site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   35477 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 30, 2023

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.

13
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Okay, so then we have to trust them not to bias the desired outcomes

Irrelevant to the question of what the purpose of AP classes is

And, I note you have not addressed to any degree whether or not any of this has any relevance to the central conversational subject of these courses being possibly objective

  1. Irrelevant to the question of what the purpose of AP classes is

  2. From my initial post: "Now, I am not a fan of most "studies" courses, because, in my limited experience, they tend to lack rigor and often push a political viewpoint,"

All of your other arguments are fluff. If we knew the College Board were almost certainly biased in favor of brutally murdering puppies for no reason, and we know that they're designing the course objectives and test, then all of their disclaimers of "But teachers have independent license to teach what they want! They don't have to teach that killing puppies is a good thing. They can just teach the merits of each position pro or con, purely objective. I mean sure, that killing puppies in all contexts is good is the correct answer on the test, but it's still their choice to go along with it!" would mean nothing (and indeed this is exactly the position that would be held by the left if the College Board had even a sniff of right-wing bias instead of overwhelming left-wing bias) and nobody would want them disseminating an Animal Ethics course.

Irrelevant to the question of what the purpose of AP classes is

This is all just basic logic that you can't worm your way around no matter how hard you try. If judges can be biased towards giving people years more or less in prison by how satisfying their lunch was, then no way in hell can you get an objective course out of a biased institution, no matter how many quibbles about teacher independence or whether anyone actually cares about the tests or not (which just happen to be offered to every student and have millions spent on their formulation and dissemination every year, you know, just what you'd expect from something that nobody cares about and doesn't influence incentives at all) that you can come up with. It doesn't matter.

Irrelevant to the question of what the purpose of AP classes is

Your defense of this here just seems to be the usual pattern where left-aligned institutions, particularly captured ones that were perhaps in the past more objective, and their defenders still seem to think they should have some unfettered right to skate by on their previous reputation above suspicion, even though their right-wing equivalents would never get the same courtesy. Perhaps I seem unreasonably suspicious to you, unjustifiably ardent and implacable in my insistence that the College Board receive zero benefit of the doubt. Well that is exactly the posture that anything right-wing has been met with for years. So the same to the other side is the natural response.

  1. Irrelevant to the question of what the purpose of AP classes is.

  2. Infantile

Apparently, you are no longer interested in defending your claim that "the whole point of AP courses is the test." Which is certainly understandable.

Apparently, you are no longer interested in defending your claim that "the whole point of AP courses is the test."

Yes, I am no longer interested in arguing about something you are blatantly wrong about and that also has not much relevance to the central issue at controversy anyway.

It might not have much relevance to the central issue, but you are the one who brought it up in the first place. It’s like the kid who is losing the game so takes his ball and runs away.

I brought it up because of its relevance to the central issue only, not because I want to argue about what color the barn should be instead of building it. It is not a game to me, because to me making a game of autistic nitpicking is what is most juvenile and also a waste of life. If you wanna see that as me running away with the ball then so be it. It affects me none. Enjoy your tangential nothings.

LOL nice try!

Refrain from this kind of low effort last-wording.

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