site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   25652 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 10, 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.

6
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

It’s not just the urban poor who are on SNAP. The Democrats had a chance to make gibs into a real bread-and-butter issue, not just a culture-war distraction.

This was also a great opportunity to bait the Republicans into abolishing the filibuster, which would have helped Democrats in the long run. Zero Machiavellian instincts from these people. No wonder the base is angry.

Completely agreed. The filibuster is idiotic and not well suited to a political system that has just two major parties which means effectively both parties position themselves to capture around 50%+epsilon of the seats. In the long run getting rid of it helps the dems so much more than the reps because the dems at least have some sort of positive vision for how society should be rather than trying to go back to the 1960s.

It’s worth noting that a full Christmas SNAP crisis would be a major escalation. I realize some think the Dems should abandon “traditional politics”, but others think that the alienation and loss of trust that big of a move would cause could created some terrible effects. Like another Trump could rise, just as easily as the Dems could get a Trump of their own. A lot aren’t willing to risk that brave new world.

Like another Trump could rise, just as easily as the Dems could get a Trump of their own.

Could? I think you're being a bit pessimistic there. Trump arose because he channeled the frustrations of his base and promised opposition to the policies that were hurting them. Since then, all the conditions that lead to his rise have gotten significantly worse - none of the zoomers who are realising that a six figure income isn't enough to let them start a family or live in the area they grew up are going to vote for another boring swamp creature promising business as usual ever again. A Trump-like figure on the left would be able to get a truly massive share of the vote, including a lot of people on the right wing who expected actual economic relief and instead got 50 year mortgages.

A lot aren’t willing to risk that brave new world.

Au contraire! Those people are doing everything they possibly can to make sure that a brand new Trump-like figure arises. If they ACTUALLY didn't want to risk that brave new world, they'd have to improve the material conditions of the electorate - but they'd prefer to spend that money on more wars in the middle east, more bailouts for the rich and their own personal enrichment. Maybe the growing angry mobs will be appeased by just banning Nick Fuentes from public discourse, but I really don't think so.

If they ACTUALLY didn't want to risk that brave new world

There is always the possibility that they're not that smart, or think their voters aren't that smart. After all, the voters did vote for them in the past.

I am entirely open to the possibility that my enemies are dumb, evil or both.

What is your mental model of this "full Chrismas SNAP crisis", because I think its probably a load of crap. At least with regards to actual people being hungry. I'd expect people would loot and steal and riot because they can't get their Dr. Pepper, but no actual amount of people would be starving. There are too many school lunches, shelters, food banks, etc. And even outside private charities, states can also always easily step up in this sort of situation by simply being less generous in their dispensations. Restrict the eligible product pool to vegetables, fruits, grains, beans, and dairy and you save like 90%, while avoiding the issue of people spending all their cash on day 1 on waygu steak or orange crush, or selling them for spending money.

The French and Russian revolutions both started as what were essentially bread riots. I think a lot of the Motte falls into let-them-eat-cake-ism and doesn’t realize how serious a problem a SNAP/EBT shutdown could be. Most of the lower enlisted rungs of the US military are on food stamps. Most Walmart employees are on food stamps. It’s not just 300 pound welfare queens spending EBT on hair extensions.

Most of the lower enlisted rungs of the US military are on food stamps.

Seriously, source? That's major "foreseeable downfall of empire" levels of blunder, and the USA only just ended its 20 year long invasion of Afghanistan...

Most of the lower enlisted rungs of the US military are on food stamps.

Source? Big, if true.

Yes, the sheer scale of the program is part of the problem. Its almost certainly making food 20%+ more expensive!

ts almost certainly making food 20%+ more expensive!

How did you come to this conclusion?

Total US grocery spending is projected to be $900 billion or so, food stamps are $100 billion give or take, so 11% of the market. Supply is not highly elastic, demand, particularly on superior food goods (beef) is highly elastic. 20% seems like a reasonable ballpark number.

What formula did you use for estimating the effect, though?

Did even a single, solitary person die from starvation due to the recent SNAP suspension? People just seem to be pissed at the inconvenience of having to go to a pantry that has a worse selection of items.

Just curious, when was the last documented case of someone dying of starvation due to poverty in United States?

Pure starvation for economic reason, as "cannot afford enough calories to stay alive", not mentally ill people, drug addicts who forgot to eat, children starved by their parents, people stuck in place with no exit or lost in the wild etc.

No, but it was only a few days long. I think ending the shutdown over fear of what a prolonged suspension might lead to is not unreasonable.

