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 -
Who else up watching election results? As of the time of this writing Decision Desk has called all of:
The Virginia governor race in favor of Abigail Spanberger (D).
The Virginia lieutenant governor race in favor of Ghazala Hashmi (D and the first Muslim woman elected to statewide office).
The Virginia Attorney General race in favor of Jay Jones (D lmao).
The New Jersey governor race in favor of Mickie Sherrill (D).
The NYC mayoral race for Zohran Mamdani (D, projecting a majority of the vote too lmao).
Both statewide Georgia Public Service Commissioner races for the Democratic candidates.
Polls are still open in California so no word yet there on the redistricting ballot measure. In other Jay Jones news the house delegate who leaked his texts is on track to lose her re-election, as part of dems winning a trifecta in the Virginia government.
The county by county level results I've seen show pretty much all of the above running ahead of Harris and Spanberger even running ahead of Biden in 2020. Is this indicative of what we might see going forward? Dems had previously overperformed in special elections this year but this is the closest to a general until next years actual federal elections. If these trends hold up not a good sign for Republicans!
That "IF" is doing absurd amounts of work here.
Anyway, literally none of these outcomes was too surprising or even concerning to me. I have managed to studiously avoid caring too much about these elections since my state has mostly just been a beneficiary of other states self-immolating.
The outcome that was ALSO unsurprising but I think has some really noticeable import is the Young Female Vote*:
and on the male side:
*Exit polling, so the real margins might look different.
Dems can pull a basic majority with young men, but still have 40+% going republican even in a good year. But are pulling huge majorities with the young women.
So there's a sizeable gendered political gap even in blue-leaning states.
If you're a young conservative dude in any of those states, good freaking luck finding a romantic partner. For the <20% of women who might partially agree with your politics, your competition is your 'fellow' conservatives, who overall outnumber the available pool of women.
Oh and then there's the recent research that "Male students show more tolerance for political enemies than females show for their own allies"
So in terms of 'trends,' What do you think eventually happens if young women continue voting for Democrats/lefties in droves... and have extreme intolerance for anyone who doesn't, while young men tack further right?
Complete Democrat political dominance? 80+% of women consistently voting for Democratic party candidates would be a nigh insurmountable electoral advantage.
Right.
Unless men decide they don't like that.
I've said it before, Women are a potent political force but an incompetent military/policing one.
If 60ish percent of men vote one way, and 80ish percent of women vote the other, and win, seems like a problem if the men who are in that 60% are ALSO the ones who would be tasked with carrying out/enforcing the laws they expressly disagree with.
Oh, and paying for it all too.
So here's the question I really want answered:
If less than half of the young men buy-in to the ideal of gender equality, what happens to a Democracy that tries to enforce gender equality?
WE'RE PROBABLY GONNA FIND OUT.
Time for the modern version of Lysistrata? Will the men fare any better this time around?
Its sort of already happening.
But no real demands are being made so there's no clear way to end the standoff.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
What are you envisioning here? Are police going to refuse to make arrests for crimes? What crimes? Prosecutors refuse to file charges? Judges going to toss cases? Are you under the impression all parts of the justice system today think every law they enforce is just? I am very skeptical that is the case.
What do you think is going to happen?
The thing about the legal system is that it is always susceptible to cascades in any direction.
Lets say the new trend is that drug cases are not big deals. Police stop charging them, prosecutors dismiss the cases pending, judges find not guilty in the cases they try. But, if drugs become a big deal, police charge them, prosecutors prosecute them, and judges find guilty. The guilty pipeline is more fraught with obstacles, but is not uncommon.
Once the police forces of a place make a choice, only the males of that place can rebel realistically in a way that would be confrontation-ally successful. So the theory does hold. M-W polarization is not sustainable, as approximately 90% of philosophers have suggested over the last 2000 years.
More options
Context Copy link
That's a regular occurrence right now. At least in some progressive cities with progressive prosecutors. Maybe some day the right will pick up such weapons commonly used by progressives.
More options
Context Copy link
Depends. If the issue is most prevalent on a state-by-state basis, I think we see Police quit and move to more favorable jurisdictions., which worsens the crime issues in the Blue areas, which either 'forces' a political correction, or it spirals into decay a la Detroit.
