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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31021 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 16, 2023

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Are food allergies another aspect of the culture war? I was reading Reddit and a person was feeding 100 people and someone mentioned to make sure you have all the allergies/food restrictions covered. Being honest I’ve never met anyone with a food restriction I can think of except a lot of brown friends who won’t eat sausage but also have no problem with alcohol.

Ancient religions had a lot of restrictions, now Im borrowing this from elsewhere that the rise of food restrictions is just the same thing as ancients banning certain foods as holy acts. I’ve long argued that the culture wars are less of a culture war and more of a religious war and dietary restrictions are just a modern form of Jews and Muslims banning pork/shellfish etc and Catholics not eating meat on fridays. All religions seem to have focuses on eating and sexual rituals.

I know mental illness has far higher rates amongst lefties. My guess is dietary restrictions and food allergies are much higher in lefties and if your not in that religion it’s something you never think of.

I'm a bit confused by this post. I'm not sure if this is at all relevant, but there's a genetic component to food allergies and coeliac disease (i.e. gluten intolerance) is far more common in Irish people than in other ethnic groups, regardless of their political affiliation.

I’m aware that celiac disease is real and far more common in certain groups as compared to others, but most cases of gluten intolerance are not celiac. They’re vague symptoms for an addition that they may or may not react to if unaware of it.

Just to be clear, are you suggesting - with very little to support it - that food allergies are either fake or psychosomatic?

I inferred that OP was claiming that many food restrictions are not allergies. Veganism, vegetarianism, kosher, and halal are certainly psychosomatic.

And also, virtue signalling on behalf of people with actual food allergies is of course psychosomatic.

Discourse on dietary restrictions is I suspect something like 95% holier-than-thou-ism, 5% "if I eat shellfish I get itchy".

"Most people claiming to have a food allergy do not actually have a food allergy" != "food allergies do not exist".

I know that those are not the same thing, but it sounded like he was saying food allergies do not exist.

Yes, I believe that most claimed allergies are fake. Just based on personal experience, I know one person that claims an allergy to mushrooms which I guarantee is just an aversion to their taste/texture, I know another two that claim allergies to “artificial food coloring” which is surely just some form of chemophobia and I know another with vaguely defined “gluten sensitivity”. Tellingly none of them have strongly definite externally observable reactions to the allergen.

Let's not forget the MSG sensitivity craze. As near as I can tell, that's completely fake, but quite a few people believe(d) that they had it.

The real issue with MSG is that it's saltier than it tastes. That is, it has more sodium.

A lot of sauces used a huge amount of MSG and masked the sodium flavour with sugar to get a rich semi sweet flavour.

The resulting sauces had a huge amount of sugar and sodium. Some people were getting salt poisoning.

I mean, it's mono sodium glutamate. That's like, one sodium.

(But seriously, I fail to see how MSG is saltier than salt, or has more sodium. Given glutamate is fairly complex / heavy vs Chlorine, I would assume that it has less Na than NaCl by weight. (But I haven't checked the math))

You would be right.

Has anyone even actually used MSG? I have, and I can tell you that a very small amount (compared to salt) goes a long way. I would put money on needing less MSG, compared to pure NaCl, by Na content or by weight, in order to bring out flavours in a dish.

Yes. Not like the things peanuts where you get hives and can die. But gluten and a lot of the others yes.

I am a diagnosed Coeliac (they shoved a metal thing down my throat to acquire a piece of my colon to diagnose it). If I eat sufficient quantities of gluten (where sufficient is measured in milligrams), I get severe stomach issues and general major fatigue for ~1 week. So I feel quite confident stating it is a real allergy, even if it would probably take years/decades to kill me if I ate gluten every day.

On a broader note, "not eating gluten" did become something of a health fad a few years back, and interest in gluten-free products skyrocketed. I strongly doubt all, or even most of the people who went with the fad are Coeliacs. But potentially some are. I'm also unsure how to feel about it: In many respects I benefited from a large expansion of goods availability (more than 2 shapes of pasta? LUXURY!), even if a decent amount of it is 'vegan-superfood-seeds-organic' sludge that doesn't interest me. But I also fear that at some point the fad will go in the other direction, and I will be required to forcefully explain that it's a real disease every time I go to a restaurant and politely ask them to inform me if there's anything on the menu I can eat. Or worse, the waiter will nod, ignore my information request (did you know people love to put flour in all sorts of random things? It's true!) and I'll get sick.

But back to these people who do not eat gluten, or other products, without any kind of diagnosis. Medicine is hard. Getting something minor officially diagnosed would require a lot of effort and free time / money to badger doctors into giving you tests. So maybe every time you eat paprika you get a little bit gassy. Or if you eat certain nuts the back of your throat itches a bit. Maybe you think parmesan tastes like vomit. Each of these is an uncomfortable physical sensation if you eat the related foodstuff, but probably not enough that you'd ask a doctor about it. You'll still have a decently strong preference to not eat that food. And I'd argue that it's a legitimate preference, regardless of if you think it tastes bad or it makes your throat itch.

But where we as a society draw the line regarding feeding obligations? Currently it seems he consensus is that if you think something tastes bad, that's mostly your problem, at least when it comes to feeding more than a few people. And if something makes you seriously ill, to the point where you do have a diagnosis for a food allergy, then it's up to the people managing the event to accommodate you (or rescind the invitation? But I think that would be seen as impolite). Some people seem to draw the line a bit differently. Vegetarianism strikes me as a preference, but you're usually expected to accommodate it anyway, and pretty much all restaurants/large events seem to have vegetarian options. Possibly due to some moral authority, potentially just because it's popular.

There might very well be a liberal/conservative divide here, where cons are more likely to "shut up and suffer" for the sake of not being a bother and the sense of community from eating the food as everyone else, while libs are more individualistic and will make a fuss, I have no data either way. But dismissing someone's food preferences as fake strikes me as absurd, regardless of 'slight itch' or 'bad taste', it's unpleasant physical sensations either way.

I think vegetarian options are so common because it’s anticipated to accommodate a variety of dietary restrictions, including religious meat taboos, more than out of strong concern for vegetarians themselves.

(did you know people love to put flour in all sorts of random things? It's true!)

Same with milk once you start paying attention to it.

There's the hygiene hypothesis which imo explains why there's more actual allergies nowadays, but I concur with sliders1234 that there are fakers.. that was my impression too.

I believe that at least 30% of people who won't eat gluten claiming they're allergic or sensitive to it probably aren't.

We oughta look at some papers on this is the kind of thing that some doctors may have possibly looked at.

I think it's more like, playing loose with the truth as part of a signaling. Think: self-diagnosed mental illness and self-diagnosed food allergy.

food allergies are a real thing. The evidence would seem to suggest they have gotten worse over the years

Quite a few people claim allergy to things they just don't like, to make absolutely sure restaurants don't put that shit on their meal.

My cousin is definitely deathly allergic to peanuts. Has been since birth, as far as I’m aware. I watched her arms swell up from the residue of boiled peanut juice on a table. You’d better believe she is careful, even neurotic, about food prep. Plenty red tribe, though, as if that matters.

I’ve got a friend whose sister is moderately-functioning autistic. As part of her genetic challenge run she developed some sort of gluten intolerance. While I can’t prove that the specialists weren’t overdiagnosing, I’m not going to be the one to try and convince this girl that the vomiting and hives are all in her head.

We found out that my brother was allergic to cashews when he was about 6. Full on anaphylaxis. He turned out to have a whole spread of tree-nut allergies, most of which he’s since outgrown. But almost watching your son choke to death changes a person, and Mom was quite careful with checking ingredients for the next ten years.

I’d be willing to believe that the marginal food intolerance is psychological or perhaps, in harder times, would have been kept quiet. Extending that claim to say it’s “religion” is...ridiculous.

There are supposedly people out there who get severe symptoms around wifi routers, but only if they know they're there. Don't underestimate the power of the mind.

The local public school's art teacher almost got wifi banned from the school because of that (and her friends did get it banned from local public housing, using their credentials as licensed reiki energy healers). Sanity only barely prevailed, and I heard rumors it was thanks to a "can you feel the wifi right now? Well... It's off" gambit at a staff meeting.

deleted

The guy probably showed up with his reiki energy ‘healer’(who claimed to have a license) and the manager then claimed to ban Wi-Fi while in reality affecting nothing, because it’s easier to pretend to comply than to argue.

