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’ve been meaning to write out my full thoughts on Israel Palestine for a while, and as rhetoric heats up around election season, I figured now is as good a time as any.
First off, so that I don’t keep anyone guessing, let me state my position right off the bat. I don’t care. I would love nothing more than for the I/P conflict to be treated by the media like the much bloodier Sudanese civil war – a few words of condolence during the rare slow news cycle, then shutting up. Unfortunately, that’s not the world we live in, and it seems we’re destined to listen to the same hyperbolic arguments from both sides over and over instead of news that’s relevant to our lives. So, that being the case, let’s look at the conflict.
A - There is no peaceful solution. You have two groups of people that have a multi-generational blood feud going. While there might be people on both sides that want peace, there are enough that want war to ensure that war will continue. Short of separating the groups for a generation until the memories of dead relatives die out, there is no way to end this peacefully.
B - Israel is in deep trouble. The original framework of support for Israel was US/Western World in favor (out of a combination of guilt and wanting to spread democracy), communist world against (mainly for reasons of optics/opposing western imperialism, etc).
Unfortunately for Israel, the cold war ended. For the American left, they are an easy scapegoat. The “America Bad” fifth column faction of the left has a long history of hating them for cold war reasons. Given that the factions that have joined together to make up the new left (identity group tribalists + various flavors of communists) don’t have any real reason to oppose this, hating Israel makes a for a great rallying cry among groups that historically have had a REALLY hard time finding common ground (LGBTQ & Muslims, etc). And as the American left goes, so goes Europe and the rest of the Anglosphere.
As for the American right, they seem to have lost any interest in the US maintaining international hegemony. As far as I can tell, the main effect of the social media age on the right has been to break down any sort of trust they once had in American institutions. I will be the first to admit that some of those institutions have been marred by leftist politics. But the net outcome seems to be that the right now sees ALL government peripheral institutions as inherently corrupt and not worth the cost of upkeep (which, to my mind, is the antithesis of conservatism, but that is a different discussion). Needless to say, satellite states are now within the realm of things they no longer want to pay for.
Finally, there’s Israel itself. Its secular population is declining at the same rate as the rest of the developed world. And its fundamentalists are procreating faster than almost anyone else on the planet. Within another generation, they will be the majority. They’ll have full control of everything, including a reputedly large and advanced nuclear arsenal. At which point, I’d imagine that what remains of the secular population will flee, and we will see yet another theocratic state arise in the land of milk and honey.
C - The Palestinians are utterly doomed. There is no scenario where they come out of this well. The BEST case scenario is that they somehow get integrated into the surrounding Arab countries, and are spread thinly enough that there is no repeat of the Black September uprising. But in general, the conditions that the Palestinians have been subject to has made them into a vengeful and violent people, and I don’t know what country would be willing to risk taking them in.
Short of that, every road leads to death. If Israel becomes a true, North Korea style pariah state lead by fundamentalists, then there will be little to stop them from ACTUALLY committing genocide. If the modern equilibrium holds, an increasingly aggressive Israel will continue to whittle away at the Palestinian population and territory until there is nothing left. If somehow the gulf states unite and defeat Israel militarily, given the horrific deaths the Israelis would likely meet at the hands of an invading Arab army, I have little doubt that Israel would elect to glass the entire region.
And in the end, I don’t think any of these outcomes (except maybe the one with the mass nuclear exchange) are going to have much more of an effect on the western world than the Sudanese civil war, or the oppression of the Uighurs, or the various coups in Burma. Except for the fact that, due to some quirks of history, we are doomed to hear about it forever.
The single most tragic thing about this entire conflict is that anyone in the civilised world has any sort of opinion about it whatsoever.
This should be completely unknown to us, off our radar. This does not concern us. Desert shithole ethnoreligious land conflicts are nothing to do with us. And yet there are people shitting up my town centre every weekend about this. I have to endure conversations with people who inexplicably make this core to their identity.
So I'm in favour of whatever route out of this puts a stop to that as swiftly and decisively as possible while costing my country as little as possible. If that is Palestine becoming a radioactive glass crater, so be it. This is my sole concern about this matter.
As has been pointed out before, people use beliefs not only to model the universe but also to signal group membership. In coalition politics, this can be tricky because some beliefs can alienate members (or potential members) or potential supporters of the coalition. That's what went wrong with using gender ideology and defund the police as identifying beliefs.
That's probably a big part of the reason that progressives have seized on this issue. They are hoping to find something they can all agree on; which can be used to support the need to feel morally superior; but which won't alienate too many people. Thus one can witness situations like that of "Queers for Palestine," in which gay people side against a nation which is relatively tolerant of homosexuality compared to the ferocious hostility found among the group they support.
It's difficult to predict these things, but I think progressives are about to find out that the anti-Israel position is like their support of gun control, in that they are going against a small group of very passionate advocates who are willing to oppose them very aggressively due to that one issue. I remember back in the 90s, the liberals made gun control a big issue and later got killed in the elections.
In terms of public policy in general I tend to agree with you, except that the US really can't ignore Iran. Keep in mind that Iran is hostile to Israel for basically the same reason as progressives - they believe they can use it as a unifying issue in their quest to gain power in the Muslim world.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I also ultimately have a lot of apathy and also sympathy for both sides. I've known some Israeli Jews, I think it's good for them to build a first-world state, although their friendship has never filled my heart to the brim. I've known some Palestinian Muslims, I've always found them warm people, I feel bad to see them pushed out and squeezed, but I also don't see any real compatibility between our nation and theirs. I've even known some Palestinian Christians, I've seen how they've been abused by the Israelis and abused by the Palestinians, although they're too small and impractical for me to try to have some contrarian third way take.
My sneaking suspicion is that a big part of the problem is the idea of the two-state solution. At this point, Israel is at least three states: Israel, The Gaza Strip, and the West Bank. The West Bank and Gaza are not meaningfully the same entity at all, even if they share the same struggle. It seems like every prospective peace is thwarted by the disunity of the Palestinian two sides, even if it's not always the determining factor. I suspect it would be a lot easier to actually work out a peace deal if Gaza was treated as a separate state, or worse, actually wiped off the map. That's another thing, this whole thing would have wrapped up by now if either Israel or Palestine were allowed to wipe each other off the map. But both sides are backed by larger powers plus "The International Community" trying specifically to avoid a final solution. So there aren't any. I wonder if we've saved suffering this way or if after 80 years of intractable conflict the interest was greater than the principle.
Also, a large part of the conflict is exacerbated by the emotions of people who aren't actually involved but identify strongly with one side or the other, like spectators at a particularly grisly sports game. There is a lot of proxy struggle from people who use Israel-Palestine to subsume their more complicated feelings about Western Civilization as such.
More options
Context Copy link
Okay, I am way out of my depth here. But I nevertheless have a couple thoughts.
I would not take this for granted. I am sure that there would be atrocities regardless, but I think that some surrounding nations, were they running the show, would elect for an ethnic cleansing over a true genocide.
This is possible, because there are those who treat the survival of Israel and the survival of the Jewish people as fundamentally the same thing, but I think it would be a straightforward mistake even from the perspective of self-interest. If Israeli Jews were fleeing ahead of an Arab army, or being expelled by an Arab Palestinian state, any number of Western countries would be happy to take them in. A retaliatory nuclear strike by Israel would threaten this in a way that few other things could.
Edit: For the avoidance of doubt, I endorse neither ethnic cleansing nor genocide, in either direction.
I saw someone post on Twitter that Jewish hatred is always balanced and at any given time one group hates them and others love them.
The gulf states love Israel now especially at the elite levels. S America actually has booming Israel love. Meanwhile Europeans now hate Israel and support for Israel has collapsed in the US.
The idea of an invading Arab army attacking Israel today is low.
The leadership of the Gulf States are happy with Israel now on the "my enemy's enemy" principle. The people of those states (including people in their military) still hate the Jews as much as ever.
I think your understanding of the situation between Israel and the Gulf is wrong. It’s not about Iran primarily. It’s Israel talent in tech and finance and the Gulf states needing a post oil-society while having a lot of money. That is why Gulf leadership became friendly with Jews.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Some people believe that the way the relative sizes and distances of the Moon, the Sun, and the Earth are such that both lunar and solar eclipses just about exactly cover the moon/sun is evidence of God's design. Some people believe that the fact that the ratio in size between the observable universe and a typical human being around the same order of magnitude as the ratio in size between 12 grams of carbon and 1 individual carbon atom is evidence of God's design. Surely the greatest evidence of God's design, though, is that history always conspires to make sure that there's always an equal amount of hatred and love directed at the people who claim to have been chosen by Him.
I'm not sure what the best ways to measure hatred and love are, but I do feel like there probably were periods in time where the former overwhelmed the latter in aggregate, though.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Let's consider America's allies/satellites. Britain - Five Eyes, cooperative, sent troops to Iraq and Afghanistan, was going to help out in the Asia Pacific before things heated up in Europe. Not very strong but causes no problems.
Australia - Five Eyes, cooperative, Pine Gap signals, rare earths, sent troops to Iraq and Afghanistan, helping out with developing US submarine-building to buy some nuclear subs. Small and weak but causes no problems.
France - a bit unruly, wants more European strategic autonomy, doesn't like buying US weapons, kicked out US troops of their own country for a while but is still in NATO. Not a major problem though.
Turkey - quite unruly, buys some Russian weapons, complicates things with Syria or anything to do with the Kurds. Constantly double dealing everyone.
And then there's Israel.
Israel is constantly needy for US weapons - about 3-4 billion in military aid per year. Israel has all kinds of special carve outs where the US will contribute to R&D for Israeli weapons that the Israelis later export. Whenever there's a war they get more supplementary military aid. Even their neighbours get military aid to serve as a bribe for being nice to Israel.
The Israelis provide bad intelligence, it was the Israelis producing imaginary armies of Kurds for this most recent Iran shambles. They've been demanding Iran be bombed for 20-30 years now because of nukes that nobody's ever seen. They were demanding war with Saddam's Iraq and didn't lift a finger to help out. They don't contribute to US wars, unlike all other US clients who at least show up sometimes. South Korea sent plenty of troops to Vietnam. Israel never shows up for a US war with the exception of the Iran war, which was started for Israel. Rubio's initial remarks were that Israel was about to attack Iran and so America had to go in too due to the inevitable response. Israel causes massive diplomatic and reputational problems for the US. Why was Osama and all these Muslims so upset with America? To a large extent because of Israel.
Consider non-proliferation, how much harm does it do to the US non-proliferation agenda for Israel to be sitting there while America warns Iran must never be allowed to have nuclear weapons? Rules for me and rules for thee...
Israel is a uniquely toxic US ally but exercises such vast power over American politics it's insane. What has Canada ever done to America that would motivate harsh rhetoric and trade wars? Canada might be incompetent and weak but is that such a great crime? They show up to US wars. Better a weak friend than a moderately powerful leech, deceiver and problem-starter who's shown zero intention to help the US.
Trumpian anger with US allies has been directed everywhere except where it actually belongs. Most farcically, he's now fallen taken that final step that even Bush shied away from.
The idea that America went to war with Iran because of Israeli intelligence about the Kurds strikes me as very bizarre.
Why does Iran keep building secret nuclear sites under mountains where inspectors aren't allowed to go?
How much harm does it do?
Canada imposes tariffs and other barriers on American goods, often in violation of our agreements. Trump retaliated. I really don't think it's deeper than that.
Let's be fair here, America also had its own share of unfair trade practices that Canada tolerated. I don't begrudge Trump for playing the game, and I find silly how politicians here act like his actions are unprompted aggression (it plays well to the population, who loves a good reason to feel offended or to act morally superior to americans), but putting fingers on the scales with regards to trade is a game everyone, including the US, has been playing.
I think the US took more than it gave before Trump but I think you're also basically right.
This is one of those things where, I think, a lot of the emotion and anger is really just for the cameras. That is to say, I know that a lot of Canadians are angry, and I know that a lot of Canadian politicians also claim to be angry, and I know that Trump certainly sounds angry, but I suspect that behind closed doors Trump and the Canadians probably are just doing business.
As I understand it from my Canadian friends, the defining point of Canadian culture is being "better (morally/culturally, rather than economically/militarily) than the US". The 51st state talk really riled them up far more than any trade war could ever have.
Yeah, that's pretty much it. I think it's an Anglo/French HBD thing. Fortunately, with all the immigrants they're importing at my direct expense, they'll soon be a minority; unfortunately, it'll be too late for me to gain financially from that because destroying any hope of that is why they are importing the people in the first place.
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
Have you not seen the one state solution meme?
/images/17865937517738411.webp
More options
Context Copy link
Ultra-Orthodox Jews are not like Christian fundamentalists. Christian fundamentalists generally have the skills necessary to survive in industrial first world societies without outside support, because if they did not, there would not be Christian fundamentalists anymore. That means their leadership has the normal leadership abilities that would enable them to lead their societies overall- perhaps less well or more corruptly, but they could do it, whereas it's not clear that grand rebbes have any such ability, because they're hereditary cult leaders who trade votes for welfare fraud.
Instead, the religious Zionists will probably run Israel. They already kind of do, and sure they're more corrupt than the left would be, but Israel isn't falling apart. And they have a barely lower fertility rate than the haredim.
I'm not convinced that lacking the ability to run a modern state is enough of an impediment to prevent a group from trying to run a modern state. Look no further than the Taliban.
In any case, I suspect the arrangement that exists between the religious Zionists and the Haredi sects can only exist as long as there is a secular state there to exploit. Once that is diminished, things will come to a head rather quickly.
Afghanistan is a medieval kingdom that happens to exist in the 21st century and not really a modern state; in fact ‘state’ is a word that doesn’t necessarily apply. The taliban can govern that state through handwritten notes and beatings. Israël cannot be.
More options
Context Copy link
Naftali Bennett is already trying to take advantage of the collapse of the Israeli left to realign Israeli politics based on an alliance between right-wing patriotic secular Jews and Modern Orthodox patriotic religious Zionists, as opposed to Netanyahu's coalition which is increasingly based on an alliance between MO and the Haredi parasites.
Given the widespread view in Israel that Netanyahu should have been able to prevent October 7th, he is likely to succeed.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link