site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 7, 2026

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.

5
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Yes, the US would be a considerably nicer place to live if it were all white. I imagine that the same principle would apply equally to New Zealand, or South Africa, or Nigeria. Was America herself not the birthright of savage peoples in the not-so-distant past?

You realize, the asymptote of your rhetorical line is the wholesale replacement of the non-white peoples of the Earth (plus or minus East Asians) by whites. Perhaps the natives, once reduced to a manageable population, might be allowed a few reservations in the interest of preserving the local fauna. Still, the beacons of civilization which now surround them would not glitter for their sake.

To be clear, I respect your clear-sightedness and I believe your position is the truest and most coherent on the right wing. I am, however, continually frustrated by others' seeming inability to follow the conclusions of their ideas and assumptions past the Overton window, even one as accommodating as here's. I plan on fleshing this argument/rant/sermon out more in tomorrow's thread, but for now I'll ask you this:

Do you wish to wage the race war?

You realize, the asymptote of your rhetorical line is the wholesale replacement of the non-white peoples of the Earth (plus or minus East Asians) by whites.

I'd be dishonoring you by flinching away from this, so I'll say yes, with a caveat. In fact other races do have a tremendous amount to offer, and my ideal ultimate human race is only directionally-white. I'm also not such a fool as to suppose that I know best here. However you slice it, opportunities for gainful admixture are very much on the table. But some things are better than others, and yeah, a good future looks comparatively white.

Perhaps the natives, once reduced to a manageable population, might be allowed a few reservations in the interest of preserving the local fauna.

It's a serious and interesting question and here again I don't suppose myself up to the task of answering it, though I'm pleased that someone has at least floated the topic. This is what we should be arguing about.

Do you wish to wage the race war?

Bear with me, because again I will not show you disrespect by pretending not to understand what you're asking. But I'll digress a bit because the frame just doesn't comport with my own.

The worst case scenario happened before either of us was born and the time for what you're talking about was long, long ago. At this point? Again we have to gesture at AI and remember that, in a sort of dark-mirror land acknowledgement, every conversation we are capable of having must necessarily be in obsolete terms. Again I say that, inasmuch as this is so, it's a fruitless exercise to try to chart any course into the future.

But if I were to float a best-case romantic fantasy scenario, it would be something like a medium-level collapse, balkanization of every mixed country, and the formation of something like the tribes in The Diamond Age, at which point white peoples would (and should) roll up most of the earth.

This should be with an open heart to the best of other peoples, and eagerness to accept them as our own. But you and I both understand this prospect to be marginal. Most cannot compete and so will end up failing to reproduce or in some kind of preserve, yes.

The question of what sub-Saharan Africans have to offer The Good is an interesting one. Should we let them have a place to rape infants and shatter the heads of bald men? Is that worth... anything at all intelligible to us? What does it look like to 'keep them around' but also curb their worst tendencies? Why would we do so?

I don't have clarity on any of this but, like you, I'm mainly upset at the lack of anyone to talk to about it. Oh and, you know, the awareness that clear thinking and good ideas aren't especially pertinent.