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 -
This is naturally just how people think but it isn’t how historical development and processes work. History isn’t the result of an overarching plan that only happens with some global elite at the press of a single button up in some nefarious high tower somewhere. When I was growing up, there were a lot of kids in my neighborhood that I saw and interacted with a lot due to their unavoidable proximity to my friend group, and I mentored a lot of younger peers and taught them quite a bit. There were a couple of them I can recall having to explain the concept path dependencies to. Things in the world don’t happen because of some “grand master plan.” They happen because overtime there’s a thousand little events taking place in the world that collectively add up in the direction of particular, emergent outcomes.
When people ask questions like, “Who rules the world?”, they think you can’t answer questions like that meaningfully without appealing to some ultimate, single factor explanation that unfolds like a conspiracy and explains why everything happens the way it does. It’s the US and multinational corporations that run the world, by and large. They just don’t run it like a cartoon conspiracy, because historical events are messy, incomplete, with countervailing forces against present day trends, along with everything else. It’s part of the natural historical lifecycle of things.
More options
Context Copy link