Likewise, why, do you suppose, did Military recruitment surge in 2025 after literally hitting an all-time-low in 2022 under Biden?
Guys choosing to simply not join military/police forces would be enough to undermine a government's legitimacy in a given territory.
I think we see a political figure arise who notices and exploits the disconnect between the political priorities of the government and the actual political grievances expressed by a majority of men.
I think we should be very hopeful that its J.D. Vance or a guy like him. Vance clearly NOTICES the issue, and he's good at credibly establishing himself as "one of the guys."
Whether Vance will exploit this to the hilt remains to be seen.
But someone will.
I also think that an economic contraction will re-assert some 'reality' to the discourse, should it occur. We had a long era of economic growth post the 2008 crash and the Zero-Interest-Rate era. Plus the Covid Hiring boom.
lotta people getting laid off from cushy jobs, in many cases maybe the only real career-type jobs they've ever held. Women might finally, F-I-N-A-L-L-Y be required to either suffer from economic destitution or make some concessions to men to obtain the support of a good one.
If they can't marry a corporation who will take care of all their needs, and the Federal Government, for once, isn't bending over backwards to accommodate their complaints, well, the default fallback is probably either prostitution or marriage. And there's already a lot of prostitutes.
I do personally expect things to get worse before they get better.
Without @HereAndGone's snarkiness: why do so many of you salivate at the thought of women being forced to sexually service someone they don't want in order to eat? Yes, this was the norm in earlier ages. Those ages sucked a lot for almost everyone, given that the average person lived a precarious existence at best.
To desire a return to the sort of civilization in which you can get a woman because her survival literally depends on you does not seem to me like a normal, healthy thing to desire in a society with abundance enough that most people shouldn't have to consider starvation or enslavement a realistic possibility.
Even if this worked, would you not always be living with that gnawing awareness that she's only with you out of necessity? That you're literally just the next best thing to starvation?
It seems to me to not only be a spiteful and misogynistic attitude, but one utterly lacking in self respect.
It's a spiteful and misogynistic attitude, but the alternative you imply isn't good either -- that women get to eat through the efforts of men that they provide absolutely nothing for. His attitude is pro-rape; that alternative is slavery.
Are those truly the only two alternatives you can conceive of? You are literally incapable of envisioning, or observing, relationships between men and women that are not slavery?
That is indeed horrifying.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Because the typical man disgusts the typical woman. The only way the average man gets laid on a regular basis if a woman is coerced into fucking him through some combination of physical force, legal authority, social pressure, religious indoctrination, and economic privation. The alternative is what we see now; masses of incels whose best chance at marriage is to wife up some post-wall roastie in her thirties, huge numbers of single mothers and childless cat ladies, legions of children traumatized by divorce, cratering birth rates driving us towards extinction, elites responding by importing infinite immigrants to replace the missing grandchildren.
The fact that the government steals at gunpoint from productive men to support women's """independence""" just adds insult to injury. The government taxes us to provide welfare to underclass women, uses the threat of lawsuits to force companies to hire middle-class women, and employs armies of men as cops and soldiers to physically defend all women. In other words, men are still providing money and protection for women, like we have always done, but now we do it collectively rather than individually, and get nothing out of it.
The message the political figure @faceh is talking about needs to deliver is simple: "We don't have to live like this. We don't. There is another way; a better way. But it starts with rejecting the zeroth commandment".
If the redpill view on women is correct, what's the alternative? You can accept being an incel and become a MGTOW, you can work towards a tradcon world where every productive man is rewarded with a wife, or you can try to become Chad and use PUA to pump and dump as many women as possible while enjoying the decline.
Still, it does fill one with existential dread. As AntiDem put it:
This is a big claim. Neither my anecdotal observation nor the data that I've seen supports it. According to this 2020 survey only 31% of US men are single. Now, out of the 69% of men who are not single, of course some fraction is partnered with women are either not having sex with them or are only having sex with them for reasons other than being attracted to them. I contend, based on anecdotal observation, that this fraction is not large. If you believe otherwise, perhaps you can put forward some data to support the claim.
However, no matter how large the fraction is, keep in mind that out of the US men who are single, there is also a fraction who would not be single if they lowered their standards.
