site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 3, 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.

12
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

A good summary of the Revisionist position is "the things that have always happened in human history and war: concentration and forced labor, conscription, property confiscation, forced resettlement, death by shooting, starvation, death by disease- actually happened. But the things that have never before happened in human history: herding millions of men, women, and children into bedroom-sized gas chambers on the pretense of taking a shower and being gassed by engine exhaust, after which they were buried, and then later unburied, cremated, and the ashes were scattered to hide evidence that this happened, did not actually happen."

Some people want to say that concentration and forced labor, conscription, shooting, starvation, and disease still constitutes a Holocaust. That's a fine perspective, but the ones with the delegated authority on that matter do not allow compromise on the gas chamber narrative or the extermination camps or the elusive extermination plan.

David Cole for example has long tried to distance himself from Holocaust Denial, but the establishment still does not allow his "Auschwitz was not an extermination camp, but Treblinka, Sobibor, Belzec, and Chelmno were" conclusion to acquit him from the crime Holocaust denial. His YouTube channel was very recently banned.

Cole has retreated to Substack to host his content, but alas, Substack has attracted the Eye of Sauron for its relatively lenient moderation policy and is now on the chopping block.