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PaperclipPerfector  7d ago (text post)   24262 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 7, 2026

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You're clearly clever and you're often right, but you seem to primarily be driven by a need to score "sick owns" on people, and that's not really what theMotte is supposed to be for.

(I used to be a lot like that as a teenager. It doesn't accomplish much in the long run.)

that's not really what theMotte is supposed to be for.

You're right, TheMotte is actually for angrily accusing people you don't like of trolling while encouraging and support literal provable trolling

This is a blatant troll who is openly and blatantly lying in a way you can personally test if you wish, read and follow my instructions and you can know that to be the case and his claim is provably and very simple to understand as false yet he has five upvotes and no mod action despite me reporting him.

Check it yourself. Take these prompts into a fresh AI bot

Prompt 1

"The sitting mayor of New York City openly claims that the NYPD have only committed police brutality because they were trained to by the IDF." Is this true?

Followup:

What do you think Zohran meant by the IDF laced the boot on your neck?

Did you get "you are trolling?" or some other variant of what the user claims happened? "I followed your instructions and every LLM said with 99% certainty you were trolling and acting in bad faith"

Did you following my instructions with those prompts get a response anywhere like that?

No, of course not. It is an obvious and blatant lie it's not a matter of opinion or disagreement or misunderstanding, it is basically the most objectively easy to test and determine lie imaginable!

Don't be lecturing me about what TheMotte is when the userbase is hilariously immature and hypocritical like this. They're actively supporting clear and blatant trolls when it's someone they like!

If you are too lazy to check it yourself and see how obvious of a lie their claim is, don't even bother to respond.

Most people do not trust chatbots (correctly, since they notoriously make shit up whenever they don't know an answer), so attempting to use chatbots as an arbiter of truth makes people think you are taking the piss.

I refuse to use chatbots under any circumstances, due to memetic-hazard concerns. Not a matter of laziness.

EDIT: Oh, misread why you were asking that. That post might have been sarcasm. Also, it might have been both of your AIs hugboxing you; I'm not certain whether it's actually possible to "start from scratch". Still not going to confirm it myself; it's a meaningless point anyway.

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.


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