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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   9193 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 1, 2026

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The aftermath of the case seems like a classic Toxoplasma of Rage situation - not the controversial, toxoplasmic one that gets everyone whipped up, but the Eric Garner style. The murder, the police behaviour, the family behaviour: everything is so cut and dry terrible that there is no controversy. Even on UK reddits, which are as fortified progressive as you can get, there is almost universal outrage here.

Unlike George Floyd, where his past criminality and the fentanyl accusations gave plenty of meat for culture warriors to help spiral it into a national emergency, Nowak's murder looks destined to fizzle out. There's not even some low sentence for the murderer, while the authorities have been quick to recognize the blowback against his family and sought to charge them with related crimes.

Ironically, if the police had actually found some spicy memes or similar in Nowak's phone, it probably would have helped the overall cause.

I think this is a case where you can sell it to leftists based on how you frame it. If you stick to "police bad", they'll agree, no questions asked. The moment you introduce the "white people are disfavored in two-tier policing" or "deport the immigrants", they'll sour pretty quick and condemn the entirety of the protests.

"white people are disfavored in two-tier policing"

Some extremely stunning loss of message control going on there where the usual suspects are denying that two-tier policing is real while the UK government itself is desperately pleading with the public that it'll review its explicit two-tier policing policies.

Instead of "white people being disfavored," maybe "shitty people who happen to be People of Color will take advantage of the special protections afforded to them to victimize others or avoid consequences. They know that if they say 'Racism' people like those cops or you will immediately jump to their defense. So maybe be slightly less credulous when someone cries wolf/racism." might be more convincing?

There are no shitty people of colour, only victims of microaggressive/genetic/societal racism that they have no choice but to react with violence. The teenage Ukrainian refugee girl who was murdered by Decarlos Dejuan Brown Jr is not a cause celebre, she is a victim of white societies racism that forced Brown to stab her and scream "I GOT THAT WHITE GIRL". Murals honouring Iryna are taken down, Saint Floyd is still honoured. Agency only exists for white people, who by simply existing are the cause of all sins blacks and browns endure and commit.

I don't think this works, because I think that many people reconcile such cognitive dissonance by never admitting a single crack in the facade. Antiracism, like any religious with mountains of apparent evidence against it, starts to fall apart as soon as you allow a single crack in the facade. I'm not singling out leftists here, honestly, this is a pretty common human trait. It's epistemically sustainable to close your eyes and cover your ears and say "LALALA I'M NOT GOING TO LISTEN TO YOU BIGOTS/SINNERS/COMMUNISTS" while it's extremely uncomfortable for most people to hold nuanced or qualified versions of deeply held moral beliefs.

Unlike George Floyd, where his past criminality and the fentanyl accusations gave plenty of meat for culture warriors to help spiral it into a national emergency,

I'm fairly keyed into rightwing stuff, and I don't remember this being reported until well after the rioting was a Thing.

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