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 -
Hmm. I got a pamphlet from them mixed into a bunch of political mail that 100% knows I'm a republican(one a flyer for my republican house member, one a Greg Abbot flyer, one a handwritten-by-machine letter from Ken Paxton's daughter, and one a Talarico add by a 'lifelong republican' crossover voter. Being a high propensity voter in Tarrant county right now is a great way to be deluged with political spam through all media). Let me dig it out of the trash and open it...
Return address is a private house in Houston. It signs off with 'You don't need to have everything figured out. You don't have to know whether you're definitely trans. You don't have to decide about hormones or surgery right now. You don't have to convince your parents. Your job right now is to stay safe, find people who will listen to you, and give yourself time to figure out who you are. There are other kids in Texas going through this too- and there are adults whose actual job is to help you. Even if your family doesn't accept you as you are, groups like these are ready to become your found family.' The entire pamphlet is clearly addressed to minors becoming trans against their parent's knowledge or consent. It was addressed to 'students of the (my family name)household' and very clearly labeled as 'Texas trans and LGBTQ+ student resource guide'.
Uh, guys, I think this is a false flag sent out to rile up republican voters. And I say that as a Ken Paxton donor.
I'd... also add that from the other side, trans activists have an internal story about closeted kids being accidentally or 'accidentally' outed, then being
beaten to deathliterally rapeddisowned and homelesssent to conversion campstuffed into an oublietteconstantly monitored 24/7. How well those stories existed to start with is debatable, as evidenced by highlights like Sam Brinton, but I can't imagine a Texas-based organization, even one that's little more than a webhost and a meet-and-greet, either avoiding exposure to those stories, or knowing of them and writing that text.At the very least you’d expect them to use a nice unlabeled envelope instead of one with a trans pride flag on the front addressed specifically to my (in this case nonexistent)teenaged children.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Republicans have been doing this for a while. I used to get tons of text messages about Kamala Harris' purported sexual conquests with a "you go girl don't let the republicans keep you down" vibe.
If Dems don't like it they can fight back. Put out a flyer telling people to vote Ken Paxton so that he can help the president run for a third term and rename Texas Trumpsas.
I'm glad I don't have to constantly hear about Willie Brown's willy anymore.
I hope I never have to hear about Kamala Harris again as long as I live.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
It’s rather telling however that democrats get upset about republicans saying true things about them. If democrats made ads that said republicans want to cut spending and lower taxes, republicans would be thrilled even if they went to the wrong side.
Democrats are constantly running on "Republicans want to cut spending on [widely used government service or one that serves a sympathetic category] and pay for it by lowering taxes on the wealthy". That's like the single most common Democratic line besides "Trump is bad".
Ok, and the analogous situation would be if there were some kind of conservative NGO with a website and literature promoting these sorts of tax and spending cuts; and some Democrat supporters started spreading their literature among people who would be offended by such proposals; and they concealed the fact that they were the ones spreading the literature.
I think that in that situation, a conservative Republican candidate might respond with something along the lines of "I support tax cuts for everyone and my priority would be to cut taxes for the middle class, not just the wealthy." Which might be a bald-faced lie, but I think @MaiqTheTrue 's point is plausible.
It seems that much more than the Republicans, the Democrats have positions which are very unpopular, very embarrassing, but which they still are reluctant to disavow. To be sure, I am a conservative so I am possibly biased on this issue, but if anyone can identity a few analogous issues on the Republican side of things I would be interested.
More options
Context Copy link
True, but if I understand correctly, these are unedited flyers merely send to the wrong people. The group in question doesn't even claim that it disagrees with the content itself?
Anti-Rep ads on the other hand usually explicitly uses a Dem framing, like the planned medicare changes: Reps say they want to make access harder to make abuse more difficult, Dems say they just hate poor people (Btw, I'm against the medicare change).
That seems qualitatively different.
Yeah like Democrats had no problems with pushing a lot of 'Project 2025 is the secret plan of the Republican Establishments look how evil it is' when it's like one think-tank's opinions which have some overlap with Republican interests but are nowhere near 1-1. Reddit Libs were treating Project 2025 like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion for years.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
The flyers I get on the regular suggest that would probably earn more Republican votes.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Address is correct according to this article (modulo a typo): https://www.dailysignal.com/2026/10/19/texas-families-lgbt-student-resource-guide-mailers/
Getting the number slightly off is a very believable typo, and both addresses point to the same nonexistent place in the city. Either way, you can generally put whatever you want in that field, so whether it's right or wrong doesn't mean anything, and there's no reason a false flagger would intentionally make it close but not exact, so I think typo is almost certainly the case.
Edit: It appears there's a ups store at 11611 (thanks chat gpt), I bet it's likely that address, and both the fakers and real group made a typo on the number. It's very common advocacy groups and stuff to use po boxes, so that's not at all unusual.
As someone who owns one of these mailboxes, it's pretty clear to me that the real group made a typo and the fakers deliberately used a fake address. Not that the mailer includes a suite number but no box number. The plaza that the UPS store is in labels the units by letter, not suite number. So the address looks close to a real address but is actually unreturnable, since even if the post office was able to figure out the street address they wouldn't know what business to deliver it to. They have good reason as well; if some of the mail is undeliverable, they don't want the organization they're spoofing to get tipped off by a bunch of returns.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link