Restrict the eligible product pool to vegetables, fruits, grains, beans, and dairy and you save like 90%, while avoiding the issue of people spending all their cash on day 1 on waygu steak or orange crush, or selling them for spending money.

This simply isn't feasible. Even assuming it's legal for states to deviate from Federal SNAP guidelines (and I doubt that it is), and that eligible items could be agreed on politically, there's simply no way to implement such a system without giving significant advance notice. Grocery stores rely on internal codes to determine what is food stampable and what isn't. If such a change required them to go into their computer systems and change the status of thousands of items, it would be a tall enough order, but it gets worse than than. To avoid having to code each individual item as being eligible or ineligible, they rely on an item's categorization in the relevant department. So in a typical grocery store items categorized as produce, meat, dairy, edible grocery, frozen, bakery, and deli would be eligible for food stamps, while items categorized as HBC, inedible grocery, and prepared foods would not. When you decide to start changing the eligible items you're requiring grocery stores to upend their entire department systems to accommodate the change. What you propose wouldn't affect some departments, but something like edible grocery would be entirely screwed up, and even things like deli would get complicated (what you propose would include cheese but not meat, and some stores categorize certain bread items as deli, but not others).

Conservatives in general like to excoriate poor people for the perception that they spend their food stamps on items they shouldn't be spending them on, creating a sort of triangle with the following three categories being the points:\

  1. Items that are objectionable because they're inherently unhealthy (fruit roll up, pop tarts, cheese curls, Dr. Pepper, etc.)
  2. Convenience items that resemble unobjectionable items or are composed of items that would individually be unobjectionable, but are prepared or processed to a degree that makes them both more unhealthy and more expensive than unobjectionable items (Hungry Man Dinners, frozen pizza, etc.)
  3. Luxury items that would be unobjectionable but for the cost (Waygu steak, most seafood, artisanal cheese, etc.)

There are certain staple items like the ones you probably have in mind that fit right in the center of the triangle that aren't objectionable to anybody. But when you move closer to the edges it becomes extremely difficult to draw the line. For example, you suggest restricting the product pool to grains. But what do you actually mean by that? Let's look at some items:

  • Rice, oatmeal, flour: These are more or less pure grains that would presumably fit any definition you want to use.
  • Bread, pasta: Processed, premade items, but such basic staples that it would be ridiculous to not include them.
  • Prepackaged cookies, cakes, donuts, etc.: Obviously in the snack food category, but they're really just basic grain items with more sugar and fat content
  • Boxed crackers: Still firmly in the snack food category, but without the added sugar and fat
  • Breakfast cereals: Run the gamut from Cheerios and Kix up to Fruity Pebbles and Count Chocula. I guess you could propose a sugar limit like my mother did?
  • Granola bars, breakfast bars, energy bars: Usually found in the cereal aisle. Like cereal, they run the gamut from so healthy as to be inedible up to Pop Tarts, the poster child for oversweetened convenience foods.
  • Hamburger Helper, Rice-a-Roni, Kraft Mac-n-Cheese, boxed stuffing mix, ramen: Unobjectional staple items plus flavorings that may or may not make the product significantly less healthy
  • Pancake mix: Unobjectionable on its own, except the intended purpose (and only purpose the vast majority will ever use it for) is to drench it in a sauce made of pure sugar, which is sold separately but conveniently located right next to it
  • Frozen garlic bread, frozen ravioli, frozen pierogies: Unobjectionable items made slightly less healthy and sold in a form that is typically associated with objectionable convenience foods.
  • Specialty breads: An unobjectionable item made in a way that may or may not make it more expensive. Bakery Italian is among the least expensive and best-tasting options at the store I shop at, but you can also get more expensive stuff pretty easily.

I don't doubt that you have your opinions on this and could draw a line somewhere that's both logical and reasonable. That's not the issue. The issue is that disentangling all of this would result in regulations so byzantine that you couldn't possibly expect the average person to have an intuitive sense for it.

Totally with you here. Of course every grocery checkout clerk has had to scan through huge packages of crab legs and Hi-C through EBT, but the difference isn't that big. Adding a bunch of complexity and power to a federal program is almost always a bad move.

The right one is to restructure SNAP as a whole to just serve fewer people.

I mean, you made a list including 10 bullet points and I am perfectly comfortable saying only the first two should be SNAP eligible and the rest is for people using their own money.

The issue is that disentangling all of this would result in regulations so byzantine that you couldn't possibly expect the average person to have an intuitive sense for it.

I can't wait to read the 50-page regulation in the Federal Register explaining exactly what kinds of "rice, oatmeal, flour", "bread, and pasta" are eligible.

Doesn't this already necessarily exist? You cant use snap to buy Budweiser or Cough Medicine from the grocery store.

