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 -
The article seems to be either eliding something important, or treating small-town-folk as serious rubes -- while I'll grant that normies are not likely to be as familiar with the details of AI-doom discourse as the average Mottizen, surely it trickles into their consciousness at least a little bit?
Which is particularly relevant because it's being promulgated by the same people trying to build the data centres -- it's similar to the dust-up with fedgov on "AI safety".
Only instead of:
"Hey we are building this technology that can hack everything and take over the world, you should give us money -- but we need you to leave us in complete control and not regulate us in any way"
it's
"Hey, we are building this technology that will take over not only your job, but the entire world -- also there's a strong chance that it will lead to the extinction of humanity. If you help us out on this, we will happily... pay municipal taxes at a somewhat reduced rate(!?) as negotiated by our slimy lawyers"
Does this seem like a good deal to you?
Speaking out of both sides of one's mouth and then being shocked (shocked I say!) when people catch wind of what you are saying to others and become uncooperative is a strong sign that one is not as smart as one thinks one is -- probably a pretty big bear signal for these companies if you ask me. (doesn't help that both sides of the mouth sound suspiciously like an evil robot)
Small-town bumpkin real-estate developers have been able to mint money by working municipal politicians into approving terrible deals (in terms of, say, servicing costs for new subdivisions) for many years -- you do it with some combination of bribery and 1-1 marketing; not sure which of these Sam et al are failing at, but if they can't figure it out they definitely deserve to lose.
More options
Context Copy link