site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 4, 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.

4
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

You can not replace what he has created (5.4 trillion dollar valuation of Nvidia!) with your average Joe, it is not possible.

Again, Jensen Huang alone is so massively valuable that even hundreds of thousands (probably even millions) of net negative parasites would be cancelled out.

Not really. It's true no amount of average Joe's can replace a Jensen Huang, but the truth is he depends on them as much as they depend on him. This is trivially observable by the fact that none of these people are able to "cancel out" impoverished populations of other countries, and have to go to the US for their success.

It's also telling you measure his contribution by the valuation of his company, which is an absurd thing to do. In the mind of a valuation appreciator, all you have to do is subtract government expenditures going to the net negative parasites from the company valuation, and as long as the bottom line is in the black,you're good! The reality is that just like no amount of average Joes can compensate for Jensen Huang, even if you get enough of them that their total contributions exceed $5.4 trillion, no amount of Jensen Huangs, and no amount of money transferred by the government, can compensate for the social erosion caused by mass immigration from incompatible cultures.

Yes, and part of that cultural change is a culture that values being smarter and harder working than what we currently have. A culture of grinders and geniuses.

That's not the cultural change that's happening anywhere in the west. We are constantly being pushed to erode our standards, and a significant justification for that is the push for greater "diversity" necessitated by mass migration.