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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   6830 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 21, 2026

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Man, after punching you in the face, "Really when you think about it, there is no reason for us to fight. I was mad before. You are mad now. Suffice to say we both experienced madness and it's time to bury the hatchet."

I agree that we should patch the vulnerabilities. But the people patching the vulnerabilities should not be the same people who shut the world down and tried to create a global censorship regime. It matters.

You are never going to know who punched you in the face. You can take steps to avoid getting punched in the face again, regardless of who did it, or you can obsess over who punched you in the face and get punched in the face again and again.

I'd love to know who punched you in the face. I'd love for you to never get punched in the face again, and I'd love to never get punched in the face.

No amount of pressure from the West or anyone else is going to make China stop being sketchy as fuck, it's unlikely we will ever know.

Improving wet market and lab safety is an increasing existential threat.

Don't focus on the former at the expense of the latter.

I think we're broadly in agreement, but it's imperative that we don't put the same people in charge of the cleanup that caused the problem in the first place.

I'm not even talking about China. I'm talking about the gain of function researchers in the US. I'm talking about Anthropic setting up a biolab. I'm talking about the people whose bungled response caused an order of magnitude more damage than the virus itself. Nothing was learned. Putting Fauci in prison would at least "encourager les autres".

I think in a just world you might be right but the reality of the situation is that things have become wrapped up in comorbid political problems and a focus on say, jailing Fauci just firmly distracts from getting any useful done.

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