site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 15, 2025

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.

4
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Now the federal government is going to come in and try and bus in right leaning stuff into the marketplace of ideas at gunpoint. Some stalls are going to get kicked over but the result is going to be me more free speech.

How has this worked out in the past? The most salient examples I can think of of this in the past are

  • Chinese Cultural Revolution
  • Franco's Spain
  • 1950s America around communism

But in fairness to you, are there some specific times in history where a government came in and forced specific views into the marketplace of ideas at gunpoint, and this went well? Maybe it's just a failure of historical knowledge on my part, and this is usually a strategy which leads to a free and flourishing nation.

Again - the marketplace of ideas and free speech are already dead. CPR does not have a good success rate but we do it because you can't get worse than dead. CPR is ugly. You feel the mangled flesh of their chest and feel like you are going cut your hand on their fractured ribs. Doesn't mean you give up.

Especially important because the people who killed it have oppressed me for the last ten+ years (or at least, I identify that way), some of them appear to be publicly stating they want me dead (see: polling, public statements by left leaning influencers), and we've seen what happens when you put these people in charge (marxist and socialist thought in China, Russia, etc).

You mention the cultural revolution - Trump has zero percent chance of making that happen. None of what that is or the environment that brings it is represented by Trump. Meanwhile the left has already started their cultural revolution.

You want the cultural revolution that has zero chance to happen or the one that is already picking up steam?

Rumors of the death of the marketplace of ideas are greatly exaggerated. Exhibit 1: we are posting on a site where holocaust revisionists speak freely (and incessantly). Free speech norms aren't as strong now as they were in the late 90s, but they are not entirely dead, and (up until the Charlie Kirk murder) were moving in a mostly good direction. A lot of right wing ideas have been winning in the marketplace of ideas recently (e.g. around immigration, trans, parental rights). In many cases, I am not happy that those particular ideas are winning - but I am very happy that the marketplace of ideas seems to be recovering. Let's maybe not throw that away.

I get that you feel personally wronged, and that you want revenge for that. You likely genuinely were wronged. The people you are trying to take revenge on, though, are not the same people who wronged you, even if both sets share a broad ideological tent.

You want the cultural revolution that has zero chance to happen or the one that is already picking up steam?

Which one is picking up steam, in your view? Are you sure you're not living in 2021 still?

Exhibit 1: we are posting on a site where holocaust revisionists speak freely (and incessantly).

Literally the point. The Motte was chased off of /r/SSC and then reddit in general because of no-no thoughts.

You can tell me the marketplace of ideas is recovering when I can reveal my political affiliation at work without severe professional consequences.

The Motte was chased off of /r/SSC and then reddit in general because of no-no thoughts

Yes. And we moved here, and nobody stopped us, and now there are multiple more mainstream places on the internet (e.g. twitter) where people can say stuff that at one point would have been pushed to fringe places like here.

You can tell me the marketplace of ideas is recovering when I can reveal my political affiliation at work without severe professional consequences.

No, I can tell you the marketplace of ideas has recovered at that point. The place it's in is still bad, the direction it's moving (or at least was moving) is good. The difference between 2021 and now is the difference between having $15,000 of credit card debt that's going up by $1000 / month and having $15,000 of credit card debt that's going down by $1000 / month. Obviously it'd be better not to have the debt at all, but the latter situation is much much better than the former, and I am suspicious of anyone in the latter situation saying they need to blow up their financial plan and replace it with something reckless because they are still in debt.

(Although on a concrete object level, if you're in a left-dominated profession outside of education, you likely can reveal your political affiliation at work without professional consequences, if you own your beliefs and state them in a level-headed and reasonable sounding way. The vibes really have shifted quite a lot).