site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   25034 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 29, 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.

7
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Apart from the vast wilderness of North America with natural predators (not super relevant because in such places in Europe you can also often own hunting rifles), I have always assumed that this simply has to do entirely with the number of black people around in the US metro areas and the general distrust of large segments of the population towards the government that it will actually protect them from these black people.

Can Americans sanity check me?

No.

The directional distribution of crime stats is widely known in America, but the specific stats are not- and most Americans do not feel threatened by high black crime, because 'not going into the hood'(the ghetto is not where most people want to hang out anyways) is a perfectly viable method of avoiding it. And political support for gun rights is mostly correlated with living outside of the inner city anyways. Distrust of the government is a real factor, but the driving factor for concealed carry is fear of mass shootings, or drug fueled 'random' crime. Not fear of gang related crime among the black population, which yes most Americans are aware is a problem but also is seen as something that is geographically limited to places you don't really want to be in anyways. The sentiment is more 'the police can't be everywhere at once' and less 'the police favor black gangbangers'- the latter sentiment would be seen as farcical among the vast majority of Americans, including the last pockets of red tribe racism.

Uh, not really.

Political support for gun ownership is inversely proportional to distance from an urban center. It’s more a rural/redneck/rugged-individualist signal.

There was a video on twitter recently of a PoV of someone having to shoot a charging boar utilizing a bolt-action rifle.

I couldn't help but stare at the set of circumstance and think to myself, 'In that situation, I really, REALLY would prefer a PTR-91. Or AR-10.'

Which are semi-auto magazine rifles chambered in 308. Which is a typical hunting round.

And boars have become an endemic invasive species in America as of late.

That aside... I know enough to say that gun culture overall in the US has undergone a quiet, seismic shift who's origins can date all the way back to the initial attempt at a gun ban in the 1920s, threading through the Firearms Owners Protection Act in 1986, Clinton's Assault Weapons' Ban in the 90s, up until today, where you've had a steady increase in constitutional concealed carry.

It's around this point I could probably fish around for how holders of CCWs having less crime rates than police officer, the twisted and uncertain number of defensive gun uses and so on and so forth... but there's still a very American cultural thread that basically boils down to, when the Government gets a bee in thier bonnet and tells thier citizens 'No', there's an instinctive reaction of 'Fuck you, now I want it MORE'.

1911's have become a default sidearm among hog hunters for a reason.

I'm surprised they haven't taken a page out of Alaskan bush hunters and use 357 revolvers or whatever Glock is chambered for 10mm.

You have a link to that? One of my coworkers will definitely get a kick out of it.

Shit, I’d prefer an AR15 to my bolt-actions in that case.

Here you go.

If it was actually possible to stamp down the number of handguns circulating in the US metro areas (and not just taking them from the law-abiding citizens), I'd expect a general reduction of crime for the following reasons:

  • criminal ghettoes could be policed more reliably and in a less volatile manner, resulting in lowering the hostility of inner city culture towards cops;
  • harder to commit crimes and run gangs when guns are harder to get;

In addition, while I'll let Americans correct me my impression was that the large segments of the population who are wary of black people and the segments of non-black population who live in the US metro areas were two circles that do not overlap much. Cities vote blue, rurals vote red, do they not?

my impression was that the large segments of the population who are wary of black people and the segments of non-black population who live in the US metro areas were two circles that do not overlap much.

Eh maybe. To start with, the black-hispanic... strong mutual dislike... dwarfs any other racial tensions in the US by the numbers, even if BLM shenanigans are more common in the media, and this is a mostly urban phenomenon. You're certainly correct that the blue tribe is less wary around black people but nice urban liberals are well aware that big crowds of blacks/majority black areas are not good news from a safety perspective. They won't say it out loud of course but they are aware of the general correlates of race and crime, even if they think 13/52 is exaggerated, blame racism rather than criminals, etc.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats