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naraburns  nihil supernum  2d ago (text post)   Edited 2d ago   2342 thread views

Quality Contributions Report for October 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

@FiveHourMarathon:

Contributions for the week of September 28, 2026

@100ProofTollBooth:

Contributions for the week of October 5, 2026

@kky:

@YE_GUILTY:

@ThenElection:

@FtttG:

@roystgnr:

@YoungAchamian:

@KingOfTheBailey:

@Shakes:

@hanikrummihundursvin:

@OliveTapenade:

Contributions for the week of October 12, 2026

@4bpp:

@Rov_Scam:

@coffee_enjoyer:

@FCfromSSC:

@rockbier1218:

Contributions for the week of October 19, 2026

@Shakes:

@Iconochasm:

@Dean:

@Primaprimaprima:

@naraburns:

@satirizedoor:

Contributions for the week of October 26, 2026

@Shrike:

@hanikrummihundursvin:

@FCfromSSC:

@SecureSignals:

@Nerd:

@Goodguy:

@Shakes:

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I think one can distinguish vaguely right-coded from outright culture war? By comparison, consider, say, Korrasami is obviously left-coded, but I don't think it was held up primarily as culture war.

Take this:

Right-wingers didn't jump onto the meme for its 'racism and ethno-nationalism' — the majority of the appeal for them was about romance, love, yearning, gender dynamics, and flag planting. Malfoid as a trend led to lots of people discussing what was lacking in modern-day courtship, or in modern western media.

I don't think that's culture war, as such. That's just a lot of people genuinely enjoying something that speaks to their values. That is itself the good thing that I want to encourage, and which I don't want to be hijacked by opportunists.

I suppose the content-neutral way to express this is that every popular trend like this starts with people who genuinely enjoy it on its own terms, for what it is in itself, and then later there are opportunists who want to convert it into propaganda for some other cause. I have no objection to the former, and indeed I commend the former. The latter are the ones who make me see red.

Adding onto all of this is the use of AI fanart and animations in this trend.

I've thankfully been able to avoid most of that by using more traditional art and fiction aggregators.

There is definitely a culture war story to have around bot-generated content, and I'm pro-Malfoid while still furiously against that garbage, but in this case I think Malfoid is just the occasion, not the cause. Any popular media trend is going to attract bandwagoners, and unfortunately bots have made it easy for people to try to bandwagon with slop. I wish they wouldn't, but the issue is the bots, not the art trend itself.

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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."

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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.

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