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 -
So something actually happened regarding Greenland.
Details are fuzzy, but Trump just posted that the US made an agreement with Denmark and Greenland gives the US permanent military control over Greenland, the right to expand its military presence there and, most importantly, to veto any foreign intervention on the island.
This will not make Greenland a part of the United States, which means Mercator Projection dominance lies beyond our grasp for now.
Critics will point out that this doesn't really change anything since the U.S. already had de-facto military control over Greenland. I think in these case the critics would be wrong. If Trump's post is accurate, this does seem substantially different from the previous agreement. It's permanent, the US can expand with Denmark's permission, and they can deny foreign expansion without Denmark's say so.
It's unclear exactly what the US gave up in order to get these concessions, but Trump says it will cost the US taxpayer nothing. Perhaps there are trade concessions?
What's somewhat interesting is that the US barely has a presence on Greenland at all anymore. At one point, in the Cold War, it stationed 10,000 troops there consisting of a quarter of Greenland's population. Today, just 150-200 unlucky souls man the Pituffik Space Base in northern Greenland. Perhaps that's what makes this agreement valuable. The U.S. can now deny adversaries such as China a perch in Greenland without having to actually send in troops.
I'm betting it's a nothingburger and just a way for trump to decalre victory while greenland gives up nothing of value.
Unless Trump's post is straight up wrong, it seems that we already know what the US received, which is not insignificant.
I'm asking what they gave Denmark in exchange.
But you are right that Denmark/Greenland did not give up anything tangible, only veto power. US control of the island is good for them and Chinese investments would ultimately be counterproductive. It's a win win.
Yeah there is no foreseeable world where Denmark gains by having Russia or China on Greenland (which are the only powers that matter here, unless someone goes to the paradox console and spawns Jan Mayen), and now Trump is happy with them. Neither side concedes anything, nothing substantive changes, mutual diplomatic win.
Fully agreed. I still wonder why Denmark would say yes.
Consider, for example, Canada. Their leader just goes around saying anti-Trump stuff and then gets to rule like a king because that's the only thing anyone cares about. Seems like a formula that would work almost anywhere.
Two reasons: one, Europe is currently really worried about the possibility of Russian escalation into asymmetric attacks outside of Ukraine, and the Scandis very much want the US to have Europe's back right this minute. Two, Europe is not Canada. Unlike Canada, Denmark is a country that has its own identity and its own domestic political considerations that don't revolve around the US - including an almost unique political synthesis which is willing to compromise with the Right on e.g. immigration in order to protect Danish neoliberal social democracy. These domestic political considerations vary (for instance, I don't think that Sweden would have made the same decision, they're more divided and less competent than the Danes, and any country closer to Russia would have rolled over far sooner, if they'd somehow happened to own Greenland), but this makes sense in the particular context of Denmark.
I'm not really following the "real" vs not real distinction between countries in this thread, but Denmark, with a population of 6 million people and tiny landmass, would not really be my pick for a country that is more real than Canada (40 million people and huge landmass).
Being next to a much bigger and more powerful country like the US makes you not real? Or is it generally having military interests aligned with your powerful neighbor what makes you not real? Is Belgium, surely a very non-real country, more or less real than Canada or Denmark?
It's having a grounded and coherent identity as a nation which animates the state. It's not to do with size exactly (Iceland, for instance, is one of the "realest" countries in the West). Having that sort of self-grounded nature is generally very hard when you're in a position like Canada's - the real issue is cultural proximity to a much bigger and more influential nation, such that your culture is constantly bobbing around like a rowboat in the wake of a supertanker. Compare for instance Belarus, or the old tributaries of the Middle Kingdom. Where there is a "real Canada" among Anglophones that is distinctly Canadian, it's in the run-down Maritimes, the rural prairie, places which are sheltered from America's impact, either as an object of emulation or as a Big Other to which one defines oneself by opposition. Belgium is a good example that actually, I think, illustrates the point. Belgium is not a real country because it has no coherent identity, divided as it is along linguistic lines which also represent internal national and economic divides (the parallel to Canada should be obvious), and having developed its state while torn between the influence of four different larger powers. Denmark, and Danishness, on the other hand, go back over a thousand years with a basic internal understanding of its own continuity to the present day, with the intangible self-possession that entails.
I don't think it's so much America's impact as that TPTB have been actively trying to kill it for about 30 years -- Vancouver had a Canadian identity as lately as the 90s, and while it was still pretty self-centred I'd even give it to Toronto in the 80s.
It's something I've noticed a lot in the Trump discourse here lately -- if you substitute the "America" in all the unhinged things people are saying about Trump with "Ottawa", you will have accurately described the situation in vast swathes of the nation since about Y2K. Like, uh "We will not be reduced to a mere vassal paying tribute!" kind of rings differently in Alberta, y'know?
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
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link