site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 23, 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.

3
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Some root factor makes people both more likely to be non-cis AND more likely to be non-cis

I would imagine that there is a correlation with r=1 between the two. SCNR.

I know you meant "victim of CSA and non-cis", which would be weird. But then again, quite a few things could are both weird and true. Generally, everything is correlated with everything else, mostly through boring confounders (perhaps the size of the town one grew up, or absent parents could be a risk factor for either).

I mean, it is also possible that child abusers in aggregate have some preference for victims which are less gendered than their peers, and that being less gendered as a kid also makes one less likely to be cis. But I don't think that is a big effect either.

...So if you have kids, and want to maximize their chances of identifying as cisgender into adulthood, your top priority should be reducing their opportunities for anxiety. Personally, I don't think it is worth worrying about very much. There is a sure-fire way not to have trans kids, and that is not to have kids. I see being trans as a minor medical annoyance for the patient, less severe than diabetes and a bit more severe than Hashimoto. I mean, if we had total control through magical genetics, deliberately making someone trans would be a bit of an asshole move -- like using CRISPR to give someone color blindness so that they can continue to carry on the legacy of color-blind people or some bullshit.

But of all the medical conditions a kid could have (and which might be avoided through embryo selection to some degree), being trans does not feel like a very big deal. (Of course, I say that as one who is happily cis-by-default. OTOH, I have been on antidepressants for more than a decade and would probably trade them for hormones if some fairy offered me the deal.)

Openly worrying about drag queen story hour and queer books would be ironically counterproductive.

Yes, but it is also not meant to be productive, it is performative, signaling. You might as well try to raise non-alcoholic kids by pretending that booze does not exist. Or try to raise abstinent kids by not teaching them about sex, which commonly results in teen pregnancies.

Unless you ban kids who are openly non-cis from schools (which would be problematic), kids are going to get exposed to other kids who decide that they are trans. Of course, talking about how brave they are will lead to more kids deciding that they are trans. A better approach might be to offer them your condolences for them not having the chromosome set they would like to have, use their preferred name and continue with the lesson plan.

I know you meant "victim of CSA and non-cis",

Fixed typo:

Some root factor makes people both more likely to be non-cis AND more likely to report being sexually assaulted

("report" is also important here.)

I see being trans as a minor medical annoyance for the patient, less severe than diabetes and a bit more severe than Hashimoto.

I've had (non-trans-related) body image issues since puberty and it's been fucking horrible. If I didn't think therapy would be largely useless for me I'm pretty sure I could get a body dysmorphia diagnosis. (Useless compared to the replacement option of looksmaxxing, not in general-- I'd probably go if it was free, quick, and convenient, but as-is I have better ways to spent my time.) I completely understand, on an emotional level, why trans people are trans-- I just don't believe that wanting to be something is the same thing as being something. To my eternal furry chagrin, I am not a wolf on any level, including physical.

Given that experience, I very much hope that if (and hopefully when) I have children, I will be able to protect them from feeling similarly-- and by applying the pharmaceutical, behavioral, and social interventions that would have helped me, hope to dramatically reduce the internal factors that would contribute to the same thing. The final piece would be just, "not talking about it." The body-image issues in my family are generational, so I think combining the other interventions with "stop yelling meme" would cut them off at the knees. Applying that logic to transgenderism, I think that helping kids feel pride in their gender roles without being neurotic about conformity is half the puzzle, and easy, so figuring out how to counter whatever confounding factor exists between CSA and becoming non-cis is what I should be focusing to spare my kids from a frankly hellish fate. (Meaning: the dysphoria, not the non-cis-ness specifically... though as opposed to something like bigorexia I do think gender-related ailments are particularly pernicuous, and that post-treatment surveys significantly underestimate the amount of trans people telling themselves ego-preserving lies, A.K.A "coping.")

Or try to raise abstinent kids by not teaching them about sex, which commonly results in teen pregnancies.

Not to derail things. But how true is this? I know people say that. But i find it hard to believe someone would commission, publish and report on a study that says Catholic abstinance sexed in fact reduces pregnant, harm, whatever.

I know you said “not teaching about sex” which is a straw man version of the argument.

I have no idea. But I could easily imagine how a religious abstinence approach is superior to the modern public school insanity that is sex and gender.

But how true is this?

Wildly not true. If you'd like to know more, you can consult the considerable literature on the subject:

Underhill, Operario, Montgomery Cochrane systematic review (2007). This is one of the strongest reviews: 13 randomized or quasi-randomized trials, 15,940 U.S. youth. It found no consistent effect of abstinence-only programs on unprotected vaginal sex, frequency of sex, number of partners, sexual initiation, or condom use, and concluded the trials suggested these programs were ineffective in high-income settings.

Denford et al. review of systematic reviews (2017). This “review of reviews” covered 37 systematic reviews summarizing 224 randomized controlled trials. Its conclusion was explicit: abstinence-only interventions were ineffective at producing positive changes in sexual behavior, while comprehensive interventions were effective.

Chin et al. / Community Preventive Services Task Force (2012). Their systematic review/meta-analytic work found insufficient/inconsistent evidence to conclude that group-based abstinence education works, whereas comprehensive risk-reduction interventions were found effective.

Trenholm et al. / Mathematica federal evaluation (2007). This congressionally mandated evaluation of four Title V abstinence programs found the programs had no effect on youths’ sexual abstinence and that participants were no more likely to have unprotected sex.

Kirby, review of 56 studies (2008). Kirby found that most abstinence programs did not delay initiation of sex and only 3 of 9 abstinence programs showed any significant positive effect on any sexual behavior. By contrast, about two thirds of comprehensive programs showed strong evidence of benefit.

Kohler, Manhart, Lafferty (2008). In a population-level analysis, abstinence-only education showed no significant effect on teen pregnancy or vaginal intercourse, while comprehensive sex education was associated with lower teen pregnancy risk. It also found that teaching contraception was not associated with more adolescent sexual activity or STDs

Actually I’ve heard the relevant group to study on this is the Mormons and statistics on citizens in Utah. They also have one of the highest adoption rates in the country. It’s less about preventing it from happening and controlling for the context in how it happens such that it’s intentional.