site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 3, 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.

8
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

He didn't just die. He was murdered.

By a dude.

This is perhaps the one big thing that could break if too many guys check out of the system.

Outbreaks of targeted violence on political figures across the spectrum, and as mentioned above, insufficient police capacity to catch and stop all of them.

Don't think that guys aren't noticing how positively many women responded to Luigi Mangione offing a CEO.

Vance is married with a daughter. If he does it he'll stop when his daughter is old enough to understand.

That really seems to be the big test. There are a lot of wifeguys and girldads out there who might feel sympathetic to the plight of young males, but are inherently unable to utter words that they imagine might upset said wives or daughters and thus can never really be the leader such guys might seek.

Vance so far hasn't seemed to have had that issue, he's at least willing to openly hope for his own wife's conversion to Christianity.

Outbreaks of targeted violence on political figures across the spectrum

What makes you think it would be "across the spectrum"?

and as mentioned above, insufficient police capacity to catch and stop all of them.

First, you don't have to catch all of them to have a deterrent effect (just look at case closure rates for various crimes in the US). Second, that just becomes reason to prioritize the "more dangerous" would-be assassins — by which, of course, I mean those targeting left-wing politicians. (Right-wing politicians? Well, don't you know we have a police shortage? Shame we just can't do anything to protect them from these assassins, who are probably all fellow right-wingers, don'tchaknow.)

Don't think that guys aren't noticing how positively many women responded to Luigi Mangione offing a CEO.

Because he's a leftist with a leftist motive for the murder; it wouldn't work the other way around.

That really seems to be the big test. There are a lot of wifeguys and girldads out there who might feel sympathetic to the plight of young males, but are inherently unable to utter words that they imagine might upset said wives or daughters and thus can never really be the leader such guys might seek.

Exactly. Between them and women, your "based pro-male" politician's supporters will be hopelessly outnumbered. Women are wonderful, men are expendable.

What makes you think it would be "across the spectrum"?

Such guys will have grievances against politicians of almost all stripes, and will probably start going after targets of opportunity if they don't have strong ideological motivations.

First, you don't have to catch all of them to have a deterrent effect (just look at case closure rates for various crimes in the US).

Deterrent effect relies on guys being afraid of prison and/or death.

What my position presupposes is: What if they aren't. What if they see no path forward that leads to them being, e.g. happily married in a solid career in a safe neighborhood and a bright future for their kids.

Some % of them will accept their lot. The rest, what can anyone threaten them with to 'de-radicalize' them.

it wouldn't work the other way around.

Wanna bet.

Between them and women, your "based pro-male" politician's supporters will be hopelessly outnumbered. Women are wonderful, men are expendable.

Don't forget gay guys. I think that between the liberal females, the lefty dudes, the gays that simply don't have share their concerns, the sociopathic lotharios who just want to get laid, and the tradcons that cannot ever speak ill of women, it is a loose but generally united coalition that says male-oriented political concerns are generally beneath notice.

But the pool of males that is the subject of the problem is almost the exact same pool which performs almost all the important economic activity in this country.

Such guys will have grievances against politicians of almost all stripes, and will probably start going after targets of opportunity if they don't have strong ideological motivations.

"Such guys" will be very rare, basically for all the reasons Tyler Cowen gives in Average is Over for why nobody will overthrow the dystopian future he foresees, despite 80% of the population being utterly immiserated peasants crammed into favelas and subsisting on beans: aging population, ever-improving electronic distractions, ever-broader applications of psychiatric meds (and weed), ever-more omnipresent surveillance and increasingly-autonomous police drones. Then add obesity and lack of fitness on top of that. Most guys with grievances will mostly just numb themselves with video games and porn. I hear AI girlfriends are getting better every day.

Deterrent effect relies on guys being afraid of prison and/or death.

And our society is still well-off enough that very few men will ever end up being that fearless — and I say that as someone with frequent suicidal ideation. Aside from being about to turn 44, I'm pretty much part of the very group you're talking about. And even then, I'm still quite afraid of prison (much more than death).

What if they see no path forward that leads to them being, e.g. happily married in a solid career in a safe neighborhood and a bright future for their kids.

Nothing. Whether they see that "path forward" or not makes no difference, because they can't do anything about it. They're powerless. They'll keep on doing what they do, because they won't be given any choice in the matter.

Some % of them will accept their lot.

I suppose > 99.999% is still "some %."

The rest, what can anyone threaten them with to 'de-radicalize' them.

Punishment. Escalating punishment. If punishment isn't deterring them, then increase until it does. Impose increasingly torturous consequences.

Wanna bet.

I don't really have money to spare with which to bet, and even if I did, how would we set up terms? You win if, within some period of time, there's a right-wing assassin who proves as popular with the ladies as Luigi, and if not (either no such assassins, or insufficient popularity), I win? How would we define "right-wing assassin" to mirror Luigi — as opposed to, say, "random schizo"? And how would we measure popularity with the ladies?

Edit: That said, I stand by that position, and I'll add this Substack rant from Kulak. As he notes about the Left:

The most senior of your ideologues might get arrested for a few years, then come out only to get millions in donations... If they go away for a decade you can give them tenure at one of your institutes as a reward....

And if they actually do something and die or are captured in the attempt like Sacco and Vanzetti, or the Rosenberg, or Che Guevera, or Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht... You can just celebrate them as martyrs to the cause and immortalize their names no matter how traitorous and guilty they are by the standards of the mainstream justice system or indeed any sane person… And insist that they were actually “innocent” against all evidence if openly endorsing their crimes might not be quite palatable in the social circumstance.

You can just give professorships to the children of your allies who were executed as traitors.... The Rosenbergs’ sons got Tenure in payment for their parents service.

You can just say they were completely innocent and didn't do nothin’ and then also worship them as icons and martyrs of the coming revolution they totally didn’t contribute anything to…

But, he noted, both in that article and over on Twitter, this is only on the left. Over on the right, anyone who resorts to Mangione-style violence is instantly denounced and disowned by everyone, their very memory spat upon by their entire side, even their own parents.

The adoration you see for Luigi is a purely left-wing phenomenon. It only happens on the left, can only happen on the left, and will only ever happen on the left. The right does not do it, and never will.[/edit]

Don't forget gay guys. I think that between the liberal females, the lefty dudes, the gays that simply don't have share their concerns, the sociopathic lotharios who just want to get laid, and the tradcons that cannot ever speak ill of women, it is a loose but generally united coalition that says male-oriented political concerns are generally beneath notice.

And it's never going away.

But the pool of males that is the subject of the problem is almost the exact same pool which performs almost all the important economic activity in this country.

So what? They're going to keep providing that economic activity, whether it provides them with a "path forward" to marriage and kids or not, because if enough of them stop providing as to make a difference, they will be forced to start again. And if the force is insufficient, then more will be applied. Where there's a whip, there is a way, and the beatings will continue until morale improves.