C'mon, who hasn't done a little Chicago sunroof? And anyway how was he supposed to know the kids were in the car?

I actually don't think most of it is psychological, although it may have a vaguely related, CW cause. Autoimmune disease, with allergy being a prime example, seems to be more common in developed countries. One common (although not universally accepted) hypothesis is that the autoimmune system overreacts when it doesn't have anything to do, or otherwise malfunctions if not exposed to pathogens when young. First world countries are so clean and disinfected that our immune systems have started to break down. The idea of increasing exposure to allergens has actually become mainstream enough that the director of the NIH recommends early exposure for kids at risk of peanut allergy (although does caution this isn't universal advice--some allergies probably are just genetic and not caused by a modern sterile environment). The allergies are very real--no amount of psychology will change your immune system's antibodies (although a friend of mine indicated they were able to slightly reduce their peanut allergy as an adult participating in an exposure study).

If you're wondering what the CW angle is, you may notice (if you're familiar with Jonathan Haidt's work, or Nassim Taleb's notion of antifragility) the similarity to the generally-accepted biological fact that muscles grow by being damage, and bones heal stronger than they were to start, and the hypothesis that we need exposure to psychological and emotional adversity in order to be able to handle disagreement and discomfort. And indeed, Haidt uses these biological mechanisms as analogies in his presentations (see the section starting around 26:00 in https://youtube.com/watch?v=B5IGyHNvr7E&ab_channel=PennStateMcCourtneyInstituteforDemocracy). By telling pregnant mothers whose babies are at risk of peanut allergies not to consume any peanuts, we've increased peanut allergies. Are we doing the same for immune systems more generally with excess cleanliness, and for human psychology with helicopter parenting (and general excess adult supervision)?

bones heal stronger than they were to start

Actually false

Interesting, thanks! The linked article is paywalled, but this one isn't: https://www.hackensackmeridianhealth.org/en/HealthU/2021/08/02/do-broken-bones-heal-stronger

This article does say that the surrounding bone weakens due to lack of use (I believe astronauts have to do a lot of exercises to overcome this weakening) so I think bones still count as antifragile, but the common knolwedge being wrong is good to know.

I have to go off on this. The trend (and it very much is a trend) to have a personal, unique set of food “sensitivities” is very annoying to me, and makes hosting guests near impossible

I recently invited an acquaintance and his wife over for a homecooked dinner and was informed he had a gluten “sensitivity”. Not celiac or a deathly allergy mind you, just a vaguely termed sensitivity. It occurred to me how selfish this is, in a way. Because if more than one person has such non-overlapping sensitivities you pretty rapidly reach a point where the intersection of acceptable foods is empty. If one person is gluten free, another vegan, another paleo, another won’t eat seed oils, what exactly are you supposed to cook?

Any meal can only really support one such person before a home cook has to just throw up their hands and say that there won’t be a meal and everyone should just eat on their own. So by making such a claim you are claiming that one spot for yourself and more or less destroying the meal should anyone else dare to do the same

It especially annoys me because these claimed sensitivities usually just cause the person to “feel lethargic” or some such vague nonsense. Can you not suck it up for the sake of a social gathering once in a while? There was a maybe 6 year period where I was vegetarian, but I would eat meat if at someone’s house for Thanksgiving or some such, it just would have been rude to stick to my diet

What's annoying about this is that only some dietary restrictions are honored.

For instance: I often eat a keto diet. This means lots of high fat, usually red meat. But when places with catered food ask me for my dietary restrictions ask, do you really think they'd accept "I eat a new york strip and runny eggs with a side of avacado for breakfast every morning, so please have that ready."?

However, if somebody asks for vegan food, that is always accommodated, even though in my opinion that is far more of a taste thing. Non adherence to my low carb diet will actually have measurable negative effects. A vegan eating a normal diet won't be meaningfully effected other than not being happy about it (at first, until they realize how good it tastes of course! Just kidding).

This is...at least adjacent to autoimmune diseases if not outright autoimmune. Autoimmune disease is fairly poorly understood by medicine, and often gets lumped in with people that are faking or malingering plus people who have something like conversion disorder. And to complicate matters further, there's shit like complex regional pain syndrome...it's a fucking mess, and there is not usually a very good way of telling genuine assholes from people that really need a specific diet.

The consensus among researchers is that non-celiac gluten sensitivity its a distinct, but closely related disease to celiac. Part of the reason there has been debate is because we didn't have any biomarkers for it, at least until 2020:

https://gut.bmj.com/content/69/11/1966

I would try and be more sympathetic to your friend. While 'feeling lethargic' is vague, the only celiac symptom I had was 'a weird rash', which I had for more than ten years before actually realising what the cause was. For a lot of diagnosed celiacs, symptoms can be as vague as lethargy, anxiety, mild depression, poor sleep, bloating etc. That doesn't mean that they are malingering, it just means that autoimmune diseases manifest in a large number of different ways.

Yeah, I have two family members who are diagnosed celiac (my father very very nearly almost died before they correctly diagnosed it; it wasn't on the radar back then). My blood work came back negative many years ago, but apparently, it can still develop later. My wife and I realized that I was always particularly bloaty/farty for a day or so after having gluten (she seemed farty, too; has never been tested), so we just stopped. Haven't gotten new blood work. I remember when my family was dealing with the doctors, they said that even if you don't have noticeable symptoms, it can still cause damage to the intestines and increase the risk of intestinal cancer.

My brother has a gluten issue (I don't know if it counts as a "sensitivity", but the doctors aren't 100% sure it's celiac, but is extremely similar so the distinction is moot), which causes him to be lethargic, messes with his digestive system and causes him to break out in red sores all over his body. The latter of which can last for weeks after having eaten nontrivial amounts of gluten in a single meal, and is the most obvious and provable evidence that the condition is real.

It's not like it's going to kill him (though the doctors say that it may increase the risk of colon cancer), but neither will drinking a small amount of bleach. It's basically literal poison for his body.

I understand that it's inconvenient to plan around. And it's especially annoying given that hypochondriacs and trenders and exaggerators exist and are difficult to distinguish from people with real biological conditions. But from the perspective of someone who actually has one of those conditions, if the choice is to be inconvenient to you, or eat literal poison in your food, they'll be inconvenient. And if you don't like it you don't have to invite them for dinner.

There was a maybe 6 year period where I was vegetarian, but I would eat meat

This isn't really vegetarianism.

Just about every thanksgiving dinner has a vegetarian dish, if only mashed potatoes. Obviously what you eat is your business, but why use a label that doesn't apply?

Imo, someone who eats meat when offered at a holiday once a year but otherwise doesn't is a vegetarian. He's just a vegetarian who isn't religious.

Is someone not a cannibal if they only eat human flesh once a year?

You're getting into a pretty ridiculous semantics argument here. There is now way to be "right" in this. You both just disagree with each other.

For what it's worth, to me if somebody eats meat once a year or so, then they can still be a vegetarian. Even the vegans eat bacon at burning man, for instance. They are still vegans though.

I don't think you're a cannibal unless you're specifically into eating human flesh for whatever weird reason( sex, magic etc) .

E.g. someone who eats it in an emergency situation, or in ignorance, or when offered as a guest isn't a cannibal.

Yes. If you don't eat meat (or whatever crap) and you insult a loving grandma by not eating her dish that she has prepared with love - you are not moral, you are an asshole.

I'm not disputing the moral judgement, I'm disputing whether they're vegetarians or not.

So if Hannibal Lecter only kills and eats a victim once a year, then it would be misleading to call him the "cannibal serial killer"? Sure, he's a serial killer, but Hannibal's no cannibal!

You could say that eating human flesh is an unusual feature of Hannibal that enables us to distinguish other serial killers, and so it's not analogous to calling someone who eats meat once a year a non-vegetarian. However, eating meat once a year is itself a distinguishing feature among vegetarians.

I just don't think vegetarianism is that strict is it? That's why vegans exist. Besides, there's no taboo against eating meat that has existed since the dawn of man, there is for eating human meat.

The vegetarian/vegan difference is about animal products, not the strictness of vegetarianism.

What you say about the taboo aspect is right, but it doesn't affect the point, which was about whether you can willingly and avoidably eat meat, but still be a vegetarian.

