site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   29310 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 6, 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.

11
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I strongly dislike this article because it's simply not true

https://compactmag.com/article/woke-ism-is-winding-down

Data on media outputs and “cancel-culture” incidents also suggest that a corner may have been turned. Across a range of datasets, we see apparent declines in “grassroots” attempts to censor uncomfortable speech on campus (even as there are growing attempts to suppress political scholarship from external stakeholders). Media discussion of various forms of prejudice and discrimination also seem to have declined significantly over the last year.

Within the Democratic Party, following anemic 2020 results and recalls of progressive politicians in blue states, there have been efforts to “course correct,” to avoid further alienating normie voters. The Democratic base has moved in a similar direction, broadly rejecting progressive candidates during the 2022 primaries. These countermeasures likely helped the party stave off the anticipated “red wave,” preventing extreme Republican candidates from facing Democratic challengers who were also perceived to be far out of step with mainstream America. Running moderate Democratic candidates against GOP extremists proved to be a winning move throughout the country in 2022.

Even if one can cite evidence of people turning against woke-ism, this does not change the fact that the woke still hold considerable power for a large number of institutions, at work, and various digital intellectual properties. The woke, the DEI people, BLM, etc. do not need to see the huge number of downvotes on their content (such as youtube videos , before downvotes were removed) to know that their ideology is not that popular, but this does not dissuade them: they still persevere. It has never been about popularity but about power.

When workers at Netflix attempted to cancel Dave Chappelle in late 2021, the company didn’t respond by issuing apologies and promising more programming on LGBTQ topics, as it had in the past. Instead, executives issued a memo informing protesting employees that if they weren’t open to publishing content they disagree with, they should quit. When an insufficient number of activist employees took them up on this invitation, the company proceeded with aggressive cuts apparently targeting these employees and the programming they worked on.

Too bad not all of us have the backing of a multi-billion dollar corp like Spotify or Netflix. It's not like Netflix can easily find another Chapelle or Spotify can find another Rogan. Regular people who get banned or suspended from twitter, reddit, etc or fired have far fewer recourse. It's all in the background: no one even notices or cares but the person who is affected. The marginal cost incurred by Facebook deleting an inconvenient account is zero. It has 2 billion users. No skin off its back.

What does woke mean to you?

If it means that the the current hegemonic values are indeed hegemonic, it's gonna be that way for a while yet probably.

The majority opinion on all 'woke' subjects is reflected by institutions that have a broad base, or who require support from the cultural or financial elite. This is how it has to be in a market system.

IT's why trans issues are so contentious; they haven't been fully integrated into the hegemon yet.

What does woke mean to you?

Applying Marxist-like oppressor-oppressed class analysis to non-economic groups.

What would distinguish Marxist-like class analysis from non-Marxist-like class analysis in your view?

Displacing the discussion to another culture, let's take the example of casteism in India. What kind of arguments against "casteism" would you consider woke, and which ones would you consider non-woke? Are there time periods or particular practices where you would think arguments against "casteism" are more justified, and is there a world state in which you think you could say, "the field has finally been levelled enough once and for all, and caste is practically not an issue for people's life outcomes anymore and all interventions along caste lines should cease"?

What would distinguish Marxist-like class analysis from non-Marxist-like class analysis in your view

Acknowledging the relationship between the classes is more complicated that that of the oppressor and oppressed.

Displacing the discussion to another culture, let's take the example of casteism in India

I'd rather not, I know next to nothing about India.

What kind of arguments against "casteism" would you consider woke, and which ones would you consider non-woke.

A non-woke argument would be one for ending legal and cultural discrimination based on caste.

Woke arguments start around things like Affirmative Action, and we've definitely crossed into them when unequal outcomes between groups are in themselves treated as evidence of oppression.

I'd rather not, I know next to nothing about India.

Fair enough. I thought it might serve as an intuition pump, but if you don't feel comfortable with the conversation, I'll drop this angle.

A non-woke argument would be one for ending legal and cultural discrimination based on caste.

Woke arguments start around things like Affirmative Action, and we've definitely crossed into them when unequal outcomes between groups are in themselves treated as evidence of oppression.

