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haha, it is definitely my favorite quote of his. It has made a tremendous impact on my views.
It is probably my least favourite Pratchett passage - it may not be objectively the worst, but I think it's a terrible argument, and people citing it as inspirational drive me crazy. I want to yell, "It's not aspirational! It's stupid! It's very, very stupid!"
But I might be a little unfair.
Oooo, this might be an interesting conversation, because I like the general outlines of the whole passage. I think it fits well with the general idea of humans as a social, story-oriented species whose need for belief drives our psyche. I think looking through humankind through that lens is very illuminating. Idk about it being aspirational, I take it as cutting, disrobing, shedding of our delusions of rationality.
But I'd be interested in hearing why you think its stupid and a terrible argument?
I'll take this as an opportunity for a longer effort post, so pardon me if I go a bit beyond the brief.
I think Terry Pratchett is the atheist version of C. S. Lewis or J. R. R. Tolkien.
Lewis and Tolkien are authors that young, nerdy, or fantasy-inclined Christians, especially those from an English cultural background, read while growing up. They often make a very strong impression on us. I know that I was moved and a lot of my worldview, as an adult, was shaped by these two seminal authors.
Sometimes atheists read and appreciate them as well, and with all appropriate grace and charity, while I'm glad that others read them too, I don't think they make as much sense for atheists. The Christianity is too foundational - too much of Lewis and Tolkien's writing is impregnated with faith - for them to make sense otherwise.
Pratchett, however, was an atheist, and I think his work is, just as much as Lewis' is with Christianity and Tolkien's is with Catholicism, impregnated with atheism and skepticism. Pratchett is in his own way a very cynical author. Yes, there are gods in Discworld, but they are not particularly worth worshipping, and the religion he is most sympathetic to, the Omnians, are portrayed as nice but nonetheless engaging in a kind of sympathetic self-delusion.
Pratchett's real heroes are existentialists, like Sam Vimes, or Granny Weatherwax, or Death. Death admits openly: "There is no justice. There's just me." Vimes is a man who is fully aware that the society he lives in is corrupt, unjust, and miserable, and yet, grumbling all the while, refuses to submit to nihilism, and makes the world a bit better. Weatherwax is a woman who dismisses religion and faith with, "I've already got a hot water bottle", and yet nonetheless spends her life trying, in her own irascible way, to make the world a little better for the people who live in it.
Often I find, when I read a lot by an author, that author has a kind of general tone or mood. Lewis has an erudite yet common-sensical decency to him. Tolkien is wistful, and lost in memory. Chesterton is delighted by paradox. Adams is wrily amused at the absurdity of the world. The mood I get from Pratchett is, surprisingly for a comedian, anger. Pratchett writes with this white-hot anger at injustice, at unfairness, at a world where stupid bullies tread all over ordinary people just trying to enjoy the good things this world offers. More than that, I think Pratchett has a kind of moral outrage at God. God refuses to even do us the decency of existing so that he can be properly accused of neglect!
Lewis or Tolkien look at the world and they see something there, a divine wellspring to creation, a loving creator who fashioned us, in whom we live and love and have our being, and to whom we will return. Pratchett looks at the world and sees none of that. It's not there. The world may be full of powerful beings separate from us, but they don't really care, and they can't give meaning to life. So what do you do?
I think Pratchett's Discword books are, in their core, about how to be moral in a godless, meaningless universe.
Yes, he writes comedy. That's the other big difference between him and Lewis/Tolkien. The Christian authors are funny sometimes, but they're saying something sincerely. Pratchett is trying to make you laugh, but he's always, I think, got this really sharp bite aimed at all the absurdities and injustices of the world. Pratchett thus has sympathy for the idealists - consider Sergeant Carrot, or the good Omnians like Brutha or Mightily Oats - but ultimately he's closer to Vimes or Weatherwax or Susan Sto Helit. The world is frequently garbage and disappointing. There is no avoiding that. But this is the one you've got and it's up to you to do your best anyway.
There is no justice other than what we make happen ourselves. So we had best get to work.