More comments

A better analogy than Hannibal for vegetarians is - participation in group ritualistic cannibalism - like Aztecs or some tribes. When you actually don't do it for sustenance. And large family gatherings are closer to the second case. So if you eat meat in private - you are not really vegetarian. If you eat meat from time to time when in a social gathering with unenlightened rubes trying to blend in - you still are because there are other reasons motivating you.

The desire to be pure 100% is a form of narcissism/fanatism.

I am happy to agree on "ritual carnivores" for people who eat meat just once a year (or so) to fit in. I grant that they are a non-central example of non-vegetarianism.

What's rubs me the wrong way is how entitled people feel to having any and all preferences/restrictions accommodated. Did you parents not teach you manners ? If you can't eat most things in a random buffet dinner, then bring your own meal. Actually, bring enough for a few people so the host can have some warm potluck vibes.

Now ofc, if a special guest is visiting after a long time, then I will cook to their preferences. But, if it is routine guest with a 100s of landmines or one person in a group of many, then I'd expect them to be reasonable about how much they can be accommodated.

I wonder if I'm shouting at a strawman though. Every vegan, nut-allergic, celiac person I know is polite, and brings their own food.

To be fair, if you are the type to follow fashions blindly, then you probably aren't attending the house party of a bunch of late blooming ex-nerds.

where I was vegetarian, but I would eat meat

I can chime in a little bit here. I don't think you realize how viscerally disgusting eating non-veg food is to some people (certain Indians).

I remember the day I started eating beef, and my parents were in tears. My mom grew up on a farm and cows were the equivalent of dogs to her. Can you imagine being invited to a thanksgiving diner, and an upside down whole-roasted-dog is served to you on a platter ?

So now my family follows a dont-ask-dont-tell policy on my food eating habits.

It is easy for Americans to swap in and out of veganism, because their disgust response was not tuned to hate meat as a young child. Veganism is an ethnical choice, a moral boundary. It is the difference between refusing to ogle hot women as a committed man vs the disgusted head-turn away from a smelly obese homeless lady. I have a disgust response to bananas, and I get close to violently vomiting every-time I see them mashed up. This stuff is hard to change in adulthood.

At the same time, such a person should not feel entitled to be accommodated towards a rigid center-piece of a culture. (Roast turkey). You don't have to eat it, why do you think we make Green-bean-casserole & Cabbage salad ? (IMO, the sides are tastier anyway.)

Can you imagine being invited to a thanksgiving diner, and an upside down whole-roasted-dog is served to you on a platter

I would be shocked, depending on where I was and who was inviting me. I might partake, depending on how I felt about my friends...and the origin of that dog. Dogs aren't any more intelligent than pigs, and we eat them all the time; I don't see much of an ethical problem with dog consumption. I just find it culturally icky as an American. I suppose if it would've been killed anyway by a kill shelter or something I'd be OK with it.

My mom grew up on a farm and cows were the equivalent of dogs to her.

That sounds odd to me. I spent my childhood in the country with farms around us, and we grew up with the knowledge of animals and that they were also providing food (milk, dairy products, eggs, meat from poultry to beef to pork) for us. So "cows were like pet dogs" strikes me more as either some kind of 'gentleman farmer' notion where it's not really a working farm, or if your mother grew up in a culture where beef was not an acceptable meat to consume so cattle weren't slaughtered for meat, they were kept for dairy only.

Did your parents cry tears while eating milk, butter, or cheese? Did they eat fish? Eggs or poultry?

Yeah I think OP is from India where I could see a farm keeping a cow around to mostly be a pet.

My family in the states raised cows from calves including bottle feedings and lots of play, but still butchered them and ate them.

A childhood friend's family freezer had packages of beef labeled by name, which they always thought was hilarious. (I usually stick with date, with tag# in the log if I need to look it up.)

if your mother grew up in a culture where beef was not an acceptable

Yep, this was India. She also personally avoids pork & goat......but doesn't get worked up about others eating it.

Cows in India are treated pretty well, when compared to how we treat our own humans.

There is a clear association between animal intelligence and how likely we are to empathize with it. Fish & Poultry aren't smart or can't message intelligence in a manner that is easily recognizable to humans. Cows, Pigs, Goats.....different issue. I eat everything, but I draw a line at dolphin.

Can you imagine being invited to a thanksgiving diner, and an upside down whole-roasted-dog is served to you on a platter ?

If it is well prepared. I grew up in a rural environment - spent my summers there. We played with the chickens, rabbits and sheep. In the autumn we slaughter them and ate them.

My mom grew up on a farm and cows were the equivalent of dogs to her.

As an aside, I find this incredibly surprising. I also grew up on a farm (a dairy farm specifically). For me, and for literally every other farm kid I ever have known, they have a very pragmatic approach to life and death as a result. Cows die, we eat them, it's just part of the circle of life. When you grow up around this reality of life every day, it desensitizes you rather than makes you more attached. I've definitely never heard of a farm kid thinking of cows as pets before, or being upset if someone eats meat.

Indian farms are very different that western farms.

This was an incredibly poor & pre-mechanization Indian farm. The cows were the transportation, they provided milk to the family on a daily basis, protected the children when the parent wasn't there (my mom has actual stories where their cows intimidated strangers who try to come near kids of the boss) and most importantly, they pulled the ploughs. In that sense, the cows were more similar to shepherd dogs.

She does not have that kind of fondness associated with chickens. No matter how close of relationship she built with a chicken, it never seemed to understand things quite like cows did.

A family story I've heard is that my great-grandfather kept a hog each year, fed on scraps and whatnot. The pig always had the same name and whatnot.

Each late winter they'd invite over a butcher and he'd slaughter it and make ham, bacon, sausages and all the related delicious foods.

Great-grandpa always cried those few days. Maybe it was genetic, his son, who otherwise bore more than a passing resemblance to O'Brien from 1984 (job description, mentality,. dominance) also couldn't handle being around raw meat, even in the kitchen.

But hey, it was 1930s eastern Europe. Grossly overpopulated, people in rural areas were barely above subsistence level farming civ, basically.

Most today had no idea what's woodland now was then marginal farmland. People were trying to eke a hard living out on stony hillsides.

People were trying to eke a hard living out on stony hillsides.

Same with pre-Famine Ireland. Lots of stone walls on hillsides to mark where small farms used to be, because population was (relatively) high, due to historical reasons large farms or tenancies of same were difficult to get for ordinary people, and you couldn't afford to let marginal land go to waste.

Western Europe, 2023, and that is still going on where I'm from :)

This can be true for dogs on farms too- from stories i've heard (this was 80 years ago in a poor country) dogs were treated as working animals, fed whatever's around and not fed if nothing is, excess puppies disposed of (if that sounds cruel - how are puppies different from cows, and their food comes out of yours and your childrens'). The way we currently treat pets is contingent on material prosperity and culture, not a fact of human nature!

At my grandparents farm back in Eastern Europe, they would let my cousins dispose of the puppies as a “fun activity”.

I've definitely never heard of a farm kid thinking of cows as pets before

Have you talked to an Indian dairy farmer before? I know a small-scale dairy farmer here in Ireland that would be loth to eat his own cattle, even though there's no taboo on beef here.

For OP it's like growing up on a stud farm and then eating horse.

What did they do with bull calves?

My grandparents owned a work horse, treated it like a tool, and when it got too old, they sold it for meat (which was apparently exported, because nobody ate horse meat in the old country, but they had no trouble with others doing so).

Horse meat is pretty good and similar to beef and when I've seen it sold it's usually far cheaper. We used to eat horse regularly when I grew up because a butcher near my father's work sold it for next to nothing.

There are about as many horses as there are dairy cows in Sweden so presumably there is a lot of horse meat out there but it doesn't really seem to get to market, maybe it goes to export somewhere.

In Finland, horsemeat is sometimes put into this sausage, which is pretty popular as a breakfast sausage.

Now that you mention it there is a reasonably popular horsemeat sandwich meat branded as "hamburger meat" lol.

The worked on fields. Nothing was mechanized.

Cows had actual value. So a bull ox would juts get sold to some neighbor who needed one on his farm asap.

So they used the cattle to pull the plow and stuff?

Yep, this was before electricity was available in these villages & when tractors were too expensive.

Socialist India was not a great place to grow up.

Think something closer to a cattle ranch that also raises horses as working animals and someone growing up there with a pretty strong aversion to horse meat.

I was reading Reddit and a person was feeding 100 people and someone mentioned to make sure you have all the allergies/food restrictions covered. Being honest I’ve never met anyone with a food restriction I can think of except a lot of brown friends who won’t eat sausage but also have no problem with alcohol.

Probably because it's one of those things in which the downside is big but the inconvenience is small

It goes back to the Moral foundations theory and the red / blue split.

Red tribe expresses purity through sexual restrictions. Blue tribe expresses purity through dietary restrictions.

So if you're holding an event with a very blue tribe group like climate change policy you are going to have to deal with a massive matrix of dietary restrictions.

Conservatives doing exotic eating plans is definitely a thing these days, but they generally view it as a pure health issue and don't feel that anyone else should have to accommodate them. So they tend to pack their own lunches if it's an issue.

Conservatives doing exotic eating plans is definitely a thing these days, but they generally view it as a pure health issue and don't feel that anyone else should have to accommodate them. So they tend to pack their own lunches if it's an issue.

Anecdotally, quite a few of these people are still evangelists for their diets. I can barely believe how many people who are obviously less fit than me still want to give me advice on how those carbohydrates totally make people fat and sluggish.

There's something to carbs making people sluggish. I had a bad habit of substituting cookies for cooking, and I'd eat like 8 ounces and then feel sleepy, as if I'd drunk a beer. Stopped buying that kind of snack, my self control is not good.

Overeating makes people sluggish. Just it's easiest to overeat when done with carbs. After a good 3 pound steak I am satiated up to the next evening.

Haha, I feel like this replicates every one of those conversations I've had. Eating a half pound of cookies is absolutely wild to me. Just don't do that! It's obviously bad for you! Just eat one cookie, or maybe two! I realize that in practice people have very different impulses around these sorts of things, so this is a completely useless suggestion, but it seems like the heart of every anti-carb conversation winds up being people going absolutely bonkers on things that I just eat a little bit of and then walk away from. Admittedly, impulse control is a hell of a lot easier with steak and eggs than with a giant pile of fried rice.

Haha, I feel like this replicates every one of those conversations I've had. Eating a half pound of cookies is absolutely wild to me. Just don't do that! It's obviously bad for you! Just eat one cookie, or maybe two!

Cookies are like that. I love cookies, but they completely ignore my satiety centers and hit only the pleasure ones. I used to have some cookies and a piece of candy after a meal, and when I tried to cut down on superfluous carbs, I realized I would feel hungry for something sweet after wolfing down a few cookies, but not after skipping cookies and eating a single chocolate candy.

My wife and I work around this by completely banning having a cookie by yourself in the house. If you want one, you have to get one for the other, too. This means you have both the impulse control of each person as well as making it relatively rare for both people to be craving cookies at the same time, so it's very rare for us to have more than one or two each. I can't think of the last time we've done anything even close to having a whole box in one sitting.

It also helps we don't keep particularly delectable cookies like flavored Oreos in the house at all, anymore.

I just switched to protein bars. I've found a brand that makes organoleptically great bars (with "chocolate" glazing and "caramel" and a blend of non-caloric sweeteners that works for me) and eating one triggers that "had dessert" switch in me.

You want me to spend 25 minutes fixing dinner when I can just down a liter of milk and half a pound of cookies and get back to whatever unnaturally rewarding thing* I was doing with the Skinner box on my desk ?

Ha!

*I feel the meme is correct, if you play a game where, if you do very well you see the message 'target destroyed' flash on the screen, you'll probably enjoy watching videos with that message rather a lot.

Milk is great though! If you insist on literally prep replace the cookies with bread or something, perhaps rye, which is great with milk, and plenty of fruit/veg are edible without cooking. Fixing dinner doesn't need to take time though, throwing some potatoes and meat in an oven and browsing the web for 30min is a lot easier than 30min spent on making a 'real meal'

But still not as easy as lying on the couch, cramming cookies into your mouth until you can't close your lips, and then pouring milk and baileys into your mouth so that the cookies all disintegrate inside your mouth! And then doing that again and again until you pass out.

Admittedly, impulse control is a hell of a lot easier with steak and eggs than with a giant pile of fried rice.

Not necessarily. Someone who might consider an entire American sized large (14" dia) pizza as something for two proper meals but probably consumed as one long meal might be equally undeterred from treating a 40oz porterhouse in the same way.

very fatty 2lb+ pieces of meat are very filling and become actively unappetizing once you've eaten 'enough' in my experience

I'm exactly that sort of pizza eater. On keto, a 14oz steak with some veggies on a mostly empty stomach is plenty. It genuinely feels like a totally different experience with hunger. Like the conversion from hunger to mere appetite just doesn’t happen.

In my experience the easiest way to deal with the various dietary restrictions is to just offer vegan food. It's not foodproof but it's usually suitable for most.

The replies to this one are interesting. I should probably clarify that this is just my personal choice - I'm not suggesting others do it. Even then, I never said that it's anything beyond my personal choice, and I don't see it as some sort of a huge burden or something where I need to bend over backwards to satisfy unreasonable demands - I know several places where I can get excellent vegan food and can also cook it myself (and frequently do). Not to mention that usually this means I just offer a vegan alternative among ones containing animal products. When we baptized our second child I got only cakes and cookies for the guests after the ceremony and these were vegan, but I didn't hear anyone complaining about the vegan cakes.

Perhaps I should also clarify that my social circles just plain happen to not only include many vegans and vegetarians, but also committed Orthodox people who devoutly observe the fasting calender - which means they spend a lot of the year not eating meat or animal products beyond fish. My family also has people with real and serious food allergies which happen to be of the sort that vegan food is suitable for them.

Not that I'm every likely to deal with it, but I'd offer roast game meat and declare vegan opposition as null and void on account of prey animal control being a necessity in any ecology lacking large apex non-human predators and would they have preferred the meat to rot in a land fill?

I have done this before. Strangely, does not seem to make vegetarians think better of eating meat.

Well, I'm lucky to note that I don't have any vegetarian friends. Well, there's this one girl who liked talking to me in high school and is, but we aren't in contact.

Interested in whether it'd work, I think it should, she's fairly intellectully honest and a catholic, vegetarianism isn't her primary religion.

Yeah but that only helps people with ideological dietary restrictions. It actually is bad for allergy sufferers because legumes are one of the more common allergies. Peanuts and soy being the obvious culprits, but legumes in general being fairly common.

That reminds me of when my old school friend and her hubby were getting caught up in the Trump doomerism back in 2017. But there's a simple solution I told them - Make America Great Again. Then there's nothing to worry about! Naturally they were very grateful.

I have no idea how this comparison is even supposed to work.

It’s that most of the meat eaters find veganism completely toxic the way a trump derangement syndrome person would find becoming pro trump completely toxic.

I don't think the analogy is perfect, but I'll try. In both cases, it goes something like this.

Problem: I am annoyed by people making unreasonable demands.

Solution: Simply satisfy their unreasonable demands, then they won't have any more demands, and you won't be annoyed anymore!

I think the comparison is that vegan food is not a solution that is very suitable or easy to do for most people (also it has to be vegan without bread and pasta a lot of the time). In the same vein that solving the Trump problem by deporting all the illegals and building a 30 foot beautiful wall with gargoyles on it isn't palatable for trump doomers.

I think this is wrong especially if food is a bribe to get people to come. Would be a huge turn off to me. Can work for a brief event with a snack but if I’m expecting a meal I would be starving. Vegan doesn’t make me feel satiate.

Shirtless bodybuilder looks up from his small publishing extra-based translation of Carl Schmitt: "Excuse me, was this steak cooked with seed oils?! I demand to speak to the manager!"

There are some guys like that around here, but I think most understand it's a dose-dependent thing, not ritual pollution.

My guess is dietary restrictions and food allergies are much higher in lefties and if your not in that religion it’s something you never think of.

Maybe slightly, just because a lot of leftist I know are a bit neurotic and hypochondriac. Food "sensitivities" are very trendy among them, and they obsess over their state of the mind and body after ingesting seemingly random ingredients that have been brought to their attention, like gluten, soy or nightshades. Then they draw all sorts of spurious conclusions between a food item and some vague, probably psychosomatic phenomena like "brain fog", "bloating" or "gas".

Where as I just laugh about getting death farts after a night of terrible decisions.

But I think you also just notice red tribers with restrictions less, because to them it's nobody else's business. They avoid what they have to avoid, and don't expect the entire world to cater to their diet. Blue tribers seem to think the world revolves around them, and if they can't eat absolutely every food item at a pot luck, nobody should.