More options
Context Copy link
You aren't citing redpill theory, which argues that we all act according to evolutionary imperatives to reproduce, which supposedly explains almost all male/female behavior. As reductive as it is, it does not posit that we are a loveless, hateful species unable to be happy with one another.
You are blackpilling. That's the "Females are hypergamous whores incapable of forming genuine emotional attachments to men because they hos" theory.
Indeed. If I believed your philosophy, I would see little reason to pursue a relationship at all.
If I were a woman in your world, I would expect death to be preferable to being forced to partner with men.
Now of course an outlook being bleak and nihilistic beyond words doesn't necessarily mean it's wrong. But my empirical observation suggests you're wrong.
Certainly, you don't make a compelling case for any woman, or any man who doesn't absolutely despise women, to adopt your worldview and solutions.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Golly gee, I wonder why those uppity females are not rushing out to marry men who think they should have the right to beat and rape them just like the Good Old Days when the choice was between economic destitution or making concessions regarding marriage.
This is why there was a whole thing about women having careers of their own, so there wouldn't be the risk of economic destitution. This kind of statement is one step away from "and in fact being enslaved was better for the slaves because owners were obliged to feed and shelter them".
You are not going to solve the problem of "why are men and women not getting on? why isn't marriage and children happening?" by telling one side "we want to force you into marriage with someone you would not choose and who can be abusive thereafter, because the alternative is indeed literal starvation and he knows you will be trapped".
Why the hell are you making it "being a whore is better for me than being a wife"? Don't we want women to choose to be wives and mothers, instead of "well if it's sex for meat, then at least let me not be tied to one provider"?
Serious question. Do you think concessions in a marriage are a bad thing?
More options
Context Copy link
Odd thing to say, when its becoming increasingly evident that married women are happier on average than unmarried ones. And that this has been true FOR a long time.
Oh, also side note. Single Women are more likely to be victimized by rape and homicide than ones in a commited relationship too. So if fear of violent men is a factor, you're making women WORSE off by discouraging marriage.
Maybe... just maybe... women have been lied to about the allegedly rapey, abusey, slavery-lite portrayal of marriage in the past?
Is it possible that this entire debate has been framed around an abject falsehood?
As we can see, the only evidence presented to rebut the idea that marriage is a good deal for women is a derisive dismissal of men as a gender as if the ONLY thing they can do to keep a woman is literally lock them up barefoot and pregnant, there's no POSSIBLE way they could entice them to stick around otherwise.
Of course. But that requires there to be an incentive to choose and pressure to make a choice and stick with it. Rather than the current zeitgeist of "take as long as you need, keep your standards as high as possible, there's no (social) penalty to remaining single, and if you don't get married don't worry the state will make sure you're basically comfortable anyway." In a world where all pressure to settle has been removed AND women are being told that marriage is a huge imposition on their freedom and happiness, "I wonder why those uppity females are not rushing out to marry men" when literally no person with authority anywhere is telling them to do so.
One thing I always find amusing is the conceit that women shouldn't have to depend on men...
But if they are now completely dependent on an uncaring corporate entity for their healthcare, housing, social life, and income, THAT is somehow the mark of 'independence.'
Explain to me how being tied down to a job with a (most likely male) boss who places constant demands on your time and labor but can also fire you at any time is AT ALL inherently better than being tied to an individual male that has at least publicly stated his own intentions to remain loyal to you up until death.
And of course a corporation can never give them kids.
Its actually an absurd sort of logic that women are safer and more comfortable in a corporate workplace than at home with children. Especially when female happiness has been on a constant decline for the last fifty years. They are not satisfied despite all changes in their favor, despite having 'better' jobs, fewer obligations, and fewer kids.
But hey.
I'm sure it will be fine.
Anyhow, this is just what I mean, bringing up men's issues and framing them in ANY way that might pose ANY inconvenience on women as part of the solution invites absolute antipathy. This is why women's issues are just easier to discuss seriously, since nobody loses their mind if you suggest imposing more costs on men to help out women.
Which is basically what we've been doing to an increasing degree for 50 straight years.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Exploits it how, exactly? And what makes you think such a figure — with a minority of democratic support, and strong institutional opposition — wouldn't just end up shut out and shut down?
