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 -
It was a decade and a half before Nazi Germany, but the Ruhr Uprising set up a left-wing paramilitary that drove the right-wing paramilitaries of 1920 Germany out of town.
The fact that the answer was "no", whereas the Weimar Republic's answer was "well, maybe for a few weeks, tops", was part of the background that let Hitler seize power. Psychologically, fascism is basically what you get when the human sense of disgust goes out of control, and if you want people's disgust reactions to go overboard then the most powerful scenario is a combination of enemies that disgust them and "friends" who normalize going overboard in reaction.
Minnesota is no Ruhr Uprising - the death count is still around "two", not "a thousand" - but it's also not a situation that would have seemed incongruous in Wiemar Germany. It's vastly less significant in scope, but it's not in a different category.
Perhaps what is most different is the bulk of public reaction? The Ruhr Uprising spooked the median German more than its suppression did, and opposition vs support for that suppression was divisive even among leftist factions there. Opposition to current ICE practices, on the other hand, has expanded well past the median American and is still climbing. Some opposition to ICE is still an expression of unthinking disgust, and in particular the sort of anti-border-control protestors who are "reinventing borders from first principles" with Minnesota checkpoints are about as anti-fascist as the "Anti-fascist Protection Rampart" was, but groups becoming fascist while decrying fascism may come out ... weirder ... than historical groups who went fascist deliberately.
More options
Context Copy link