site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 29, 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.

4
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Just to make a general observation about the gender war as a followup to my comment on the Promise Keepers organization:

I think we can generally observe is that women’s main complaint about men is that desirable hetero men are unwilling to exclusively commit. If we accept this, we can also see that this is actually two complaints rolled into one. 1. The men that are willing to commit are undesirable (icky, clingy, lame, “chopped”, entitled, toxic, porn-addled, skinny fat etc.). 2. The men that are desirable are unwilling to commit. (On a tangent I’d argue that most of the lipstick feminist complaints made in the mainstream media by middle-class women about men in general do usually boil down to the rather similar complaint that 34-37-year-old successful, well-paid, charismatic, tall, ambitious etc. urban men are in no rush to marry 31-34-year-old college-educated middle-class office worker women.)

If we look at this logically, to the extent that it even makes sense to try doing so (which is a valid question in itself), there are two potential remedies for this problem. 1. Focus on the undesirable men that are willing to commit and somehow transform them into desirable men i.e. alphaize the betas 2. Focus on the desirable men and incentivize them to commit i.e. betaize the alphas.

Now I don’t know about you but to me it seems self-evident that #2 has more potential for success no matter how you look at it and yet virtually everyone who makes any sort of recommendations regarding this entire issue (and that does not only include Red Pillers) is promoting #1. No, really – I’ve never seen anyone advocate for #2, not even the Promise Keepers or, for that matter, any other similar group that does not claim to be feminist and is at the same time pushing the nebulous concept of a new positive masculinity.

Am I seeing things that are not there or is this really not the case? Because as far as I can tell, it is. It seems like there is a general unspoken consensus in society that trying to compel sexually successful men to commit to women is a completely impossible, pie-in-the-sky idea that deserves no attention at all; that, in other words, expecting modern women to elicit commitment from the men they are attracted to is laughable lunacy.

They're phrasing it this way to dodge the core source issue. Men that are desirable won't commit because women aren't willing to accept anyone they don't 'desire.'

Its hidden in the term 'desirable,' and how that is not an inherent property of men, but rather a descriptor that is almost entirely created in the mind of the female population. And thus can change without the men doing anything differently. Men do not get to decide what women find desirable, they can only hope to determine what that is and try to comply with it.

I could give my long, comprehensive argument (with stats!) showing that men are by and large the same as they've ever been, but women as a group have elevated their expectations while simultaneously becoming less appealing as mates.

I won't. I'll just point out my previous argument that I've yet to see contradicted: About 50% of the male population are 'invisible' to women. They don't register as human. They aren't even on their radar as possible mates, they are background noise... until they attempt to interact then they're 'creeps' or 'incels' or whatever. These men aren't even in the competition because to be 'desirable' you first have to be 'noticed.'

It is a blackpill, but there is not a single piece of evidence really contradicting it. A man who is the combination of 'average' height, 'average' salary, 'average' talent, fame, renown, and 'average' physical strength will not get female attention under modern circumstances. Hence why 'maxxxing' of one form or another is so popularized. Men HAVE to stand out along at least one dimension, ideally multiple, to even rise to attention, much less be attractive.

Flatly put: women aren't even registering that there exist men who are less than 'ideal' but would still make great partners. In their mind its that top 20% who ARE the standard, and there's maybe another 20-30% below that they could eventually settle for after their own sexual market value diminishes.

That bottom 50% is invisible. They are not part of the mental calculation when a woman is competing for a mate. Ask most women to describe what they think an 'average' man is like and it'll be an average derived from the sub-population of men they actually notice and care about.

Find me a SINGLE woman who will openly say "I'm actually perfectly fine with marrying a man who is not exceptional in any particular way, as long as he fulfills his role as a man." And its rational for them not to say that because that's just inviting a bunch of sub average dudes to come running in hopes of slipping past her apparently lowered defenses. They don't 'win' by advertising lower standards.

If this factor is true and accurate, there's no point in trying to address it on the male side of the equation. None. Expanding the pool of 'desireable' men entirely depends on women expanding their definition of 'desirable' to include an actual reasonable portion of the male population. Otherwise, most women will continue chasing a sub-population of men that BY DEFINITION they cannot all lock down... unless they're willing to share.

And even then, you have to get these women to become appealing to more men too.

And there is no aspect of culture ANYWHERE in the West that pushes women to do things that make them more appealing. None.

Which shows precisely where we could start trying solutions, doesn't it? Maybe look at the obvious area we're NOT doing things?

So lets simplify it: "The men women find desirable have no need to commit because they have many, many options available due to women finding them desirable. Women resent that they can't lock down these men but are also unwilling to adapt their behavior."

  1. Focus on the undesirable men that are willing to commit and somehow transform them into desirable men i.e. alphaize the betas 2. Focus on the desirable men and incentivize them to commit i.e. betaize the alphas.
  1. Is impossible in practice as it would merely raise the level of what women find 'desirable' to compensate. This happens in EVERY arena where ranking is easy to ascertain. The benefits will accrue to the top 10-20% at best. Women will adjust desires upward without hesitation.

  2. Won't work because even if we marry off the top 10% of men and somehow ensure they stay committed... you haven't suddenly made the remaining population MORE desirable to the remaining women.

Look, I don't think women are the problem. But the problem is with women. Specifically, in their mind, in that they've formed cultural expectations that, via feedback loops, are completely divorced from reality and renders their own desires unachievable.

So... you have to address their desires. Reality can't be manipulated to fit their desires, so it seems obvious to me that you gotta at least TRY to make their desires comply with reality.

I could give my long, comprehensive argument (with stats!) showing that men are by and large the same as they've ever been, but women as a group have elevated their expectations while simultaneously becoming less appealing as mates.

Please do, because from what I can see in this comment, and the one you've linked, you haven't presented any actual evidence. Just a just-so story that doesn't match the data at all. To pick out an illustrative sentence:

It is a blackpill, but there is not a single piece of evidence really contradicting it. A man who is the combination of 'average' height, 'average' salary, 'average' talent, fame, renown, and 'average' physical strength will not get female attention under modern circumstances.

Among men between the ages of 22-34, 90% have had sex ever and 75% have had sex in the last year. There has been a big rise in sexlessless starting in 2014*, but even then, the average young man is definitely getting female attention. The article also demonstrates that while there is a gap in male a female rates of sexlessness, this is not driven by promiscuous men hogging all the women.

*Which happens to be the year after smartphone penetration crossed the 50% marker, I think this is related.