Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.
What is this place?
This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a
court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to
optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.
The weekly Culture War threads host the most
controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are
appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy;
if in doubt, post!
Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts.
You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.
Why are you called The Motte?
A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently,
it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey",
originally identified by
philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial
but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens
this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for
the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired
propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."
On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.
New post guidelines
If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it.
A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts
such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a
submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).
Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or
significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.
If in doubt, please post it!
Rules
- Courtesy
- Content
- Engagement
- When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
- Proactively provide evidence in proportion to how partisan and inflammatory your claim might be.
- Accept temporary bans as a time-out, and don't attempt to rejoin the conversation until it's lifted.
- Don't attempt to build consensus or enforce ideological conformity.
- Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
- The Wildcard Rule
- The Metarule

Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
What are you playing?
Dunno why I'm starting the thread when I'm barely playing anything but I finished an Ascension 2 and an Ascension 3 run in Slay the Spire 2 this week! :D
I saw that a Sims-like game released this week, called Paralives. Hopefully you can do horrendous things to the characters. That was half (all?) the fun in those terrible old games.
I wouldn't mind trying the new Lego Batman game at some point.
I’m playing Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines 2. Continuing my registered fondness for widely-considered-to-be-bad RPGs, I’m quite enjoying it! The writing is nothing special but it’s regularly entertaining, I really like the night-time-in-Seattle vibe (and am a sucker for games set in the modern day / ‘real life’ in any case), and the gameplay is surprisingly not terrible. I bounced off the original years ago, so don’t have the fondness that others do, but it’s pretty fun.
Oh, this is the first time I've seen anyone talk about the sequel (except I saw there's debate on whether it should be considered a sequel). Why'd you bounce off the original? Did you play it many years after its launch? I played it at launch, during a time when you had to get used to bugs and jank. It was pretty fun. Very unpolished, but fun. I think they got the atmosphere very much right, even if the combat wasn't great.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link