Put charitably, this is what I think the "atom of justice" speech is trying to say. Justice isn't a metaphysical constant; it's not out there, it's not written into the fabric of the universe, and there isn't a god coming to make it happen for us. We have to do it ourselves. If stories about gods or spirits or hogfathers have any virtue, it's that they train us to believe the impossible, to go on seeking justice, despite the emptiness of the universe we're in.
Suppose you were a young, teenage atheist, and a fantasy fan. You like people like Lewis or Tolkien, or even their lesser imitators like Robert Jordan, or Weis and Hickman. However, you cannot share their faith, or make that connection. What can you do? Pratchett comes along and writes equally entertaining stories, in an equally expansive mythos, that addresses this question for you. Here's what you do if you share these values, but can't believe in their metaphysical commitments. You acknowledge this godless universe and then set out to make justice happen anyway. More than even that, Pratchett's theory of "the little lies" actually helps contextualise the Christian authors - perhaps Narnia or Middle-earth are lies, but they are lies that help prepare you to believe, and fight for, the big ones.
(Compare Lewis' Puddleglum: "...I'm going to stand by the play-world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia.")
So, all that said, why do I hate the "atom of justice" speech?
Well, mainly just for the reason I said. I think it doesn't work because it's a straw-man. Nobody believes that justice comes in atoms, or mercy in molecules. Things that aren't elemental particles are not lies, or any less worthy of being valued or loved. Death's rebuttal of people who believe in justice does not land, and because I know Pratchett was a brilliant author and extremely capable fantasist, I believe that Pratchett could have come up with a metaphor that worked. It is not beyond his imagination to make the same point in a more artful way. After all, most of his other books make the same point, often more successfully.
Maybe I am just an intolerable pedant. But I hope it comes through that I'm saying this from a place of appreciation for Pratchett.
This was well written and definitely insightful. Allow me to mirror with an equally broad interpretation. I am however, much less eloquent, hopefully my ideas will make it through my torturous use of the English language.
Your conception of Terry Pratchett as this ex-theist, now atheist author, angry, shaking his fist into the sky at the injustice of existence. Wishing such a god of his youth would exist, so that he could to be taken to task for the cruelly of the world, is pretty close. But I think your view misses a core piece, though I think you touch on the penumbra's of it. Pratchett is at his core a cynical humanist. He might rage against the absence of the divine but he more rages against the follies of mankind.
One of those follies, is our penchant for delusion. We lie to ourselves a lot. We delude our selves into believing we are nobler, better, purer than we are. We divide ourselves along arbitrary boundaries, other each other, create monsters in the guise of man and justify it with copious amounts of bullshit. We call upon gods of every shape, size, and creed to justify our actions, our lies. We pretend the world is complex and complicated, that there is so much grey.
In this vein, Pratchett positions himself as the magnifying glass, the pickaxe. He does what many comedians of the more cynical bent do. He pulls at that edifice of delusions. He constructs fantastical worlds that at the same time mirror our own, and he uses them to speak truth about the human condition. Sure there is that anger you see, but there is also an unburdening, a liberation to the authentic human experience. I agree Pratchett might have favorites characters like Carrot, and that he really speaks through characters like Sam Vimes, Granny Weatherwax, Havelock Vetinari, and Death. But those characters all to a tee, see through the delusions of mankind.
In a different psychology profile of a section of readers, put yourself in the shoes of a young high-functioning Autist, of agnostic religious belief. Your world is one of lies, people say one thing and mean another. Everyone is constantly claiming this or that faith or creed is perfect, but not that piece of it, that gospel, that word, the "situations" is different, the rules need to be bent, "stop trying to make everything so simple", "can't you see the world is more complex", "stop being so rigid". But in comes fantasy literature. At first: Tolkien & Lewis, their worlds are so much more pure, the good, are noble and good. Evil is bad. The world is black and white, and simple. Complex in its expansive history, its cohesive world, but fundamentally an honest world, full of wonder, and symbolism. More than enough for your extreme pattern-recognizing brain to fall in love with. Then Adams, with his absurdism, you can't help but relate because the real world is so absurd, there is so much bullshit, so much fakery trying to dress itself up. Then you discover Pratchett, cynical, humorous Pratchett. Nobody in Narnia or Middle earth pretends the world is more complicated. Sauron never tries to sell you the "its complicated" argument, Aragon isn't genociding Haradrim while acting like he's a noble king. Gondor's economic policy is not discussed. Discworld however feels closer to reality, it feels more representative of the IRL delusions. And Pratchett peels back the curtain, shows that yes, even the more "complex" world really is simple. In that sense, the fantasy is realer, it requires less make-believe, less suspension of belief, but is still full of wonder and whimsey. It helps that Pratchett is clever and funny.
