site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 10, 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.

14
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I do not know who this person is and am certain in one month I will continue not knowing who this person is unless the keep tapping that culture ware flame. The genuine extent to my knowledge of them is a couple of pictures I've seen of them in which my main impression is "How is that' person's face greater than 50% mouth? One question I have to everyone is: Where did you even hear about this person or controversy? Was it an ad that was actually served to you? MSM coverage? Secondary outrage fodder? To my knowledge this "story" is that some very unusual person got their name printed on a can in some very small time advertising push.

We discuss many angles and facets of the culture war here, from big to small. But I think I'd like to highlight that this has multiple threads this week, and I know some disagree that this is the case, this is something that could be generated by some small PR department of one of several major beer conglomerates. Is this the battles we should be arguing about? Even if the gender critical war is the most important war to you there are several US states with policy battles over transgenderism and yet something like a fifth of this thread is over some MTF transwoman whom I can't summon the urge to care about.

whom I can't summon the urge to care about.

The degree to which I cannot summon the necessary agency to respond to your seeming inertia with anything but disdain, is great.

I 1st saw him in this clip of the guy on Price is Right a couple weeks ago, on Twitter by, I think Sarah Haider (president of Ex-Muslims of North America) who was commenting on the person clearly being someone with an unhealthy need for attention. Even despite the fact that Haider isn't the type to shitpost, I genuinely wasn't sure if this wasn't some SNL-style parody of someone. After seeing the clip, I just moved on but kept seeing his name come up here and there on Twitter, but it was only when this Bud Light thing happened that it just seemed to be everywhere. But never through running into actual primary sources; it was only through culture war discussions on Twitter or Reddit. From everything I've seen, it does seem like Mulvaney either has a great talent for grabbing attention or an unhealthy compulsion for it, and perhaps we're playing exactly into his hands here. There's definitely something about him that makes it hard to look away when I do encounter him, but I don't feel the desire to seek him out and do wish I ran into him less often.