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 -
Jimmy Kimmel pulled indefinitely by ABC for Charlie Kirk comments.
Late night talk show hosts have waned from their glorious Letterman days, but boomers still care about then enough that they're still a scalp worth scraping off the skull. It's hard to think of a prominent figure on the right that would be equal in stature - Gina Carano? Piers Morgan? Roseanne Barr? nothing like him - if only for the fact that the entertainment industry is so aligned to the left. Indeed, even during the height of the progressive cancel culture era, it was liberal icons like Louis CK and JK Rowling that felt the heat.
If such a big figure can fall, who will be next?
With Colbert going off the air, and with the upcoming FCC hearings on Twitch, Reddit, Discord, and Steam, one can only anticipate the prizes that are coming. Destiny and Hasan are obvious trophies that the right would love to claim, but I have no doubt that the powerjanitors of Reddit are quaking in their boots. How many leftist/liberal commentators have made snarky comments on social media, as of late? This is the reddest of the red meat, dripping with blood, raw. The long march through the institutions has only just begun, and for the populist right base, it'll be a enjoyable hike indeed.
A detail worth noting in the monologue he's being fired over, which I have no idea how much it mattered in the official machinery behind the scenes in this and which I'm reasonably certain will not matter in its narrative fallout, but which was the primary outrage animating the cancellation campaign:
This was on Monday (Sept 15th), which was after the bullet engravings were public ("hey fascist! CATCH!", public on Sept 12th) but before the chat transcripts in the indictment were public ("I had enough of his hatred", public on Sept 16th).
In that interval (and perhaps still?), there was a very active and successful misinformation shitstorm on lib social media to frame the available evidence (including, remarkably, "hey fascist! CATCH!") as smoking gun proof that Tyler Robinson was right wing and in particular a groyper, which it's extremely likely that Jimmy Kimmel's writers (and perhaps Kimmel himself) were stewing in.
I think Kimmel was just throwing red meat to his followers and critically failed at reading the current political climate. I can understand why; he got away with highlighting Trump's inflammatory statements in low key victim blaming after the two Trump assassination attempts.
I think part of this though is that its the final straw in Kimmel's repeated stances on these kind of events (eg political violence is bad, but he kinda deserved it wink wink) and it had drawn
the Eye of SauronFCC attention. Whether Trump had a quiet chat to the FCC chairman about this is a seperate issue.I think that the misinformation made a difference to how events are unfolding. I think that this in particular would not have happened without it.
Just as an autistic matter of documenting events as I have witnessed them occurring.
Of course it's all just a forgettable skirmish in a much larger war that's still in its preludes, in which a whole lot will be lost in the foam.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link