"To the disaffected, lonely men listening now, I promise I will stop the flow of tax dollars out of your pockets to programs that disproportionately benefit single mothers and childless girlbosses.
I will aggressively punish institutionalized discrimination against males at every level, and seek removal of any gender or other quotas that undermine meritocratic promotion or allow your salary to be undercut and your career derailed.
I will create large tax credit incentives for men who get married, hold down a job, and are raising children, and promote strong, male-led households where he can be the primary breadwinner without needing a second job or for the wife to work full time."
Or if you want a really simple one: "Men, I'm going to close off all non-skilled immigration except for attractive, fertile young women, and due to the looming crisis of declining birthrates we will issue emergency visas and expedited citizenship paths to any such women who get married and bear at least 2 kids."
Basically actually propose solutions, viable or not, that address the actual anxieties and misgivings that men have been expressing, and make them feel like they've got some investment in the movement.
Note that there is no real mainstream political figure, ANYWHERE, in ANY country that is able to make these sort of statements. Which has led to the current issue. Women's issues are central in the Overton Window, its impossible to even elevate male concerns to the point where they're discussed seriously.
By whom. They keep trying to do that to Andrew Tate, he still has a voice and following.
Charlie Kirk was talking about these sort of issues until he died.
Matt Walsh brings these issues up too and he's still got a large following.
The only option they'd have is arresting them and that'd probably not work out for them unless the person in question was actually trying to get seriously militant/violent.
And if this person is J.D. Vance, how the hell do you expect them to 'shut out' the sitting Vice President of the United States.
Sure there is; you need only look north. That won't get you into political power in that country for reasons that have a lot to do with geography, but at least the solvent half of the country will vote for you.
More options
Context Copy link
I would like to see that happen, but I'm dubious for a couple of reasons. First, we've set up our economies so that isn't really a runner, anymore. Unionised jobs which did provide good benefits and you could be the single breadwinner became corrupt and atrophied (see the fairly recent example of the longshoremen, for one). Industries collapsed during the 80s and the salvation was to outsource to cheaper labour and resources abroad, and to get more women into the workforce.
Second, a strong male-led household can be one where the man runs them into debt and other problems, or where the ostensible male head is weak and incapable. To work at its best, marriage should be a partnership. "This happens because I say so" can only work where "I say so" is reasonable and not "I've decided to take out loans, mortgage the house, and put all our savings into this sure thing a guy told me about, and if you don't like it, here's a black eye for you".
More options
Context Copy link
And when this program fails to get them enough votes, because the men who approve of such are outnumbered by the mix of:
Assuming, that is, that such a person is even allowed in the race to begin with.
Have you considered that maybe there's a reason for that? That, first, it might not play as well with voters as you think; and second, even if it could, that maybe the Establishment have tools at their disposal to ensure that any person who would make these sort of statements is totally prevented from ever becoming a "real mainstream political figure"?
The Cathedral/Deep State/Swamp. The Ruling Elites who actually decide everything, regardless of what the voters in the sham that is "democracy" think.
And is he running for office? How much electoral sway does that "following" have?
And where did it get him?
Same questions as Tate.
First, no, there are other options. Just do like in Europe and engage in "defensive democracy" — make sure both party establishments know not to let such a person ever get on the ballot. Second, I think arresting them would work just fine. First, because it'd be easy to develop any number of pretexts for doing so that the media can "sell" to enough of the public. Second, because what would it not "working out for them" even look like?
It almost certainly won't be.
In rough order of escalation? Get the GOP to nominate someone else instead. Defeat his campaign with lawfare a la Ted Stevens. Find a legal excuse to remove him from the ballot. Rig the election. Assassination by "lone gunman." Imprison or execute him after he's convicted in Nuremberg-style trials alongside the rest of the "Fascist Trump regime" as part of the start of the campaign to "denazify" America.
Democracy is fake, electoral politics is all kayfabe, the will of the electorate means nothing, us peasant masses are entirely powerless.
More options
Context Copy link
He didn't just die. He was murdered. So there is your answer.
Vance is married with a daughter. If he does it he'll stop when his daughter is old enough to understand.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link