Maybe slightly, just because a lot of leftist I know are a bit neurotic and hypochondriac. Food "sensitivities" are very trendy among them, and they obsess over their state of the mind and body after ingesting seemingly random ingredients that have been brought to their attention, like gluten, soy or nightshades. Then they draw all sorts of spurious conclusions between a food item and some vague, probably psychosomatic phenomena like "brain fog", "bloating" or "gas".

Consider MCCX theory as an explanation for this. I find it plausible as a theory, but wouldn't bet the farm on it being true. Basically, hypermobility, autism, ADHD, autoimmune disorders, and allergies are a "cluster". Because of this cluster, you've got flexible, autistic, often androgynous, intelligent people moving to big cities. Why? Because hypermobility and manual-labor careers don't mix well.

Arguing that food sensitivity is a trendy affection popular in lefty circles is... okay, I guess. I can't even say I disagree. Anecdotal observations, even slightly cherrypicked ones, are fine.

But of course you had to finish with a bit of pure culture warring boo outgroup. You've been warned often enough now that it should not surprise you that "Boo blue tribe, so narcissistic and entitled, amirite?" is going to get you another warning. You seem to be determined to keep doing this because you just can't help yourself when there's an opportunity to poke your outgroup in the eye (and, I expect, you will complain again about being told not to do it), so do not pretend to be surprised when your already lengthy record of warnings turns into a ban.

Fair enough, this time. But here is the thing I am increasingly struggling to get.

A user can write paragraphs and paragraphs describing textbook narcissistic behavior. And so long as he doesn't call it narcissism, no problem. The moment someone comes along and goes "Yeah, that's called narcissism." out comes the "You aren't being charitable, that's 'boo outgroup'". It's like we're only allowed to point out the obvious and undeniable transgressions of the successor ideology, and those who follow it, by leaving negative space in the shape of it. The moment you point and go "Yeah, they're derange entitled narcissist" because that's what all the behavior that is being described ad nauseum is examples of, you've crossed a line.

I get it, the project of this place is some sort of open forum where both sides can talk. But increasingly I feel like I'm trapped in a room with cannibals, and it's against the rules to point out how my friends keep disappearing. Or I can make vague statements like "Man, it sure is weird that I haven't seen Steve in three weeks. I mean we're all locked in a room together, it's not like there is anywhere he could have gone. And you sure look well fed." But I'm expected to hope that the secret cannibal will just admit they are a cannibal. I can't point out their obvious cannibalism. Even up to the point I wake up and my own arm is missing, I can't accuse them of anything lest I be accused of "lack of charity".

Edit: Let me give another example, because I am curious how the "rules" would handle this.

Suppose there was a Heaven's Gate cult member here. And he took extreme umbrage that people described it as a suicide cult. He went hard that's uncharitable, and generalizing, and boo outgroup. And no matter how much you tried to point out that all the members of the cult, except for him, killed themselves, he just insisted they didn't. And it's really hurtful, and alienating, and unkind, to keep insisting that they did.

This is how it felt to me watching the groomer debate of a few weeks ago. By every act that we have come to recognize as grooming, grooming is occurring. And yet the side perpetrating it just doggedly claims they aren't, and out go the mod warnings that calling grooming grooming is unkind, uncharitable, generalizing, blah blah blah. What even are these rules? Are they supposed to facilitate truth finding? Or are they supposed to protect malicious actors who can just lie with a straight face and feign indignation? Or people so cognitively mutilated they can't draw the connection between their actions and their consequences?

A user can write paragraphs and paragraphs describing textbook narcissistic behavior. And so long as he doesn't call it narcissism, no problem. The moment someone comes along and goes "Yeah, that's called narcissism." out comes the "You aren't being charitable, that's 'boo outgroup'".

This is false and not descriptive of any mod action I can recall. If you are describing behavior, you're fine. "This thing I have seen a lot of Blue Tribers do, it's narcissistic." You'd be fine. Did you notice the key words "a lot of" in the preceding sentence? That's all you need, but apparently that's too big an ask of you.

It's like we're only allowed to point out the obvious and undeniable transgressions of the successor ideology, and those who follow it, by leaving negative space in the shape of it. The moment you point and go "Yeah, they're derange entitled narcissist" because that's what all the behavior that is being described ad nauseum is examples of, you've crossed a line.

If "they" = specific groups of people doing the thing, you have not crossed a line.

If "they" = every person in my outgroup, you have crossed a line.

You know what we mean by "outgroup" and you know what we mean by "Post about specific groups, not general groups, wherever possible" because you have been around too long to keep pretending you are "struggling to get" the rules. You know the rules. You know where the line is. You know because all I'd have to do is rewrite one of your boo outgroup polemics with the polarities reversed, something about all those MAGtard Red Tribe chuds (so racist and fascist, amirite?) and I am absolutely certain that you would have no problem identifying the lack of charity and unacceptable weakmanning and booing in that post, and you would remain unconvinced and unimpressed if I tried to defend it with a catalog of Red Tribe chuds being racist and fascist.

I get it, the project of this place is some sort of open forum where both sides can talk. But increasingly I feel like I'm trapped in a room with cannibals, and it's against the rules to point out how my friends keep disappearing.

Who are the cannibals in this analogy? All Blue Tribers everywhere? Blue Tribers here in this forum? If you want to complain about cannibals eating your friends, point out the cannibals. You know, the people actually eating your friends.

Or I can make vague statements like "Man, it sure is weird that I haven't seen Steve in three weeks. I mean we're all locked in a room together, it's not like there is anywhere he could have gone. And you sure look well fed." But I'm expected to hope that the secret cannibal will just admit they are a cannibal. I can't point out their obvious cannibalism. Even up to the point I wake up and my own arm is missing, I can't accuse them of anything lest I be accused of "lack of charity".

Right, you really truly believe that all Blue Tribers are cannibals. All of them. And we're quokkas because we can't see them feasting on your friends and when you scream "They're all cannibals!" we're telling you "You can't say that, either point out the person actually eating people or knock it off."

I'm sure it's very frustrating to be the only person who can see the horror.

The problem here is, you are not wearing magic glasses and all of Blue Tribe is not cannibals.

Suppose there was a Heaven's Gate cult member here. And he took extreme umbrage that people described it as a suicide cult. He went hard that's uncharitable, and generalizing, and boo outgroup. And no matter how much you tried to point out that all the members of the cult, except for him, killed themselves, he just insisted they didn't. And it's really hurtful, and alienating, and unkind, to keep insisting that they did.

"What if a literal Nazi was a member here claiming that the Nazis never killed any Jews?"

You can argue over questions of fact (did those other people do that thing?) without insulting that member. If you really equate half the population (i.e. everyone not politically aligned with you) with a suicide cult, then I guess you will continue to struggle with how to express your abhorrence of them without breaking the rules, but what I would actually suggest is to not use ad absurdum arguments. Yes, there are Blue Tribe members here, and no, you may not say they are all self-centered narcissists, even if that's what you really believe.

This is how it felt to me watching the groomer debate of a few weeks ago. By every act that we have come to recognize as grooming, grooming is occurring. And yet the side perpetrating it just doggedly claims they aren't, and out go the mod warnings that calling grooming grooming is unkind, uncharitable, generalizing, blah blah blah.

Are you talking about reddit, or TheMotte.org? If the latter, you're going to have to point me to the mod warnings in question, because even if they were mine, I don't remember them, and considering all the spurious reasoning above, I am deeply skeptical that you are accurately describing what happened.

What even are these rules? Are they supposed to facilitate truth finding? Or are they supposed to protect malicious actors who can just lie with a straight face and feign indignation? Or people so cognitively mutilated they can't draw the connection between their actions and their consequences?

"Why can't you fools see that I'm objectively right and my enemies really are that terrible and you should be taking my side, so please start enforcing the rules keeping in mind that my outgroup is in fact The Worst" never seems to go out of style.

Even granting that you sincerely believe this, try engaging in some epistemic humility.

Man, it sure is weird that I haven't seen Steve in three weeks. I mean we're all locked in a room together, it's not like there is anywhere he could have gone. And you sure look well fed." But I'm expected to hope that the secret cannibal will just admit they are a cannibal. I can't point out their obvious cannibalism. Even up to the point I wake up and my own arm is missing, I can't accuse them of anything lest I be accused of "lack of charity".