So, do you think in the immediate aftermath of ending some form of discrimination that no activist interventions is justifiable, even on grounds of prudence and support of societal stability after a massive change?

For example, in the immediate aftermath of the American Civil War, a lot of Northern Christians poured into the South and started schools for the newly emancipated individuals. Is this woke, in your opinion since it is giving extra support to black people that white people aren't getting? If it isn't woke, is it because black people were genuinely unjustly worse off and this was an effort to redress that imbalance, or is it because it was the actions of private individuals and not the state?

Do interventions only start being "woke" once all major legal and cultural discrimination has been eliminated? If so, do you have a year after which you think it is safe to say, "all activist interventions after this point are woke, in the United States"?

For example, in the immediate aftermath of the American Civil War, a lot of Northern Christians poured into the South and started schools for the newly emancipated individuals. Is this woke, in your opinion since it is giving extra support to black people that white people aren't getting?

Would they actually turn away non-black people that wanted to go there?

Do interventions only start being "woke" once all major legal and cultural discrimination has been eliminated.

Interventions start being woke when they begin discriminating themselves.

Interventions start being woke when they begin discriminating themselves.

What are the limits of this?

Imagine a hypothetical situation 70 years ago (or however far back you need to set it to make this an actually interesting question.) Suppose it was the case that all (or the vast majority) of existing college scholarships were de facto limited to white people. Would it be woke for a private individual to create a college scholarship and limit it to black people in this environment? Even if it was woke, do you think it would be a morally justifiable form of wokeness given the larger cultural situation in this hypothetical scenario?

Was Ghandi woke for only advocating on behalf of oppressed Indians in South Africa, and ignoring the plight of Black South Africans?

Would it be woke for someone to spend all of their charity money in third world countries, and not to spend a single dime in the United States?

Is it ever okay to discriminate against/ignore one group, while trying to better the station of another?

Your framing presents a false dichotomy. It would in fact be woke to offer specific black scholarships, the key difference is between fighting perceived discrimination with more discrimination. The non-woke, really liberal, remedy would be opening the white only scholarships to all on some universalist and fair criteria. fighting discrimination with discrimination creates fault lines in our society. If you opened a scholarship to all with a focus on the poor irregardless to skin color you'd be spending most of your time helping black people but not be woke. If you're thinking about it in terms of racial groups being very salient at all that's woke.

Was Ghandi woke for only advocating on behalf of oppressed Indians in South Africa, and ignoring the plight of Black South Africans?

Yes

Would it be woke for someone to spend all of their charity money in third world countries, and not to spend a single dime in the United States?

If they do this because of some universalist reasoning, like I'm trying to reduce deaths to malaria and would help Americans with malaria but there aren't any then it is not woke. If they're trying to reduce opiod deaths and choose to defy universalist reasoning just to spite Americans and spend their money less efficiently elsewhere then yes, that's woke.

I don't mind answering these questions, but before we go on, can we acknowledge that wokeness is a solid concept, no worse that literally anything else that we've come up with to discuss political issues?

I've noticed these kinds of questions are often asked in order to imply wokeness is nebulous, but we've veered so deep into edge cases that I don't think it has any impact on the integrity of the core concept. Literally anything could be deconstructed by asking questions like that, and literally everything outside the world of pure mathematics would fall a apart under the pressure.

I could probably successfully argue that the concept of "chair" is nebulous, because you can't point to the exact limit between chairs and cars.

Would it be woke for a private individual to create a college scholarship and limit it to black people in this environment? Even if it was woke, do you think it would be a morally justifiable form of wokeness given the larger cultural situation in this hypothetical scenario?

Yes, and yes.

Edit: Actually, sorry. The first answer also depends on motivation. In could be woke, or not.

Was Ghandi woke for only advocating on behalf of oppressed Indians in South Africa, and ignoring the plight of Black South Africans?

Did he explicitly advocate against Black South Africans?

Would it be woke for someone to spend all of their charity money in third world countries, and not to spend a single dime in the United States?

Depends on their motivation.

Is it ever okay to discriminate against/ignore one group, while trying to better the station of another?

Ignoring is not the same as discrimination, and both can be ok. The circumstances have to be pretty extreme to justify the latter, though.

More comments

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