site banner
PaperclipPerfector  7d ago (text post)   25045 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 2, 2026

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.

5
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

But the thing which sucks is, I like doing my job. I get a great deal of joy from programming. It's an exhilarating exercise in solving interesting problems and watching them take shape

Not necessarily related, but DAMN I am so jealous of my programmer friends who report this. Having an exhilarating job that stimulates the intellect, that you genuinely enjoy, that gets you high social status, AND a ton of money? Good Lord... how is it even possible?

I can barely imagine having a consistent full time job as an adult that I enjoy and find stimulating, let alone all of the other goodies that seem to come associated with many of my programmer type friends. Seriously I have multiple friends making 4x my income with 3x my job satisfaction. It just seems incredibly, brutally unfair that the world is like this. Alas.

High social status? I'm basically embarrassed to tell anyone I work in tech because either they also work in tech (in which case they will probably talk my ear off about some inane office politics) or they don't (in which case they probably hate me).

High social status?

Yes. Not as high as a doctor, but absolutely. People - men and women - absolutely treat me differently (better) after learning where I work.

Money and status are too linked for it to not give status. There's some importance to it too - we (often) work on systems people know and care about. We're famously difficult to tell what to do professionally, which is itself a form of power/status.

Well... being a programmer doesn't get you high social status, except from other nerds. But yeah I agree that it's unjust in a cosmic sense that programmers get to do something they love which also pays very well. I look at someone like my sister, who works crappy factory jobs and gets paid 1/3 of what I do if that, and it seems to me that in a just world she would be getting paid what I do and vice versa. But that second part might come true at least... I guess we will see how it shakes out.

Don't be too jealous, if AI meets its promise they'll all be... well, they won't be saying "would you like fries with that" because the AI will do that too. But they might be delivering the fries until the robotics catches up.

Remember, it's a mathematical result that all your friends are probably more popular than you. If it makes you feel better, I was really good at programming, but it wasn't intellectually stimulating, I didn't enjoy it, I have bottom-of-the-barrel social status, and ... ok, I do have a ton of money. 1 out of 4 ain't bad.

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