disagree with a lot of his policies -- mainly his wars and torture prisons, but I would probably also disagree about his tax policy if I read up on it -- but his policies were at least coherent.
Not so with Trump. His tariff announcements were simply some underling of his asking ChatGPT for the trade deficits with various countries. While he certainly has an uncanny ability for showmanship, he does not have a political vision apart from becoming president and getting the peace Nobel. He is against immigrants because that is what his voters want.
A lot of politicians are opportunistic to some degree. But most pick up the spoken and unspoken rules. With Trump, I have the feeling that he is playing president simulator and skipping through all the dialog and ignoring the world-building. Take J6. If he had read the supplemental material, he would have known that the coup game mechanics work different in POTUS2016 than in Tropico, and just telling his followers to "stop the steal" would be futile. But he does not care about the finer points. He wants to be a beloved king, whatever the Americans call him. (He can't be playing a tabletop because any self-respecting DM would have either stopped his character or walked out. On the other hand, it is bizarre that the game designers even included a dialog option to criticize Zelenskyy for not wearing a suit.)
I think that even in the GWB era, the universities were mostly left-leaning. But they also knew that Bush needed the US to keep its technological advantage for his new American century grand strategy or whatever. With Trump, all bets are off. That guy put an anti-vaxxer in charge of the health department, not out of personal conviction or even because it was a big campaign promise, but just on a whim. Whatever research is done in the STEM departments of universities, and however useful it is to either humanity or the US in particular, it is likely less beneficial than vaccine development.
In short, the universities had quite a few bad reasons to be against Trump (e.g. SJ), but they also had a lot of excellent reasons to be against him. I also do not think any big university will fully suck up to Trump, e.g. giving him a honorary doctorate (which would work great -- a pompous celebration of Trump is just what he is waiting for).
You are a master of understatement.
With intellectuals like these, who needs anti-intellectuals? While I disagree with Alexander's take on complicity, I can at least understand where he's coming from in theory. Aaronson, with his persecution complex, groveling to people who hate him, and who attributes his desire to have children entirely to spite, does not strike me as someone capable of doing anything worthwhile with that complicity. It is not a matter of convenience or strategy for him.
The best part of the AO with Chris Christie was the anecdote near the end, Chris talking about Trump trying to do his makeup at some campaign event. The man cares about appearances, in his way.
Like Trump, the universities that "matter" are way too prideful to do anything so strategic. And to be fair, the big ones are probably correct that they can play out the clock instead. That said, that does suggest exactly where they find their telos these decrepit days.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link