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 -
Money and exchange directs economic activity. "the total compensation should stay more or less the same" may be true in nominal dollars, but if the number of hours worked goes down dramatically, output, i.e. things produced or useful activity undertaken, necessarily decreases as well. And when "amount of money" stays the same but "output" decreases ... you have the same share of a smaller pie. Some jobs are straightforwardly "hours worked = output" - like they're manual labor jobs, simple service jobs (hours spent serving customers), etc. Even in other jobs, just because some of 40 hours are wasted doesn't mean a 20hr work week will cut the less-efficient hours disproportionately. The less efficient hours are often background work necessary for the more 'efficient' hours (commute, wind-up and wind-down, general coordination, finding clients), and in ""knowledge work"" each hour builds ... knowledge that makes a worker more productive over time.
Just by econ 101, this has massive deadweight loss over the 'tax single people', like a pigouvian tax vs a production restriction. If an unmarried person wants to work 40 hours a week and donate half their income (and actualized productive activity) to the married, isn't that better than working 20 hours a week and spending the other 20 on video games?
More options
Context Copy link