site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 13, 2023

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.

15
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Indeed, which is why I said we don't actually know why God does allow it.

If someone said murder is making a mockery of God, the same critique applies.

That doesn't mean murder is good, just that its hard to describe it as being a mockery of God. It is part of His plan. He knows who will murder and why and when and whom. It is (as is all evil) intrinsically part of His plan for some purpose theologians have struggled with but ultimately do not know.

If you want to say it is sinful, i think that makes sense from within the context of a Christian, no doubt.

God knew at the beginning of Creation how many trans people there would be in 2023. He could have arranged things so that that number was zero. He chose not to. We don't understand why. It could be because He prizes free will so that he chose not to eliminate that potential future quirk of the human pysche. Maybe He is constrained by rules we don't understand. Maybe its Scott's version from Unsong where multiple universe have to be different to maximize good.

But in all cases assuming Christians beliefs about God are accurate it is part of His plan and therefore isn't mocking Him. Unless as stated it is self-mockery. Which is another possibilty, maybe he has a self-deprecating sense of humor! We just don't know.

We do know why he allows it. If you can’t mock god - being trans/murder/greedy etc - then you don’t have free will. God didn’t create robots.

And then God solved the issue of our mockery by becoming like us in Jesus. To give us an example of how to follow him. Then suffered and died on the cross in our state. Was resurrected so that we too could be resurrected from our sin.

These are all solved issues and not gotchas.