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 -
I would say the first burden of proof is not on white people why rules that benefit their cultural values benefit everyone, but rather that these cultural values have anything to do with white people at all. Indeed i think that was the initial point of contention with the whole infographic thing. I would argue that hard work, urgency, rational and linear thinking, etc., regardless of how valuable they are, are values shared by people of a huge range of ethnicities/races/cultural backgrounds etc..
Towards the second point i would further say that this is the case largely because these values or whatever we want to call them are in fact better for the cultures that prioritize them. I think the short version of the argument for why this is the case is that history has sort of made this argument for us. Cultures throughout history that have valued these things have fared better, for the most part, than those that did not. Another would be that if you find yourself on an uninhabited island, devoid of any sort of society that may advantage or disadvantage you arbitrarily, it seems obvious that valuing urgency, hard work, and rational and linear thinking would on its own provide a pretty substantial advantage over not valuing those things (or over sassiness or some other example), in the face of predation, starvation, the elements, and all the rest.
There's a totally valid point to be made i think about how what values a culture prioritizes are a subset of the universe of ones that are valuable, and probably that the boundaries of this subset are to a degree a product of "white culture", whatever that actually is, at least the United States. But you can make that argument without denying non-white people any ownership in universally valued and valuable things like hard work or, for christs sake, rational thinking, which the unfortunate infographic failed to do.
More options
Context Copy link