I think the point is, in the analogy you are locked in the room with 20,000 people on your side and 30,000 people on the other. When Steve vanishes and 20 of the other side look suspiciously fat and are wiping blood off their lips, then you can say that. But you don't get to tar the other 29,980 people in that group just because they are in the opposing group. For that you need evidence all of them ate Steve.

To push it back to the example you used "Blue tribers seem to think the world revolves around them, and if they can't eat absolutely every food item at a pot luck, nobody should." That is the equivalent of noticing some people in your opposing group are bossy picky eaters and extrapolating that to the Blue Tribe itself with no further evidence of that. Either you need evidence it applies to all of them OR restrict the critique to those who do the bad thing X themselves.

Note that mod feedback said your open was ok, where you said: "Maybe slightly, just because a lot of leftist I know are a bit neurotic and hypochondriac." because you restricted that to a sub set of leftists that you knew personally rather than all leftists. So a subset, informed by your observations.

I'm not a mod, but that is the difference that struck me.

But you don't get to tar the other 29,980 people in that group just because they are in the opposing group. For that you need evidence all of them ate Steve.

The other 29,979 are bleating about "charity", and the 1 that goes "Hey... maybe you are onto something" vanishes next.

Then you need to say that and possibly evidence it before you can extrapolate it to groups. That's the rule to try and keep this place somewhat palatable to everyone (as much as possible of course). But even then notice you are bringing in more nuance!

Some of the Blue Tribe think the world revolves around them and others within the Blue Tribe enable them because X Y and Z is a more nuanced take that enables discussion more than Blue Tribe X.

Again I'm not a mod, but if you think all Blue Tribe bad, then it's going to be tricky to exist in a space which explicitly wants both Blue and Red to talk to each other constructively and so limits how broadly you can generalize your outgroup to be bad without doing a lot of work to back it up.

He's right though.

Laughing about the pussification of the Blue Tribe seems strange at a time when they run the world, are winning so much that they are tired of winning, and their opponents have basically given up to the point where their best hope is for the Blue Tribe to self-destruct in a woke-stupid dumpster fire (admittedly a highly plausible outcome). But the basic error isn't new - people were talking about how wealth made the British soft before, during, and after the peak extent of the British Empire. More recently, people were using "they/them army" memes to explain why Russia would win in Ukraine.

What's the alternative to laughing though? Aside from the Hemingway impression forever whispering sweet nothings to me from the sidelines.

Laughing about the pussification of the Blue Tribe seems strange at a time when they run the world, are winning so much that they are tired of winning

One angle of this is that the "winning" is the successful weaponization of said pussification. Crybullying. In other words, being a contemptible, pathetic pussy, and leaning hard into modern civilizational norms that reward being a pathetic pussy and deny any normal consequences. Attacking their social status is at least an actionable plan, until you can coordinate sufficient meanness to atomic wedgie the woke into oblivion.

Obviously there's a huge incentive to overgeneralize here, clearly there is more to Blue success than just sobbing about their sandy bussy until bureaucrats give in to their demands. But it's also not an imaginary phenomenon, it's an archetypal deployment of Slave Morality, which has a solid track record in the West. "Laughing at the pussification" seems useful to the extent that it's a search for an effective immune response to slave morality concern troll crybullying.

The crybullying only works at an individual level because the Blues have already won at the social level. Institutional rules that reward crybullying are imposed top-down by people who achieved power when the norms did not favour crybullying.

The bottom-up norms of the Blue Tribe treat white women’s tears - i.e. Blue elites and aspirant-elites crybullying each other - as almost as worthy of contempt as men’s tears.

Another way of thinking about it is that crybullying only works if you are a designated Blue client group. (The Red Tribe often try crybullying the Blues, and it doesn’t work). Crybullying culture only appeared when the Blues were powerful enough to have client groups.

The crybullying only works at an individual level because the Blues have already won at the social level.

I disagree. I think it works because it exploits values most people have - like compassion, justice, kindness, sense of belonging, desire to protect the weak - and weaponizes it to goals completely alien to these values. Most people do not have innate immunity for that, at least not yet. It's like the virus getting into the cell - it uses its own resources for the goals that have nothing to do with the goals the cell is for. Most non-tribers and red-tribers do not know what to do if somebody attacks them with "here's some oppressed people and either you do exactly what I say or you're the oppressor" - and most people do not want to be the oppressors. That's where the crybullying gets its power - from the desire of people to be good and fear of people to fail to be good, which is successfully weaponized.

The Red Tribe often try crybullying the Blues, and it doesn’t work

Because Red Tribe's values make for them very hard to weaponize compassion. The tribe that values individual strength, individual responsibility, individual merit and individual freedom would find it hard to convincingly pretend to be a helpless victim of circumstances and evil conspiracies. It's hard for them to pretend to be an innocent victim convincingly enough for the feelings of sympathy to overwhelm logical defenses. They are not ambush predators by nature. So copying a strategy that was not designed for them is not going to work very well. You can't have a spider and a hawk to hunt the same way.

Blue tribers seem to think the world revolves around them, and if they can't eat absolutely every food item at a pot luck, nobody should.

"Blue Tribe" is a huge swath of people, and this sweeping generalization doesn't apply to the overwhelming majority who are psychologically healthy. This statement has got to violate several site rules around being kind, being no more antagonistic than necessary, not weakmaning to show how bad a group is, and there's no evidence cited for an inflammatory claim.

Agreed. Liberal (in the US sense) are more likely to be higher in neuroticism, as defined by the Big Five model, but it doesn't follow that liberals are generally neurotics. Americans are more likely to run for Congress than people in general, but Americans generally don't run for Congress.

You’ve also got a general blue tribe tendency to go all in once they’re in survive mode- there’s no allergy that’s best avoided, it’s an allergy where accidental cross contamination could cause them to literally die.

I definitely think some people's dietary restrictions have the form you describe, as being some kind of personal belief about the rightness or wrongness of eating certain things (vegetarianism and veganism seem like the obvious example). On the other hand some things (like allergies) don't really have this character. If my friend has a peanut allergy so severe that eating them will cause anaphylactic shock and possibly death, that seems qualitatively different to something like veganism. When I am accommodating someone's allergies like this it's because I don't want to maybe kill them! Which seems like a very reasonable thing to do, and their request seems quite different in character to anything that could be called a "holy act", nor does their motivation for the request seem comparable to religious requests.

The problem is that you can't easily tell the "person with genuine allergy" from the "person who has picked up latest food fad". Making genuine sufferers produce a doctor's letter every time they want to order a meal in a restaurant is too demanding, but giving in to the food fad types does lead to "six people all claiming they can't eat anything because it will trigger their food sensitivity; George can't eat meat, Susan can't eat fish, okay do all diary and eggs and vegetables? No, Jane is lactose-intolerant, Bill can't eat carrots, Alice can only eat carrots". So it ends up with nobody getting anything and everyone is disappointed and put-out.

Or as pointed out, the food faddists mean that people ignore "I can't eat that, I'm allergic" because they're used to Phil who claims a new allergy every month when they've been eating that food just fine all along, and then they end up serving food with gluten in to coeliacs which is a very bad thing to happen.

I think the "gluten-free" is also pushed as a marketing fad by food manufacturers jumping on a bandwagon; I've seen products prominently labelled as "gluten-free" when well yeah, that item never had gluten in to begin with.

I mean, how often does the situation occur where (1) everyone in the group has to eat the same meal and (2) their food preferences are such that the food everyone could eat is the empty set? My impression is that progressives are happy to come up with a general guideline (respect people's food preferences) and then let groups come up with ad hoc solutions when the guideline proves to be problematic. Maybe in some cases different people get different meals. Maybe in some cases some people bring their own food.

I agree people who substitute claims of allergies for claims of preferences can be annoying, and I'm confident even progressives would hit a limit of patience when dealing with such a person.

Well sure, peanut allergies are one thing, but the maybe-munchausen’s gluten free diets are more like vegetarianism than that.

Agree on peanuts.

Some vegans seem to fall into the group of girls who want to be skinny (somewhat red tribe). But predominantly blue tribe. The meat only thing I guess is red tribe as it’s macho anti environmentalism thing. Meat only Im going to assume are heavy maga. Gluten’s and all those things are probably primarily the things I’m thinking about.

