This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
To add to that point about the ruins, I've had that feeling many times. I don't know about American infrastructure as much, but in my city, infrastructure is such a problem that just maintaining it becomes a bigger project (more expensive, more disruptive, longer, more divisive) than building it was in the first place. They've been renovating a bridge-tunnel built in the 60's. It cost 1 billion dollars ajusted to inflation to build and took 4 years. The renovation costs (so far) 2.7 billion and it's been 4 years already with no end in sight. There's a metro station that I remember when I was a teen looked alright, then when I started working as a young adult they had to temporarily take some wall panels out to deal with water infiltration. That was 20 years ago, the panels are still off and the walls keep looking worse and worse and you can see the precarious fixes they just kept applying, chicken wire holding pipes and gutters, funnels to move leaks and hastily bolted corrugated metal sheets patches over cracks. It's like we're children playing in the ruins of a more advanced civilisation.
In my area we've got the new Tappan Zee Bridge, and the (under construction) Portal North railroad bridge. The New Jersey Turnpike keeps getting wider. They raised the deck of the Bayonne Bridge so larger ships could get under it. We can build infrastructure -- it costs more and takes longer largely because of red tape (mostly environmental impact stuff) and cost disease, but we can still do it. When we can't -- as in the NYC subway system -- it's not that we lack the technical ability but that someone powerful doesn't want it. In that subway's case, the unions don't want to allow anything that would reduce the number of employees needed to run the system.
I know, we are also building some new stuff sometimes, at enormous cost and effort. It's just that sometimes, when I snap out of the stupor of familiarity and actually look around at some of the infrastructure that we take for granted I'm appalled that we're okay with the state much of it is in, even for infrastructure that is clearly vital.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link