The grocery store sells different kinds of rice, oatmeal, flour, bread, and pasta, which have different nutritional values. If you try to promulgate a simple definition, companies eager for government money will soon manufacture new products designed to fit within your simple definition while still being unhealthily delicious, forcing you to issue a more complicated definition.

For example: Chapter 19 of the US Harmonized Tariff Schedule lists 19 different types of bread. A government must pick which ones it wants to make eligible for government handouts, and it must define those types as well. (I don't see any definitions in this document, but I assume that they exist somewhere. You may be aware of tariff shenanigans like coating sneakers in a layer of felt so that they count as slippers, adding flimsy temporary seats to cargo vans so that they count as passenger vans, and calling X-Men action figures nonhuman so that they don't count as dolls.)

You may be aware of tariff shenanigans like coating sneakers in a layer of felt so that they count as slippers, adding flimsy temporary seats to cargo vans so that they count as passenger vans

Couldn't that be stopped with some language such as "products are classified based on their primary use"? If most people remove the felt or the seats, they then wouldn't count.

More comments

So why don't they already do this with booze and the like? Market beers and vodka as kombucha or something?

More comments

There's no sales tax on core food items in WA. You still get charged sales tax on most of that list.

You can make a good list if you choose to. They already exist, elsewhere. Throwing up your hands at the merest possibility of a list is choosing to quit before you start.

No, you don't get sales tax charged on any of that list, let alone most of it. The only items excluded from the Washington sales tax exemption are prepared foods, soft drinks, and bottled water. And even that takes ten pages to fully flesh out. And sales tax isn't the best example to use because you're talking about an extra charge of what is probably a few cents if you incorrectly select a taxable item over a nontaxable one. What you're proposing is the difference between being able to buy the item at all or not.

I will quote the learned lawyer once again:

The issue is that disentangling all of this would result in regulations so byzantine that you couldn't possibly expect the average person to have an intuitive sense for it.

The existing exemption for "food and food ingredients" in Washington's sales tax takes up three pages of law and seven pages of regulation. Exemptions for specific kinds of food would be much longer.

Tell me how you really feel, Dan /s

No one has to die for it to be a crisis. You’re projecting. Lawmakers are unusually sensitive to grumpy people around Christmas. That’s all that’s required. People usually have semi-short memories when it comes to politics, but if Christmas and Thanksgiving are “ruined”? That sticks. Next year people will remember, and the vibe shift is potent. SNAP affects almost 1 in 8 people - you’re completely correct that blindly accepting that number is an overestimate, but stack it with the 1 in 14 people who fly during Christmas break, a shutdown past December 1st would cause another 1 in 7 adults to go without paychecks… these things stack up, and hit different segments of the population, not purely the poor. Many Americans if they miss a paycheck are OK, but discretionary spending IS sensitive to that stuff. Smaller Christmas gifts potentially (sudden back pay might even more than counterbalance this of course).

And that’s not even going into the vibes. People tend to view shutdowns as Congress not doing its job. That creates bitterness, since they can go “well I am working 50 hour weeks, and they are twiddling their thumbs playing blame games”, and that’s a bit of betrayal - a potent emotion that you have to be sensitive to. (Democrats aren’t immune from this either, of course, it’s possible constituents blame them, even if I think it’s not super likely to be a durable feeling)

I think it's a good example of just how non-typical the average Mottizen is that this isn't immediately obvious to everyone. Giving over 10% of the population a ruined Christmas in a way that can be plausibly blamed on a particular party is basically a political bullet to the brain, especially in a period where the election margins are pretty thin. I mean in the culture we have an entire century-old genre of story that is basically just "people being poor at Christmas/not being able to celebrate Christmas properly is bad and you have to make that not happen." Any government that fails at such a basic task has lost the mandate of heaven, and will be thoroughly destroyed.

People joke about people tolerating/enjoying Fascism for "making the trains run on time," and that's a pretty good example of ordinary day-to-day things that the general public cares more about than things like civil liberties. The Holidays is basically that times ten. People make a lot of promises leading up to the holidays, both implicit and explicit, and keeping those is a 'big deal' to most people. The party that causes family drama, marital strife, sad children, and economic harm right at the time where everyone is the most sensitive those things? They're done.

The only hope for this continuing shutdown would have been somehow successfully fully offloading the blame onto the opposing party, and that wasn't happening.

Republicans have a Senate advantage. It's by no means clear that nuking the filibuster (especially in Trump's term) is a good idea in the long run.

Though I grant it'd allow Democrats to pull more shenanigans like the ACA subsidies and then dare Republicans to take away the gibs.

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