Further on Peterson the right is less religious than they once were so getting a subset inventing new diets like meat only would be a form of right religion too. Personally when I’ve looked at the science I’m open to ketone supplements having benefits but my understanding of human biology is it can handle anything but the system works best when it doesn’t need to turn protein into carbs or carbs into proteins.

The big categorical difference I think is as state expecting others to follow.

Does seem to have the same divides as elsewhere of the blue tribe being more feminine.

To perhaps bring this back to more familiar Culture War ground I think the desire to accommodate dietary restrictions springs from the same place as the desire to use preferred pronouns: the perception that it's the courteous thing to do, that it would be rude to do otherwise. Underlying this is a belief that society ought to change in certain ways to accommodate individuals living their lives the way they would prefer to, and that we as individuals have some responsibility to create that space for others. Exactly what we should accommodate in what circumstances is a question on which underlying theories differ but I think this is the general motivating principle.

ETA:

After reading some other replies I'm wondering how much of a left/right divide on social issues is about who, when, and how has an obligation to accommodate others. It seems to me right-coded non-libertarian positions tend towards the individual having an obligation to alter their behaviors to conform with wider society while more left-coded positions tend towards society (really other people) altering so as to accommodate individuals.

After reading some other replies I'm wondering how much of a left/right divide on social issues is about who, when, and how has an obligation to accommodate others. It seems to me right-coded non-libertarian positions tend towards the individual having an obligation to alter their behaviors to conform with wider society while more left-coded positions tend towards society (really other people) altering so as to accommodate individuals.

I think this is an astute way to generalize it and I'm glad someone put it in a less boo outgroup framing. It fits nicely with the often smug "Just be a good person" frustration I hear from progressives when there is pushback against what for lack of a better term I'd call pathological inclusiveness. For the most part it's fairly harmless - 99% of the time the people hosting dinner parties that have to accommodate every currently conceived allergy are progressives themselves and they get a kind of pleasure out of being accommodating. It plays into their self image as a good person to readily take on these tasks for others and I've long since learned never to tell a woman who wants to do something for me that they shouldn't bother.

This also fits into a thing I often have trouble articulating about why it's sometimes difficult to argue against this class of progressive values. On the abstract level I think my position is correct but when you're in a room full of progressives and the topic of trans people come up everyone else is affirming and validating how much of a good person everyone else there is for supporting trans people it's very difficult to speak up and say "Hey actually I don't think this whole trans thing is such a good idea, have you considered the epistemic problems with differentiating between the qualia of correctly or incorrectly believing you are a different gender" people do not say "hey that's an interesting point I haven't thought of before, let me think about it and we can have an open discussion". They say "hey man, why are you being an asshole? You made Astra cry and feel unsupported. People kill themselves because of people like you".

It's nearly impossible to penetrate this kind of love bombing with unpleasant truths. And on the meta level it incentivizes the exact grievance porn that I so often perceive of the left. Progressive type people see themselves as helping the downtrodden and it's deep in their self conception that they're the type of person that helps the downtrodden, but they've also formed an immune system against even questioning claims of being downtrodden. From my perspective they're doing the equivalent of giving a kid as much sugar as they ask for, each extra spoon full is the kindest path in the moment but it's a road to diabetes paved with good intentions.

Anyways I've rambled a bit but thank you again for putting this the way you have, it's allowed some things to click for me.

"hey man, why are you being an asshole? You made Astra cry and feel unsupported. People kill themselves because of people like you".

Think of all the emissions that they won't emit. It will help fight with climate change. And open space for immigrants and will alleviate a bit the housing crisis and unaffordability of the homes.

I think there are a few different things going on in the social interaction you describe.

I think you're giving the average trans-supporting progressive too much credit (or maybe expecting too much). I doubt they have a fully worked out theory of gender and its metaphysics, epistemics, etc. I'm someone fairly steeped in trans academic literature and I'm not sure I do! Their understanding of trans issues is not necessarily part of a fully theorized conception of gender, its more likely a surface understanding that they use to get by with supporting their friend. The purpose of the beliefs isn't necessarily having a complete theory of gender, it's understanding what their friend needs to feel and be supported, because they care about their friend.

The social context of the discussion is also important. Imagine you were at the gym with some friends. One of your friends is going to try for a new one rep max, they're going to lift some amount of weight they never have before. So all your other friends are hyping your one friend up, telling them they can do this, they've got it, etc. Then you interject with a comment describing how, based on previous lifts, they probably can't do it and may injure themselves. Your comment may be true and correct but I can see how people would think the comment was unwelcome. The conversation that was occurring had a particular purpose that was not necessarily saying true things, but hyping your friend up and making them feel better. Similarly if the purpose of the conversation involving your trans friend was to comfort or support them, I can see how a comment calling into question those acts may be unwelcome. This isn't to say such comments are never appropriate. If you were having a dispassionate discussion with your friend about what their one rep max should be, or about how or whether to support trans individuals, such comments may be appropriate but it is very much a social context thing. I'm sure this can be a frustrating experience, especially if you rarely or never have the conversations on topics you want to have that are relevant to those conversations you do have.

It's nearly impossible to penetrate this kind of love bombing with unpleasant truths. And on the meta level it incentivizes the exact grievance porn that I so often perceive of the left. Progressive type people see themselves as helping the downtrodden and it's deep in their self conception that they're the type of person that helps the downtrodden, but they've also formed an immune system against even questioning claims of being downtrodden. From my perspective they're doing the equivalent of giving a kid as much sugar as they ask for, each extra spoon full is the kindest path in the moment but it's a road to diabetes paved with good intentions.

It seems a bit hyperbolic to say progressives have an immune system to claims of being downtrodden. I can think of several groups that progressives would (and do) not believe when they claim to be downtrodden. Rather, progressives may be too focused on claims of being downtrodden based in history as opposed to the present. Though, I believe most groups progressive regard as downtrodden today have a pretty good case.

The purpose of the beliefs isn't necessarily having a complete theory of gender, it's understanding what their friend needs to feel and be supported, because they care about their friend.

Which is nice, but their friend may not be my friend and I don't care about their delicate feelings (beyond basic civility). So okay, Astra is in the room, maybe don't broach the topic. But if I'm having this conversation and somebody pipes up "Hey, don't be an asshole, suppose someone who's trans heard you this would make them cry, you're the reason trans people kill themselves", then I think not caring about the imaginary feelings of a hypothetical person who is not there is acceptable. Is there or is there not an epistemic problem? If there are no subjects that cannot be questioned in the quest for truth, then that applies to the sacred cows of the left as well as the right.

One possible problem is that conversations or discussions generally require mutual consent of the parties engaged in the discussion. If you don't care about the hypothetical feelings of people who aren't present, but your interlocutors do, it seems likely to me they will decline to engage in that conversation with you. Now, maybe you would prefer they agreed with your preferred conversational norms but there is not really a good way to force those norms on other people. If you want to have a discussion on some topic with particular individuals you need conversational norms that are acceptable to all those individuals. Maybe for some topics and some individuals this is impossible, in which case you need to find alternate people to discuss with.

If there are no subjects that cannot be questioned in the quest for truth, then that applies to the sacred cows of the left as well as the right.

Of course.

The social context of the discussion is also important...

I think we're mainly in agreement, I don't actually interrupt the love bombing. But sometimes it is not so clear that the lift isn't dangerous. On the bench at what weight does interjecting about danger into the hype session make sense? If the person has only ever benched a plate and is reaching for 155lbs of course you'd be a jerk, that's well within reason. But two plates? Three? They could actually die if the spotter slips up.

But even that doesn't quite fit, I know that lifting three plates is still theoretically possible, and a good goal even if it's probably beyond this friend today. What if instead of training at all they're getting those ridiculous synthol injections on the theory that they actually make them stronger. And there is a popular movement with the slogan "synthol makes you strong" that everyone chants as this poor fellow asks not to be spotted.

I think these shibboleths come from a desire to be kind and good and helpful. But I don't think they are kind or good or helpful. This delusion is hurting their friend and it will hurt others as they normalize it.

It seems a bit hyperbolic to say progressives have an immune system to claims of being downtrodden

Yes I do think I overreached there. As I said I have trouble articulating my trouble with this pathological empathy. There is something there but it evades my grasp.

Then you interject with a comment describing how, based on previous lifts, they probably can't do it and may injure themselves. Your comment may be true and correct but I can see how people would think the comment was unwelcome.

