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 -
I think it's great. As policy it's terrible, but it's the kind of local experimentation we should encourage. Then, if and when it's a disaster, it's a useful data point for people to point to.
Food deserts are kind of a meme, but I can agree that it's on the whole good to make sure every place has a nearby convenient grocery store to do conventional shopping and create low skill jobs, even if uneconomic. The fix for that is targeted tax exemptions that will be credibly maintained for a long time and a greater level of police presence. This isn't too different from Mamdani's proposal, except it's more open to any entrant and is still subject to a lightened market discipline.
The thing with having an advanced society is having technocratic government that is efficient and knows what works and what does not work. And this idea in our technocracy is solidly in the does not work camp. I don’t think you should say old failed ideas can never be tried again but you shouldn’t do that very often. The point of education is to develop best practices.
More options
Context Copy link
I suppose the initial five stores are the pilot scheme to see how it goes, but if he really wants to help the hard-pressed lower-income families, then there needs to be way more than five and a lot of thought into "who runs this exactly, how much will it cost exactly, will it bring jobs to the local area, and what goods will be sold there exactly?" No good selling discounted carrots and heads of cabbage if nobody wants to buy them. Cheap(er) eggs and milk, yeah that could work, but prices there are being shoved up by general costs of production. So mandating that "30% below market prices" means either (a) markups on the non-mandated staples or (b) the city makes up the difference, which whoo, that could come to a pretty penny.
Aldi and Lidl seem to be expanding in NYC so that demonstrates that it can be done and that there's a market, I'm curious as to what exactly Mamdani's city-owned stores are supposed to be doing. Will they be even cheaper than the discount stores? What is the plan?
More options
Context Copy link
I don't think sympathetic media, to the extent that they are able, would treat it as a useful example. It might get reported if it fails, but it'd probably be treated in an isolated way rather than in a general sense that "these ideas don't really work."
Outlets won't even have to lie to defend it either because there will always, always be an external cause ready for use that places the blame elsewhere. The defense will always write itself. "The idea was good, the conditions were wrong."
That wasn't Real Communal Groceries!
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
It doesn't work this way. The official results of the policy are whatever the "experimenters" wish it to be. We saw this with the Seattle minimum wage (study showed disaster, official results are it's great) and plastic bag bans in NJ and CA (studies by proponents showed more plastic waste, not less, no relaxation of bans contemplated) for instance. Experimentation with a priori dumb shit is only good if we're going to get accurate results and act on them. Otherwise, "experimentation" is just an excuse to do obviously dumb shit.
My prediction is that one of two things will happen by August 4, 2029:
It will have been cancelled without implementation because of all the obvious issues with it. Key point here is the cancellation: this prediction encompasses it being cancelled because of all the wreckers/Trump/whatever.
It will go ahead as planned, run into all the issues, and it will be widely perceived as a failure, after a long stream of articles by the Post etc. The national mainstream media will mostly memory hole it, but no one will bring it up as a Mamdani success. There will be no other major cities that will create Mamdani-style groceries.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link