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 -
The problems are indeed systemic but I disagree that uplifting individuals is not worth trying. One: I think the relationship market just isn't clearing for a lot of heterosexual men and women. It is not a waste to help any individual man or woman see the problems clearly and learn how they can improve themselves and their partner selection. I think there are a lot of people whose current offer to the relationship market is "not acceptable" because they're unhealthy or insipid or have the women on a pedestal or want a bro-friend-with-tits to play vidya and screw occasionally or think that a 6-6-6 man is going to fall into her life or that being a bitch is attractive or. Getting those people in shape and having productive dates before they burn out and join MGTOW or buy a dozen cats is not zero sum. Two: at the very least if you are one source of truth in a world of lies you can help people without them having to waste years. Third: none of us are going to get access to the magic book that lets us rewrite society's scripts, but we might be able to help the lives of some of the people we touch (if they're ready to hear it).
Breast cancer gets so much more funding because everyone cares about women. This is also one factor influencing why women's social movements start so easily: pretty much everyone (normal, minus the lizardmen constant) loves and cares for women! (This is one reason I never bought the "patriarchal oppressor" framing — why do you think men call precious things like their cars "she"? Because they love women!) Other factors include structural support at all levels of society (from special departments at companies to special ministries in government) and an activist class that runs like a well-oiled machine which can be engaged to support women as well as other causes de jour.
You could argue that this is downstream of instinctual/cultural small-group behavior and it probably is.
I think it's because cars, ships and aircraft are expensive to maintain, especially when it comes to paintjobs.
Also, things that depreciate quickly—especially if already used—but for which a man can develop an attachment via sunk cost, scarsity mindset, and the endowment effect if he owns instead of rents. If it flies, floats, or fucks…
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
There's a point there, but the whole issue is that women aren't accepting such correction or coaching.
Men hear the coaching, many will attempt to apply it, and after they put in the work they may even notice improvement but, I'd suggest, rarely do the rewards scale with the effort required. This becomes disheartening. If they complain, the only advice is 'man up and try harder.' Over and over again.
Women, by and large, will interpret attempts to coach or correct them as a critique, will often react badly to this critique, reject it outright, and go to their girl's groupchat or post a tiktok to complain about people trying to 'control women's behavior' and they'll immediately have their opinion confirmed and validated by other women (and the male orbiters) and watch a dozen other videos which claim she's empowered for standing her ground.
They're much more ensconced in a media environment that coddles their emotions and confirms their biases overall.
So attempting to do one on one uplifting of individual women when there's an entire Billion-dollar multimedia edifice screaming the opposite in their ear will probably be ineffective in most cases.
It could still be worth doing, but can we at least be honest about the source of the issue?
I daresay one major reason so many feel completely comfortable heaping shame and pressure on men but leave women's behavior alone is the tacit admission that women won't accept influence or advice from someone they do not respect, and so they wouldn't listen at all (or would attack the person).
Not from non-attractive men, that is - and those are incidentally the only social group willing to coach them. It's a deadlock.
Yeah. There's probably a few high-value males out there who would actually constructively criticize a woman's behavior and expect her to listen and change.
But most such men are in such an advantageous position that, to the extent they notice any issue at all, they're not too incentivized to address it, but in the best case they'd rather grab their preferred partner and get out of the pool entirely.
It's a deadlock up until something changes in the media environment.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link