site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  13hr ago (text post)   537 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for September 2026

This is the Quality Contributions Roundup. It showcases interesting and well-written comments and posts from the period covered. If you want to get an idea of what this community is about or how we want you to participate, look no further (except the rules maybe--those might be important too).

As a reminder, you can nominate Quality Contributions by hitting the report button and selecting the "Actually A Quality Contribution!" option. Additionally, links to all of the roundups can be found in the wiki of /r/theThread which can be found here. For a list of other great community content, see here.

These are mostly chronologically ordered, but I have in some cases tried to cluster comments by topic so if there is something you are looking for (or trying to avoid), this might be helpful.

Quality Contributions to the Main Motte

@Lewyn:

@gattsuru:

@George_E_Hale:

@Thoroughlygruntled:

@FtttG:

@Rov_Scam:

@ThomasdelVasto:

Contributions for the week of August 31, 2026

@gattsuru:

@quiet_NaN:

@FtttG:

@OracleOutlook:

Contributions for the week of September 7, 2026

@georgioz:

@Ioper:

@FCfromSSC:

@FtttG:

@NullHypothesis:

@TitaniumButterfly:

@MayorofOysterville:

Contributions for the week of September 14, 2026

@falling-star:

@IdiocyInAction:

@Tanista:

@Brainwavez:

@DaseindustriesLtd:

Contributions for the week of September 21, 2026

@georgioz:

Contributions for the week of September 28, 2026

@CrispyFriedBarnacles:

@FiveHourMarathon:

"Battle" of the "Sexes"

@ratherblather:

@cjet79:

@faceh:

@self_made_human:

Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Yay my first AACQ! I would like to thank the academy.

Well played, everyone. Glad I could contribute to The Motte's September Genderslop™ Special.

Perhaps the most recurrent complaint in these threads is magnum opus dissonance: the comment you tossed off in five minutes gets showered with accolades, while the one you slaved over for days doesn't get a look in.

It's impossible to predict which comments will resonate with posters here, and which won't. All the same, I will admit to being amused that my lengthy effortpost about the importance of marriage and my desire to start a family didn't get nominated, while my (roughly as lengthy, admittedly) effortpost about the most efficient way to kill aliens without save scumming did. My wife was also amused.

Congratulations! I'm sorry to have missed your announcement, so I'm glad you brought it up again here. I have seen enough people take the opposite trajectory from yours that I find it comforting to read about people making good choices and improving their lot.

I had never heard of "magnum opus dissonance" previously, and it does seem to fit many people's reactions to the reception of their own work here.

Re X-COM and reverse difficulty: I think this is mostly a result of players not being willing to sustain losses. If you reset whenever something goes wrong (save scum or campaign scum), you'll get ahead and because the game rewards success it will become easier. Many games "reward success" but inflate away your winnings so fast they might as well not have. Love the modern XCOM reboots. You should try long war. I much prefer 1 to 2 but I could say the same about the base games.

Yes and no. XCOM is snowbally by design. You are in a race with the AI, and the way to win is by growing in strength faster than it does. Otherwise it will slowly grind you down and kill you by the mid and late game.

At the same time, players tend to overestimate how bad losses are. You absolutely can come back from losing missions and men. Early game recruits are easily replaceable, and in the late game you should have an abundance of high level troops with strong gear, so that you can tank even some heavy losses.

Especially the expansions to XCOM 2 give you so many opportunities to recover and come back, with multiple viable paths to success. They really are great games, and more forgiving than they seem on the surface.

Maybe I'll follow @FiveHourMarathon's lead and start playing Long War when I become a father.

Starting an infamously difficult and lengthy modded campaign after becoming a new dad?

Sure. Why not.

"Some people did something, as a certain Congresswoman said, but we're not going to cede the whole moral core of the faith by saying it's Muslims as such."

Funny, I was just thinking of this comment chain, and some claims I made because of this new CATO article

Data from the State Department through February 2026 show that the Trump administration has cut legal immigration by nationals of 45 majority-Muslim countries by 96 percent since December 2024. Monthly immigrant visa issuances and permanent lawful refugee admissions fell from 21,096 in December 2024 to 808 in February 2026.

The graph below shows that this outcome was not the result of seasonal trends since the drop from February 2024 was nearly as significant. Immigrant visas—primarily for family members of US citizens—were down 95 percent. Meanwhile, refugee resettlement—immigrants admitted lawfully based on threats of persecution abroad—was completely ended for majority-Muslim countries, dropping from 5,157 admissions in December 2024 to 0 admissions in February 2026.

I guess this is a win for @Iconochasm, because my take was that Trump had downsized the Muslim ban because of the problems with getting it passed. I had heard from family that he'd made processing for West African countries much harder (by requiring a large bond) but didn't think other nations were that impacted.

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.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats