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 -
Over on DSL, someone stated that the first thing they did when they moved into their house was to remove all the smoke detectors so the damn things wouldn't annoy you in the middle of the night with battery beeps. Not my thing, but, yeah.
Worst I do is speeding and other traffic violations. Even with those little violations, you start noticing things. Like... those assholes in the traffic department really ARE out to fuck things up. Do the speed limit (on an arterial) and you hit every red light. Violate it by a significant amount, and you hit several yellows in a row. Like the people who drive side by side for miles if you're doing slightly over the limit will often move over expeditiously if you come roaring up behind them at 15+mph. Like cities love to place no-U-turn and no-left-turn signs so you have to drive across town to go next door... and you can save 10 minutes by ignoring them (and also a no-U-turn sign indicates a good place to make a U-turn).
There's a Robert Heinlein quote
A lot of "civilization" is about making it harder to be a live lion. But acting the jackal really sucks if you don't have the temperament.
Evidentally there's a philosopher named Sidney Hook, who Wikipedia calls a philosopher of pragmatism, who said about this:
But that is not the general thought of the Western world today. Safety uber alles, and the state to make sure it is "unsafe" in a large way to violate that in a big way; this is why people find it perfectly reasonable to threaten a superannuated computer programmer with a trip to Riker's Island for riding a bicycle on the sidewalk. State capacity may be diminishing in the Canadian Interior, it's Orwell's dreamworld in my area.
So they didn't say that they removed the smoke alarms because the pencil-pushing bureaucrats at city hall are trying to dictate how to provision their home, it was merely to defeat and negate the proper functioning of the alarm. I expect they'll be replacing their fuses with scrunched up tinfoil next.
If the proper functioning of a smoke detector is to wake you up in the middle of the night with a hard to locate intermittent chirp that indicates no imminent danger, and cannot be silenced without getting out a ladder, removing said detector from the ceiling, removing the battery, and then pushing the test button resulting in a VERY LOUD but fortunately short alarm. But only the pencil-pushing bureaucrats at city hall think that.
As for fuses, I would feel the same about removing AFCIs if the damn things tripped every time you used a perfectly good vacuum cleaner (as was a problem for earlier ones).
Alerting you that it's running out of power instead of leaving you unaware that it has silently failed is the alarm functioning properly.
Removing a smoke alarm is practically the same amount of work as replenishing or replacing, more if you have to patch and paint any holes. They're not expensive, the first place I checked sells a twin pack for £15.
I can say from experience it's better coming home to the news that you'll have to clean up smoke damage in the kitchen than whatever the outcome might have been if we hadn't had a smoke alarm.
That's what you and the bureaucrats say. I say waking me up in the middle of the night with such an alert is broken by design.
As for actual alerts, so far I'm a dozen or so to zero for false-to-real ratio. Most due to cooking, some due to shower steam, and a couple due to defective detectors that just went off for no reason.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Is it? When I look upon my own life, ethics, not prudence has been the main thing holding me back. When I see how liars have so much currency with the shear amount of endless lies that have been told about me, or backstabbing and throwing people under the bus which takes you up the ladder a step, and the finger’s always getting wagged at you if you even think of promoting your own self-interest for the moment, this place could use a lion or two to be set upon the mass of the population and remind people to stay in their lane and mind their own affairs.
“Freedumb” is nothing but a playground for thieves, bullies and narcissists.
“We’re best punished for our virtues.”
More options
Context Copy link
I would dispute that state-mandated safetyism should be construed as a craven commitment to self-preservation. Not for nothing is it called the nanny-state - it is an essentially altruistic impulse, or to pick a more negative word, it's patronizing in the truest sense. The bureaucrats who make the rules and the lobbyists who campaign for them are not thinking of their own lives - they're getting high on the belief that they are saving other people's lives, the lives of the poor, stupid, reckless children called human beings, who cannot be trusted to seek what's good for them.
It is the worship of Safety.
Thus they center themselves on themselves and worship themselves as the source of that good.
As the source of preservation and sustainment ("they'd be dead if it weren't for me").
As a reflection of Holy Safety herself.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link