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 -
By his account, @ymeskhout grew up in Morocco, in which hatred of Jews was the air he breathed:
Additionally, I believe he has lived in several Dem-leaning American cities, and on his Substack he occasionally posts videos of himself trolling Palestine activists in person. Suffice it to say I think he has more than a passing familiarity with the movement.
Well, for one thing, the pro-Palestine movement exists outside of the US, so the second half of that cause obviously doesn't apply to pro-Palestinians in Europe or Australia.
I dont see how him being Moroccan changes anything. Living in an antisemitic society is not the same as being a part of a successful political movement for change.
Im sure there are many lolcows among protestors, but do zionist like Meshkout ever stop to think why the American public have moved sharply against Israel in recent years, even accounting for this? Could it be that people like himself, and other online warriors like Destiny and Ben Shapiro are even more off-putting?
Dems and indys, and basically every voter group under the age of 50, have adopted the pro-palestinian movements most important political goals according to nearly every poll on the matter, so all Meshkout is revealing himself as a zionist zealot.
Well, "successful" is just about the last thing you could describe the Palestinian movement as.
The pro-Palestinian movement in the US is absolutely an underdog compared to the zionist one, but have been very successful in shaping public opinion against Israel in the past few years.
Aipac now routinely have to spend tens of millions for their candidate to win, and the ads mostly dont even mention Israel, because they know it is a losing position in most of the country. As we know from many culture war issues, elite consensus can hold on for a while against overwhelming public disapproval, but usually not forever.
Israel have been a rallying cry for the leftist insurgents in the party and many democrats have already fallen in line, and are promising to never take aipac money again. If the august primaries goes well for the DSA types, I expect AOC to be the dem frontrunner for 2028.
Okay, but what has any of this actually accomplished for the Palestinian people with which the movement is ostensibly so concerned?
You claim that the pro-Palestine movement is rallied around a singular cause of preventing Israel's "genocide". In your opinion, did the movement succeed in preventing said genocide?
Many pro-Palestine activists likewise claim to want to establish an independent Palestinian state, a goal that has not come a millimetre closer since 1948.
"Boycott, Divest, Sanction" died on its arse. No major American tech company can afford not to do business with Israeli tech firms. Neither can the US, if they want to stay competitive with China.
Netanyahu is still a free man. The US still provides plenty of armaments to Israel. Israel's economy is thriving. The likelihood of Israel facing ICC charges for genocide appear ever slimmer. Hamas is militarily weaker than it was prior to October 7th. The Abraham Accords remain in effect.
Let's say AOC secures both the Dem nomination and the presidency. At the end of her first term (in 2032) do you honestly think relations between the US and Israel will have significantly changed in any way? Do you honestly think an independent Palestinian state will have been established?
"But Mamdani is mayor of New York!" "Multiple European countries have recognised the state of Palestine!" "Lots of Americans agree with us!" "AOC will be the Dem nominee in 2028!" I have to ask – so what? Changing people's minds and "raising awareness" is only valuable in so far as these are instrumental goals – if they never translate into actual policy shifts and material gains, they're meaningless. Bragging about meaningless symbolic victories like this is what you do when your movement has nothing real to show for itself, and it's frankly embarrassing. The pro-Palestinian movement is not "an underdog": they have accomplished none of their ostensible goals. What's worse, they don't even seem to be embarrassed by this. They're not earnestly engaging in soul-searching and trying to figure our what they can do better – they're just carrying on business as usual.
Funnily, @ymeskhout has not one but two articles on this very particular pathology.
Comparisons with BLM are illustrative. There's no question that BLM was "very successful in shaping public opinion". And yet six years on from the movement's peak, what material goals have they accomplished? Police departments remain un-defunded, prisons have not been abolished, and if there's been any meaningful decline in the rate of black Americans getting killed by police officers, I'm not aware of it. By any objective, material metric, the movement must be judged a failure in its ostensible goals. Likewise here.
P.S.: I think it's rather telling that you don't say the pro-Palestinian movement has "been very successful in shaping public opinion in favour of Palestine in the past few years", but rather that it has "been very successful in shaping public opinion against Israel." The pro-Palestinian movement purports to want to put an end to the "genocide" and to establish an independent Palestinian movement, goals at which (according to the activists themselves) it has obviously failed thus far. But if these goals are just smoke and mirrors for the real goal of ostracising and harassing Jews, then I must acknowledge you've had slightly more success in that venture. The top-level post was inspired by my longstanding impression that so-called pro-Palestine activists are motivated less by genuine concern for the welfare of the Palestinian people and a desire for them to achieve national self-determination, and more by a hatred for Israel and the people who live there. This interaction with you has done nothing to disabuse me of this impression.
No they are not, because support for BLM rose in the weeks after George Floyds death, and then within a few month fell off a cliff. Support for ending aid to Israel is on the rise for 3 continuous years.
Yes, it will quite obviously entirely change the US policies towards the whole of the Middle East, including Israels enemies. If you are in denial about this, I suspect you are in a minority, even among zionists.
Aipac is spending 40 million on one senate race in Michigan, and they spent 30 million to primary Thomas Massie.
Well like any movement, they build their case gradually. See the pro-life movement.
If you believe the US-Israel relationship is built on some billion shekels, then sure that's a possibility.
But what about the extensive interoperability created from decades of joint ops? What about the co-developed missile defence systems? Multiple mid-level officials across the Pentagon, State Department, and intelligence community, as well as key committees (Armed Services and Foreign Affairs) have entire careers, doctrines, and planning assumptions built around the US-Israel relationship, and favour continuity. Multiple laws, MOUs, and bipartisan resolutions across 8 decades have created locked-in commitments. Changing this needs a historically rare sustained coordination across both parties to amend many, many layers of complex legal procedures over a foreign policy issue.
Are you willing to bet AOC can girlboss her way through such overwhelming institutional inertia and rewrite war plans and agreements to overturn 8 decades of sustained policymaking?
@FtttG 's point is that these movements rarely impact foreign policy, abortion is a domestic matter. But the fact that both BLM and Palestine protests erupted across Europe, Australia and New Zealand clearly shows they were US culture war exports.
There seems to be a motte and bailey in your argument. The fact that AOC cannot completely over night turn Israel into a pariah, does not mean that she (or someone like her) cannot take serious steps to disadvantage Israel.
Aipac is spending 100 million or more each cycle now to keep their representatives in congress and senate. That is a big increase from previously. They are quite obviously doing this because "their" candidate winning is important to keep the rest of Dems in line.
I think we will see, but a DSA member winning statewide in a swing state (which seems possible at this point) is a rare moment indeed. It quite obviously will have knock-on effects.
You said
That's some strong vocabulary, and does insinuate that by 2032-36, we would have seen the type of policy reversals that I described. That institutional inertia, i.e. the airtight legal architecture and bureaucratic path dependence, is the decisive factor in the US-Israel relationship. And anything short of overturning those thick set of constraints, even by a trifle, is frankly a consolation prize. Realistically, yes, aid packages can be delayed, conditions can be dictated, criticisms can mount, and specific arms transfers can be slowed or scrutinised. Variants of that have already happened in limited ways under Republican Presidents Reagan and Bush Sr.
Re AIPAC, consider that it is a human organisation run by humans with very human judgements that are neither perfect nor 100% rational. Yes, public opinion has turned against Israel and even American Jews by extension.
Yes, they're a fundamentally pro-Israel lobby, and obviously wish to preserve a pro-Israel public consensus for that reason alone. That by itself isn't evidence of anything.
AIPAC is headed by American Jews. They are naturally concerned by the rise of rancid antisemitism both online and IRL that doesn't care to distinguish Netanyahu from IDF/Mossad from Israel from regular Jews. And that could directly impact their immediate livelihoods. In their minds, protecting American Jews is analogous to defending Israel.
To you, this wave of antisemitism may be justified or at least excusable, because this time the Jews have truly earned it by bombing Palestinian babies. But to the group whose ethnic and cultural history is marked by the Holocaust, multiple ethnic cleansings and pogroms, and all around scapegoating, that just brings up very unpleasant memories irrespective of context. So yes, they want "their" candidates to win. But even if they don't, the US-Israel relationship would still be protected by institutional inertia.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link