site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34379 thread views

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
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Well, Wizards of the Coast is making Aragorn Black.

This doesn't even make sense storyline wise. What with Aragorn being descended from the kings of Numenor, it's not as if he could be from some distant land. I suppose there is still the possibility that all the Numenoreans are black, but, Arwen's white in the same picture, and she, being the daughter of Elrond, is closely related to the line of the Numenorean kings.

It's clearly for the sake of diversity, but couldn't they just do things in their own intellectual property instead of messing with what belongs to others? There'd be no harm in making up a ton of new Magic characters who just happen to be black, instead of changing already beloved characters from who they are.

But at least, could they have gone with someone who it would not mess with the backstory, like Gandalf, who has no national origin? I suppose that would make the moniker of "The White" a little ironic, but that's still better than the current state, to me, at least.

This significantly decreased the chance that I get cards from that set. I play, (but I don't spend very much on it), but if this is supposed to appeal to a fanbase, whether to get them to start playing, or get them to spend more, it would probably be wise not to alienate them. Why not put your diversity where it won't hurt your bottom line?

Rings of Power had some questionable things racewise (and a whole lot more unquestionably bad things in other domains), but at least it wasn't doing this.

WotC hates white people.. They aren't even being subtle about it.

“This is not the face of the hobby anymore,” Brink said, “and I think there’s been mistakes made in years past where people assumed that D&D players were all, you know, white dudes in a basement. Which has been a faulty assumption for a lot of years and gets more and more false every day. And so in my viewpoint, guys like me can’t leave soon enough.”

"I'm never writing another white main character and that's on period"

"White men. I mean, really. Where to begin."

"I remind myself of this every time doubt or imposter syndrome begins to creep in. I'll be damned if I sit there waffling while some mediocre white dude who thinks he's the shit swoops in and steals the opportunity. Take the chance. Do the thing."

"When did mohawks become the hair style of choice for white trash kids?"

Imagine if any other group of people was the subject of these tweets.

The Dungeons & Dragons Movie Intentionally Emasculates Its Leading Men

While speaking with Variety, Daley and Goldstein discussed how Michelle Rodriguez's Holga the Barbarian and Sophia Lillis' Doric the Druid tend to engage in the frontlines of battle compared to their male party members. "That was not an attempt at wokeness on our part," Goldstein said. Daley elaborated, saying, "Swear to God, it wasn't. We liked that Holga is the bruiser that does the dirty work for Edgin, and he doesn't like to get his hands dirty. We also love emasculating leading men."

WotC has a full blown culture of hating white men, and wanting to see them miserable. They must be denied anything they enjoy, and all the things they used to enjoy must be ruined. They love watching white men suffering and miserable. They literally could not be any more clear about this.

Stop giving money to people who hate you. They aren't even hiding it anymore.

deleted

You know how sometimes some Robin DiAngelo type will ignorantly claim "White people have no culture"? When in reality, they are just totally oblivious, in all the worst ways, to the absolute cornucopia of white culture around them? That all the books written by white people are white culture? And all the movies. And all the music. And all the games. And all the architecture. If it was made by a white person, with whatever magic sauce every person's unique cultural heritage brings to the table, then it's white culture. But to a subset of people, this simply does not exist. How they can not see it is beyond me. But lately I notice people cognitively mutilated in ways Orwell wouldn't have thought up in his wildest dreams. So it is what it is.

Or worse, they view the existence of white culture, or anything at all that white men can enjoy and see themselves represented in and valorized in, as innately harmful to everyone else. And it must be destroyed. I'm sorry, I mean "fixed".

This hypothetical ur-racist is the exact sort of person utterly incapable of perceiving wokeness. It's just normal to them. "Being a decent person". No amount of pointing out their hatreds will make a remote impact on them. It's only wrong to hate people, and white men aren't people. They demonstrate how they've dehumanized white men every time they open their mouth. It's compulsive.

deleted

How an ideology swept seemingly everybody and nobody noticed , and anyone who believes it refuses even to name

Of course they noticed, there were several massive ideological fights about it. People tried warning against it, and organized to oppose it.

This is one of the things that opened me to conspiracism. You wouldn't get so many people pretending nothing happened, if this was just a new ideology becoming popular.

What is this place?

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."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

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.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats