site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   32944 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 27, 2023

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.

10
Bottom New Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I first came across on Reddit people parroting the belief that they could discuss lab leak earlier because it led to Asian hate and violence against Asians

Discussing the possibility that covid leaked from a very specific facility hosted in China: Racist

Insisting that covid happened because Chinese people eat weird shit: Not Racist, apparently?

The reality is that the mechanism went the other way. Discussing the possibility of a lab leak needed to be tabooed for the sake of certain political ambitions. Calling it racist is just the go-to for doing that.

To steelman the distinction, I believe would be something like this:

Accusations that COVID was created in a lab by the Chinese is racist because it means to imply that Chinese people were either lazy, incompetent or malicious enough to create a lethal bioweapon that has caused many deaths, and so are to blame for these deaths.*

Accusations that COVID emerged because Chinese people eat weird shit is not racist because we are expected to understand that different cultures have different traditions and that framing their customs as being weird is the racist part so the non racist option is to give them plausible deniability because hey, it's weird to eat [pineapple on pizza or whatever else people from X culture eats] too.

Not saying I agree with the above, but I just feel the need to point it out in case anyone really didn't already understand the reasoning behind it. I do agree that your framing does make the distinction seem a bit ridiculous.

*Incidentally, now that tensions between the US and China are rising, federal opinions are starting to like the sound of this theory more and more.

The reality is that the mechanism went the other way. Discussing the possibility of a lab leak needed to be tabooed for the sake of certain political ambitions

It might honestly come down to "Trump said it first". Which is scary.

Actually strongly agree pushing Chinaman ate the head of a bat and started COVID doesn’t seem worse for them than a US funded lab had bad safety protocols.

So yes saying latter led to Asian violence makes no sense to me.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats