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 agree with almost all of this, but I think the major exception is load-bearing:
If you type 60wpm, it took you 17 seconds to write this sentence and a half, over which period of time the federal government disperses an average of $2.2M in transfer payments, $250k of which are specifically for families and individuals facing economic hardship. Taking on that sort of task is something that the state already does, on such a massive scale that adding another hundred thousand kids' child support payments would literally be within rounding error on the commonly reported figures. Since our chief remaining worry is indeed
then we want that kid's expenses to be at least backstopped by the almost-incomprehensibly rich state, which is guaranteed to pay, not by some random guy who might delay or evade payment. Once that's assured, our remaining concerns are much less pressing: justice vs deadbeat parents, and well-being for innocent taxpayers. We can fix both concerns by finding the biological father and getting him to pay, but can we improve either by squeezing a non-father?
Justice vs deadbeat parents can't be improved by punishing a non-deadbeat non-parent.
Well-being for innocent taxpayers you might think can be improved by getting some poor sucker to pay instead of them, but that poor sucker is in the set of innocent potential taxpayers, and the marginal utility of money decreases. A priori most people would probably prefer a certainty of paying a tiny amount over a tiny chance of being unjustly pushed into paying a much larger amount. And that's just considering the financial aspects; someone who's been cheated on in this way is paying to have those extracted finances managed by their victimizer, which is definitely negative-sum in well-being.
There is a more subtle problem with just letting the state pay in these cases: doing so removes all incentives the mother might have to help the state track down the biological father. That wouldn't necessarily be a new problem, though (why bother tracking down biodad if the guy you tricked is already paying?), just a still-unsolved one.
This has been my mental response to the idea of the state's motivations being a primary driver. It's still irrational and immoral. We're already using children as a vehicle for UBI at an astonishing scale - making fathers slightly less likely to be financially cucked is the easy button nobody will push.
At the end of the day it's difficult to chalk it up to anything beyond "Women are Wonderful"
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link