Of course then in my case, I went onto the darker side, AGoT, Black Company, Malazan, Gene Wolfe, R. Scott Bakker. They help kill the child and prepare you for the cold reality of adulthood in a world filled with the nasty little monsters we call humans.
But the "atom of justice" quote from this lens is not about making our own justice in the world, or even that they train us to believe the impossible in the empty world. It's about the epistemological idea that not all lies, all delusions are bad. There are very real, very important things, to mankind that are not elementary particles. Collective ideas that we have dreamed up. That are core to what makes us human. The unfiltered truth of reality is not some moral bedrock that should be aspired to. It should go without saying, but in case it doesn't, people might not literally believe that justice comes in atoms but they absolutely believe in concepts that don't actually exist in physical reality and they treat denial of those, very not true things, as massively transgressive. So young Autistic child, be less like the Auditors, and more like Death. It is to me, a wonderful expose on how flawed humanity is, how there is beauty in that flaw, and how that flaw is what makes humans, humans.
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I absolutely love Pratchett, as a writer. But while I can look towards Tolkien for moral guidance (a Christian would look towards Lewis too, probably), I would never expect that from Pratchett. I mean, he has moral characters, virtue, and all that, but it's all kind of... floating in the void on the top of a giant turtle. That's not something you can really lean on when you seek moral guidance and support. And, of course, since he's a humor writer, there's a lot of exploiting "clown nose on - clown nose off" thing. Which I am totally willing to allow him as a writer, in fact, maybe I like him even more for that. But if you start to approach serious questions in the strictly "clown nose off" mode, Pratchett is not somebody you can have as your guide. At least that's how I feel. Maybe for many it can be, and standing on top of his giant turtle floating in the void is better than floating in the void alone.
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Good post I mostly agree with, but just an aside:
Something a lot of Christians forget is that many atheists are either former Christians themselves, or have had enough exposure to Christianity that they understand it even if they don't agree with it. We are perfectly capable of reading Lewis and Tolkien and "getting" what they are saying about God and faith and morality.
It's possible this is more true of Americans than Brits, as my impression is that while religion is a pretty weak force in the UK, even among those who still believe, in the US even atheists probably have regular exposure to sincere, hardcore believers. If you grew up in an atheist home and never went to church at all, maybe your only impression of Christianity is a kind of sneering disdain for the god-botherers. But most Americans, at least until the current generation, probably had parents who at least took them to church occasionally. The idea that atheists find religion alien and unfathomable (and that all atheists are militant sneerers) is not true across the board.
I don't know what Pratchett's childhood was like, but he was born in 1948 so he probably didn't grow up atheist. I think you are right that he clearly became one, of the "angry at God not existing" variety.
Yes, it's a straw man in that of course justice doesn't exist in physical particles, and neither Death, nor the author using him as a mouthpiece, thought people did think of justice that way. His point, whether you agree with it or not, is that a lot of people believe in justice and mercy and goodness as intangible but very real metaphysical forces in the world, manifested by divine powers (God, for Christians, obviously). And he's pushing back against that, saying no, these things only exist in our heads, they only exist to the degree that we create them. The metaphor was perfectly coherent to say what the author was trying to say: there is no Just World, there is no deity who is going to make sure that good and bad people get their just rewards in the end. Justice is only what we make of it.
Perhaps it is you, only able to conceive of atheism as nihilism or an angry reaction against religion, who finds it difficult to comprehend the speech from an atheist author's point of view.
I certainly don't think it's an absence of imagination on my part - I was an atheist as a younger man, after all. I don't mean to generalise that all atheists feel the same, nor was I suggesting that atheists have no intellectual knowledge of Christianity.
Nonetheless I do think it's fair to say that ideological or religious alignment/difference with a text affects the way one receives it, and therefore that atheists and Christians will respond to authors like Lewis or Tolkien differently. In the same way I'm conscious that my own reaction to Pratchett is different and conditioned by my own background. I am speculating a bit about atheist responses to him, with what I hope is empathy born of my own experience of atheism, but nonetheless I am in a different position now. To the extent that I appreciate Pratchett today (and I'm not actually a huge fan), there is a level of imagination involved, putting myself in the position of someone for whom the world seems very different to the way it seems to me. The same thing, mutatis mutandis, for ex-Christian appreciators of the Christian authors.
There's probably another effortpost to be written one day about the atheist appreciators of Tolkien specifically. That is for another day, though.
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It's worth noting that Trotskyites and their fellow travelers are (humorously, supposedly) saying that injustice is carried by a certain kind of particle.
Good writeup. I sometimes find myself wondering what would Partchett think of the current state of his county, he didn't seem like the kind of person who would be able to rationalize the horrors away (as other prominent British comedian is often accused to do). The closest we have to an answer is probably Thud.
One of the things I think Pratchett has in common with the earlier Christian fantasists is a genuine affection for the parochial, and a corresponding opposition to the impersonal, enlightened, or rationalist.
I mentioned Death. The Auditors might be more efficient, but Death is a small farmer. We want to be collected by the sympathetic local. "What can the harvest hope for, if not the care of the reaper man?"
But we see the same pattern over and over. The Unseen University faculty are a bunch of self-important short-sighted buffoons, but Pratchett has a real affection for them, and their dumb feuds. You can imagine a story about an enlightened, politically engaged busybody coming in, determined to mobilise the university for the cause of social justice, or even just making the wizards do their damn jobs, and you know that Pratchett would be one hundred percent on the side of the wizards. The witches likewise. Pratchett likes the local. In the post below this I cite Carpe Jugulum and the pay-off to that story was that the locals like the 'traditional' vampire lord, the one who kidnaps the bosomy young maiden and always gets staked by the strapping young hero, whereas the modernist who wants to rationalise vampiric predation is the villain. In Ankh-Morpork, all Pratchett's sympathies are with the beat cops, not grand visionaries.
That's something he has in common with the earlier writers. Tolkien loves the Shire, and hates Saruman's mind of metal and wheels. Lewis praises tradition - the bit in Prince Caspian where the children are liberated from the Telmarine schools is a moment of pure, unbridled joy. Chesterton's hatred for regimentation hardly needs to be recapitulated. Pratchett lacks their religious conviction, but something of a stubborn English spirit persists in him, as it did in his literary forebears.
Isn't that the "good old England" thing? I'd expect something like that from a British writer. For American writer, for example, there's no "good old America" to reach for, neither real nor mythical, Wild West is the best one can go for, and there are a lot of skeletons in that particular closet, too. I think it's a very English thing to have this nostalgic feeling for the mythical past.
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And even more importantly, he is closer to Vimes as a matter of worldview, but he isn't on Vimes' side because there are no two sides to this question. Carrot and Vimes are absolutely and always on the same side. (And the one time it comes up, Vimes and Brutha are also on the same side). In the Discworld, Good is good no matter whether it is real or not. And part of what is good is systems that work - Vetinari reads as an amoral snake, but he is also consistently on the same side as Vimes and Carrot because what matters is that Anhk-Morpok remains safe, free and prosperous.
Vetinari may be very scary, but I can't remember a single not only evil but even ordinarily corrupt thing Pratchett would make him do. He's essentially a saint philosopher-king, or a patron god of what government bureaucracy would be if only it could be what statolatry adepts envision it to be.
Technically as former leader(or at least member) of the Assassin's guild, and current leader "behind the throne", it was implied that he killed his way into being the ruler of Anhk-Morpork. He might technically rule now with the current consent of the legitimate king/heir, but he did murder his way to the top in typical tyrant fashion.
Not necessarily the good example of morals.
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Certainly for me, as a Christian, one of the things that made Pratchett not-intolerable was his sense of genuine sympathy for those who want to make sense of the world and do right. If you sincerely and humanely asks those questions, Pratchett is on your side.
Pratchett himself is not a believer, but his worldview allows for believers who are genuinely good people, whom he regards as friends and allies.
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