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 -
Sporting benefits...for Manchester United.
I don't know where you discuss soccer, but that's an important element imo of why "sportalists" would get downvoted in sporting spaces. If it's a Man U forum it's one thing. But if one is supporting injections of oil money on a general sporting forum (e.g. /r/soccer) then it should be expected that the vast majority of fans loathe that argument because the vast majority of fans not only don't benefit but their teams are hurt by it. Why would they support the trend?
The hatred of oil/foreign money's impact in English football is not just about morality or concern for Qataris or whoever - hell, I could argue that's secondary*- it's arguably a bad thing for the fans of every club ; even rich ones like Man U because they now need to spend more to compete with clubs that now have few financial constraints for reasons that have nothing to do with footballing success.
To say nothing of the fact that it can lead to direct cheating - e.g. Manchester City, who has faced two probes on both an English and European level for outright cheating rules designed to stop any random billionaire or sovereign state from over-spending relative to a club's finances in order to gain an advantage. Given that other, less monied clubs with worse lawyers HAVE been punished, this naturally creates a lot of resentment.
The other thing to factor in is that this sort of thing just completes the delocalization of clubs. Taking them from local entities to global conglomerates with no true loyalty - so you're more likely to end up with situations like America where clubs threaten to move at will and blackmail their cities to get enticements to stay. Given some of these clubs have been in these regions for a century, this worries some Englishmen.
Why does this matter to fans of other teams? Well, just recently the top teams in England almost seceded to join some new European league that would provide them with more money with none of the risks involved in the current Premier League or UEFA Champion's League (where money was divided based on performance). Doing so would have diluted the competitiveness of both leagues and potentially harmed the revenue for everyone else.
This is only true if you believe that the impact of people who have deliberately set out to counter sportwashing are a) inevitable and b) of as great a magnitude as the benefits of having someone like Leo Messi - a hero to hundreds of millions of kids- promoting your country.
Put it to you another way: what would you bet on? People hating Nike cause of sweatshops or people loving Nike cause of Jordan?
They adopt the minimal norms that allow them to do business with the West. But, precisely because they're buying in at a commanding position, they don't necessarily need to adopt the rest, especially locally (perhaps this is an unwelcome reminder to Western liberals about what the actual essential norms for global trade are and that they don't include supporting gay rights). Third World populaces are also well-practiced at adopting what they like from Western countries and leaving the rest.
There's also an argument that it causes corruption of Western values internally. If you are a moral crusader who is insistent on certain values, you must know that you have limited impact on the Saudis at home. But it must be worrisome to see even a superficial adoption of their traits in the West.
The idea that trade will make us all more similar was supposed to work in the other direction!
* Roman Abramovich is widely seen as opening the floodgates and most people hated him for the perception that he bought a title. The fact that he could be accused of looting Russia only added some support to the general resentment.
If anything, the "sportwashing" argument here serves as a convenient way to criticize foreign billionaires without actually reconsidering the basic structures that created this problem. With private ownership it's inevitable that local owners would give way to even richer foreign ones. In other countries many or even most clubs (I believe this is the case in Germany) are fan owned or owned by member associations and so one billionaire can't unilaterally do everything. This is not the case in England and nobody seems inclined to impose something like mandatory fan rule (you'd think it would be easier now, with Brexit) . So better to blame foreigners and "sportwashing".
EDIT: Annnd johnfabian said it far more succinctly. I need an editor :|
More options
Context Copy link