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 -
Stormwind doesn't need to be the world police! I'm tired of this administration wasting our gold on fighting in places no one has ever heard of. Who cares about the Warsong Gulch? Why is it that I can't walk between two farms in Goldshire without getting robbed by the Defias Brotherhood, but we're sending our best soldiers overseas to fight in Kalimdor? Have you seen how much grinding it takes to make a Westfall stew today? Our great cities like Gnomeragen are becoming unlivable and the regime wants to blame all our problems on the Horde. I'm tired of talking about the Greenskins! They left, let them live over in Kalimdor if they can, we need to rebuild at home. I don't care if they blockade Ratchet, let the Goblins get the straits open again. Make Stormwind great again.
I don't want to see a single silver sent overseas to fight imagined foreign boogeymen until the government control all of Lakeshire. Support our troops, bring them home!
The conflict between the Horde and the Alliance is real enough, and justified enough, but it makes little sense that the Alliance has a presence in every zone in Azeroth, when they don't exercise a monopoly on violence in any of the zones. If they refocused, they might actually be able to win! But they can't do that, it would undermine the entire project, they exist to fight the Horde, to struggle for control of all Azeroth. Regionalism has no appeal.
More options
Context Copy link