site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 26, 2026

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.

4
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Of course I disagree, don't be obtuse. A law that says you can only mow your grass and wash your car on Saturdays applies equally to Jews and Christians, but you can easily guess who its authors wanted to target.

Actually it sounds like you do agree that the law applies to both Jews and Arabs alike. But you are claiming that the intent and the effect was to target Arabs. Which of course is not true at all. For example, if an Arab Israeli citizen marries an Arab from Dubai, as far as I know there's no problem at all with the spouse moving to Israel.

This, but without allegedly.

We can argue about whether that's unfair, but it doesn't change the (apparent) fact that Arab Israeli Citizens are perfectly free to live anywhere in Israel they want provided that (1) they actually buy or rent a residence; and (2) if it's a community which requires approval of a local committee, they get approval from that committee.

Anyway, to clarify, would you say that a country is "racist" if it fails to adequately redress alleged race-based wrongs which took place in the distant past?

Judging by the terms you use like "J&S", you are overwhelmingly likely to be an Israeli Jew.

No, and in fact I had never heard of the "Yashar" party before this thread. Nor had I heard of anyone named "Eisenkot." In any event, I would not have asked you for evidence to support your claim if I were not very skeptical.

Anyway, it seems pretty clear now that you decline to supply evidence that Yashar supports the (non-racist) policies you have identified.