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'm not sure the value of this as a top level comment, but I'll write it because it struck me as odd. I live in California. I stopped by Grocery Outlet today after work to pick an ingredient up for dinner and some bleach for cleaning. I walk up to the checkout line with my $10 worth of groceries, and in front of me are two groups. The first group currently checking out are a couple, both guant, face sores, interesting clothing/jewelry/tattoo choices, and are buying food and water. I presume they are either living on the street or out of their vehicle and do drugs pretty consistently. They have a whole load of groceries and what caught my attention was the lady who requested the cashier to separate the mushroom mind focus and energy https://lairdsuperfood.com/products/focus-and-memory-mushrooms bags of snacks she was purchasing because if they weren't EBT eligible she would pay for them on her own. Luckily as I was to find out, they were, and she went on to make a separate purchase of those with her handy card.
Next up in the grocery line, we have a black lady, also buying significant amounts of groceries, and frankly she was a good 300 pounds #healthyatanysize. Luckily she had her handy card too.
Now I make decent money, but I sure feel like a shmuck when I'm the only one paying for my food in the grocery store line. Not sure what to add to this, I see the proposals to shrink EBT just to the essentials, only for people to be shocked as that would require people to make their food like me! Maybe this is what I get for living in California, but frankly, I think EBT and systems like it are just as prevalent elsewhere. It just strikes me as odd that I'm a professional, in a good industry, and I would question spending $50 for a couple of tiny packets of specialty mushroom superfood, but two methheads get to have it as they wish. Maybe I'm out of touch with the plights of the poor, but idk, doesn't seem half bad, I've car camped in the past before.
To be fair with the lady with the kid behind me, I did not stick around long enough to see if she too had her handy card with her, but I feel somewhat saddened that I am missing out on this club.
It reminds me in college, I had some hippy friends, they showed me the beauty of the college food kitchen. Just walk in, grab food, no worries. Oh yeah and btw since you're in a full college courseload, and your income is below the poverty threshold, despite being a dependent, you can apply to EBT, unemployment benefits, free health insurance, etc. Idk, I didn't partake, despite having years of less than stellar income and a strict budget. Maybe I should have? Is that just like any other tax loophole? What's the difference between saving money via that, and wash selling bitcoin shares to offset other investment income or other such schemes which I don't necessarily disagree with morally.
The other thing I think of when I roll this over in my head, is the stratification of grocery stores as a class separator. The last few years my closest store has been Ralphs. For those of you who don't know, Ralphs is slightly more high-end than Grocery Outlet which is more bottom of the barrel. Shoppers of Ralphs are probably not going to encounter EBT users at the same rates in areas with many grocery stores. Think Target vs. Walmart. The effect I feel like this has is for those contributing more to the tax pool, they encounter the absurdity of the purchasers less, and therefore the blob of money dedicated to it is further from the mind.
In China, a lot of the insurance system covers Traditional Chinese Medicine, which is pretty much just bullshit. Here in the US, I know people who have gotten chiropractic coverage under their own insurance. Acupuncture is also something apparently covered by many private insurance companies, despite also being highly suspect. Some apparently are even covering Reiki now.
Point here being that interest groups who believe they're effective push hard for their inclusion and treatment as "real medicine" and there's not really a strong lobby against it. It's not like you'll gonna be able to convince the TCM/Chiropractic/Acupuncture/Reiki/etc believers otherwise that easily after all, they're passionate and committed in a way that opposition isn't. If you have a bunch of people who really think that crystals or halo therapy or whatever are better than normal mainstream medicine, then you have a lobby pushing for their inclusion.
So in the same way, there's a whole load of highly motivated people who basically consider this sort of thing as the only real and healthy food there is. Heck even the head of the HHS now isn't that far gone, but he's a lot closer to that viewpoint than I ever will be. Even from the perspective of an EBT user, spending on those mushrooms instead of something else makes no sense unless you truly believe that they have some sort of meaningful benefits to them. They're at the store because people buy them and people buy them despite the cost because they believe it does something worth it.
Because there's a bunch of very very passionate people in support, I don't expect coverage of such products to end anytime soon in the same way that coverage of (what I consider to be bullshit) "traditional medicine" and other beliefs is being actively expanded by insurances. It's just part of living in society, sometimes you have to accommodate what you personally think is bullshit because large numbers of people believe it.
You might think "well just ban things that are stupid and bad" but the monkey paw curls and Whole Foods non GMO gluten free food and other stuff like that are the only things allowed to take EBT anymore. Whoops, turns out other people have different views on what is stupid and bad.
To be fair to the mushroom lady, although it probably would have been better had she bought real mushrooms, at least she was buying perceived benefits for physical health vegetables rather than trying to get cigarettes and alcohol off the food stamps. That at least is some kind of effort to get healthy or improve herself. I do think those 'superfoods' are gimmicks and rackets, but if it's a choice between "buy tiny expensive packet of dubious health benefit" or "giant snack food bags", then the mushrooms win.
I wish I were that motivated! (she said, hastily closing the bag of potato chips).
To be even more fair, she may well be selling her whole cart at 50% to spend the money on drugs.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link