The tough love drill Seargent/coach that tells the recruit what he needs to hear is a beloved character.

We all need like one of that person in our friend group. It's a niche...the kind but very blunt person.

"Dude, you've only done, fucking, 225, and you're going for fucking 315? Shit, man, that's dumb as fuck...OK, I'll spot you, but again. This is dumb as hell. Mike, could you get over here, get on this end of the bar?"

Much more so for red tribe/conservative types than blue tribe/progressive types, in my experience. The latter often perceive that archetype as just being an asshole.

Agreed, and it fits with the whole ‘conservatives want the government to be daddy, liberals want the government to be mommy’ meme from the late 2000’s. Red tribers are simply a lot more comfortable with being unpleasant for the sake of something more important, and view it that comfort as an important part of being an adult. By contrast, blue tribers tend to see making those kinds of decisions as the sort of thing that should be solely up to the individual, and not subject to pressure.

He is an asshole. But one that is ultimately on your side.

I used to have chronic gas and then I eliminated garlic and onions from my diet and have no issues. It's not something I would request anyone cater to at a 100 person gathering but when I'm with close family we saute garlic and onions separately and then everyone else adds them to their portion. I have an uncle with similar stomach issues who can only eat extremely bland foods and just caries his own packed lunches to most things and my sister can't handle dairy.

My guess is that a sizable minority of the population would be better off if they identified certain foods that gave them issues and then removed them from their diets. The recent culture war on this issue seems more like classic left-right divide over whether the community at large should bear the responsibility of providing for people with specific dietary needs or if the people with those needs should be responsible themselves for bringing their own food or only eating from a very small selection of dishes at large gatherings.

At very large scales and very small scales this isn't an issue. The grocery store can carry non-dairy ice cream for my sister, my family won't put onions in because they care about me and are willing to cater to my preferences. The issue is the norm for midsize gatherings where you have too many specific dietary requirements to justify preparing separate dishes in each course for each requirement.

I know mental illness has far higher rates amongst lefties. My guess is dietary restrictions and food allergies are much higher in lefties and if your not in that religion it’s something you never think of.

Possibly the most popular right wing thinker today, Jordan Peterson, advocates a meat only elimination diet for health reasons.

If pickiness about food hasn't been a thing amongst conservatives until lately, I'm sure lots and lots of them are thinking about it now.

Possibly the most popular right wing thinker today, Jordan Peterson, advocates a meat only elimination diet for health reasons.

I haven't paid much attention to Peterson in a few years, but is he really that popular? But more to the point, when I did used to pay attention him, he never advocated the carnivore diet for others but just talked about it as something he and his daughter found useful. His daughter had some sort of consultation service to help people get on the diet, but it was the kind of thing you had to really dig through to find, not something he publicized. Has he changed his tone from "this diet worked for me and my daughter, maybe it's something you could try out to see if it works for you too" to "you should adopt this diet" at some point?

I haven't paid much attention to Peterson in a few years, but is he really that popular?

He's certainly up there.

But more to the point, when I did used to pay attention him, he never advocated the carnivore diet for others but just talked about it as something he and his daughter found useful.

"Advocate the diet for others" seems like an unnecessary qualification. Vegans excepted, the dietary lefties OP complain's about don't usually do that either. The annoyance is more sparked by their expectation to be accommodated than their trying to convince you to their diet.

Yeah the left and the right did a total reversal , with the left embracing healthy at any size, fat acceptance , etc and the right now being stridently pro-health

Is that true? More liberal people probably are less likely to embrace shaming as an avenue for encouraging healthy behavior (though far from universally - in most of the liberal social circles I occupy, fat people are still very much acceptable targets, especially if they're obviously gluttonous and idle), but health nuts lean left as well (a lot of that is woo, but we're judging on consciousness, not accuracy). Conversely, conservatives are more likely to be obese than liberals, less conscious about their diet, less likely to exercise, etc... (at least in the US).

The thing to remember is that the Blue Tribe derives from the New England Yankee/WASP elite, which in turn derives from the section of the English upper-middle class which looked up to the upper class (and was frequently descended from the younger sons of upper class families). In that class, if someone commits a sufficiently grave faux pas you are unfalteringly polite to their faces and then quietly disinvite them from your social circle. (And if enough people do this to you, you fall out of the elite). You never shame people in public - that would be making a scene. In fact, the only people you even shame in private are your children and mentees, who need to learn what not to do to avoid getting cold-shouldered.

Getting fat is not acceptable in Blue Tribe elite circles. Public fat-shaming is even less acceptable. These are not inconsistent.

In that class, if someone commits a sufficiently grave faux pas you are unfalteringly polite to their faces and then quietly disinvite them from your social circle. (And if enough people do this to you, you fall out of the elite). You never shame people in public. [...] Getting fat is not acceptable in Blue Tribe elite circles. Public fat-shaming is even less acceptable. These are not inconsistent.

Yes. It's frustrating that progressive ethics seem to tear down formal rules for what a person has to do to stay in good social standing (eg no hat at the dinner table, dress appropriately, no taking the lord's name in vain, tithe 10%, no extramarital sex) while erecting a gridwork of invisible, informal third rails that cause you to lose face if you step on them.

People on the spectrum/systems-focused people skew anti-woke. Self-flatteringly, I think, anti-wokes like me say this is because wokeness is irrational, and so people with rational minds see straight through it. But the old religious rules were also irrational. Maybe autistic/systems-focused people skew anti-woke because we're annoyed that the "new way" is so implicit and requires social saavy to navigate. For example, an autistic teen girl may start putting on weight while getting supportive feel-good messages from everyone; only when her social circle shrinks and she starts getting cold-shouldered does she realize she violated a norm no one spelled out for her. You can write the same story for a person who transitions and then never gets a boyfriend.

This leads to bitterness from the systems-focused person, who would prefer explicit rules.

Yes - I am pretty spergy (obviously, being here) and I always prefer social situations with written rules, whether that is a formal dress code, Robert’s Rules, or the rules of the board game we are playing.

Anthropologist Kate Fox in Watching the English talks about the “English social dis-ease” - a kind of national spergery - and how it causes the English to adopt formalised dress codes and form social institutions with clear rules of etiquette. I also suspect it is why we invented sports with written rules.

As a single point of data, a far-left millennial friend of mine (who probably thinks I'm a stealth conservative based on the conversations we used to have about feminism) blew up when I said I had started a diet and begun to lose weight: "Dieting doesn't work," "I've noticed you have some toxic ideas about weight," "I've heard you making insensitive comments before," etc. They then recommended I read a Health At Any Size activist's autobiography to engage with these ideas because she's "very eloquent."

The book was mostly personal and second-hand experiences of trauma due to people pointing out morbid obesity and its negative externalities. There was a whole chapter about doctors and the medical establishment being shaming and misguided. I scanned the bibliography for any academic papers (now on my reading list), but most of the references were to articles from the likes of Huffpost. Then I gave up on the book.

As regards the issue of obesity, I do think the problem is systemic: the US population has lost its ability to cook proper healthy food at home, has lost the last remnants of a culture which despised "gluttony," and has been brainwashed by Big Ag to think that eating more and more is normal, and that it's all genetic. Meanwhile Big Ag has hired flavor scientists to engineer hyperstimulus into food, hires lobbyists to keep politicians from addressing the problem in any meaningful way, and pays useful activist idiots to write books about Health At Any Size.

However, as an individual, I don't have many options other than to tune out the propaganda, establish my own system, and live my life of moderation. If that makes me "toxic" and "insensitive," ... fuck it. I'm not sacrificing my pursuit of excellence for some moral fashion.

Yes, there's an odd thing going on right now where "people of walmart" are still acceptable targets, but the obese people closest to rich urban liberals are statistically most likely to be professional black women (60% obesity rate, something like 50% for high income black women), who are very dangerous to appear to be mocking. What I see is the explicit sneering shifting to the other, safer low-class markers of PoWs, like mobility scooters and trashy clothing. Even if their obesity is obviously implicitly part of the sneer.

Talebs concept of the "intolerant minority" is tangentially related.

I think caring about food allergies is not a traditional CW front, but more of an aesthetic divide that does manifest along CW group boundaries. "Oh you'll die if you eat a peanut? What a fucking pussy!" Being "accommodating" is much more of a currency/virtue for the left than it is for the right. A loose form of "inclusion".

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