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 -
Why isn't it plausible? We also only had 1 TV and when I was in college it was too expensive to make phone calls home so we sent letters. No one sends letters anymore.
Life changes. I have lived the rise and fall of video rental stores for example. They didn't exist when I was little. One of my teenage jobs was managing one, they were everywhere. And now there are very, very few. I took a picture of a pay phone in the wild the other day to share with my kid because she didn't recall ever seeing one. They also used to be all over the place.
Fast food places popping up everywhere and people eating it weekly instead of rarely is just one small change. Everyone needs their fancy coffee nowadays. Wasn't a thing in the 70s and 80s. My dad wasn't weird for brown bagging lunch every day. I have worked in offices where I was considered odd for bringing my lunch every day. That shift alone would support a lot of fast food/gas station food. Even my current coworkers who bring their lunches regularly (buying lunch is inconvenient) often plug the machines for sodas/snacks/energy drinks or roll in to work with a purchased breakfast/fancy coffee.
You can simply look up estimates of the number of restaurants in the US. There were 386k in 1982 and 789k today. Per capita that works out 166 per 100k and 220 per 100k population. Not a drastic increase over 40 years of economic and population growth, about 30% growth per capita for restaurants.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link