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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 18, 2025

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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.

You are a master of understatement.

Any genuine intellectual had to either learn Kolmogorov complicity (like Scott Aaronson)

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.

On the other hand, it is bizarre that the game designers even included a dialog option to criticize Zelenskyy for not wearing a suit.

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.

I also do not think any big university will fully suck up to Trump, e.g. giving him a honorary doctorate

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.