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 -
This is straightforwardly true. The problem is that it runs the other way also. The political problem facing Red Tribe has been obvious for some time:
As the man says, Integration became the source of our subordination. European governments have been actively cooperating with Blue Tribe to close the door on us and our values for at least the last decade. We have already been fighting them for at least the last decade. There is very little hope that this will change, and there is very little observable value in maintaining a situationship that will never, ever break to our advantage.
Yeah, that's sort of the point, isn't it? Why do I want this "architecture of collective problem solving" stronger, when in fact a lot of the "collective problems" it "solves" appear to involve my tribe's continued existence?
How about we sit WWIII out? I for one am not particularly interested in seeing the sons of my friends and family fed into a droneswarm Armageddon.
Five years ago, even two years ago, it was taken as obvious that we (meaning primarily the US) were going to fight a major war with China and/or Russia. How does the above shift the probabilities, in your estimation? Do you think the crackup of the previous Rules-Based order makes an imminent fight with China less likely or more?
The obvious problem is economics. Does this end the Dollar as reserve currency? Does this crash the global economy? Are we Americans going to get super poor forever? ...I've been thinking about writing a post, collecting some of the economic predictions made here in the runup to the 2024 election, and comparing them to what's happened since, with comparison and contrast to the economic predictions about Brexit. To boil it down, I note that the economic predictions and even current assessments seem fundamentally unreliable, that the previous order seemed obviously unsustainable, and that the risk is worth it given the current trajectory.
I do not want America to rule the world, especially not if the version of "America" that rules is a Blue Tribe that has secured itself permanent unaccountable power. Even if it were my tribe ascendent, the value seems quite limited. I do not want to be subjugated by the Chinese, but I do not want to fight a major war with them either, and my assessment is that as of a year ago, pretty much everyone in this forum considered such a war to be an obvious inevitability. And for what? I do not want my country to be poorer, but I note that our previous economic model seemed to have very obvious problems that only ever got worse, and the only solution anyone could even begin to imagine was to keep doing the same things even harder, as pressure built toward an inevitable blowout.
I wanted change. This is change. It is scary and somewhat horrifying change... but it's not obvious what the alternative was supposed to be, and what seem to me to be plausible guesses seem worse.
How is Germany, Britain or France interfering in US politics? They're unable to do so.
Is there a single example of British government operations interfering in a serious manner in US politics since the FDR approved pro-war campaign of 1940-1941?
Another example of was the concerted push of 2024 to enact the EU Digital Safety Act and bring the EU regulatory machine to bear on US social medial platform. With the implicit, if not explicit goal of shutting down and Red Tribe speech and hurt electoral prospects. The only reason this didn’t happen was Trump getting elected and having leverage over them. I have no doubt they will try again as soon as they are able. It would not surprise me in the least bit if deep state cutouts like the National Endowment for Democracy actively and publicly were involved.
US blue tribe is something like 75% of your 'intelligent' people. You can't really pin this 'interference' when 50%+ of the plot is your own representatives, and most of the people on the other side come from an environment where in some major countries, the media have been largely controlled by CIA since WW2..
Mike Benz over on twitter is pretty pissed bc Trump admin didn't axe the NED but is trying to use for its own ends.
I agree with your points. And I think it supports FC’s well articulated post. Europe is a leverage point for US blue tribe. Red Tribe should not let them have that uncontested.
And while I might like to see NED go, it’s fairly remarkable things like NED and USAID are even getting news articles. There is at least one person in the administration that is clued in.
Edit:I don’t agree with the intelligent people jab, honestly. I’m born and raised in a blue area but spent a decent amount of time doing business with industry in red tribe areas. It’s actually a trope to see the junior people on my team act shocked when they realize the engineer, who they can barely understand through the southern/rural accent, is a a brilliant engineer or some other SME.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
There was this story about members of the UK labour party volunteering for Harris. It probably doesn't amount to an example of the British Government getting directly involved but I'd say it's pretty poor form nevertheless.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link