site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   36508 thread views

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
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

That's a stretch. If you polled people with a rainbow color array and said "What does this mean?" 20 years ago, do you accept that would be radically different than the association people would have with it now? 50 years ago?

You said it, I provided a modern counter-example.

20 years ago was 2003, three years after The University of Hawaii changed its sports teams' name to "Warriors" from "Rainbow Warriors", initially defended as avoiding confusion with the gay rights movement, so even then, it seems like people thought of the flag that way. They might not have included the "Trans" or "Queer" part of it, but the sentiment is the same.

50 years ago was 1973, which was before the use of the rainbow flag as an LGBT symbol, so yeah, I guess you're correct on that one.

"Rainbow Warrior" was the name of the first flagship of I-can't-believe-it's-not-ecoterrorism group Greenpeace, bought and renamed in 1978. At the time, the rainbow represented peace and nature, and the choice of name was inspired by a fake Native American legend on that theme. Greenpeace continue to use rainbows on and off in that way (e.g. in their maritime pennant). Rainbow flags identical to the gay flag except for "PEACE" written across them were still being used as a non-LGBT-specific peace symbol in Cambridge UK as late as 2002, although the gay meaning was the primary one by then.

OG Rainbow Warrior was sunk in port by French special forces in 1985, and Greenpeace bought the second Rainbow Warrior in 1987 and the third in 2011 - at this date they still felt for whatever reason that there was no risk of being confused with an LGBT group. The rainbows painted on the first (I couldn't find a colour photo) and second Rainbow Warrior don't look like the gay flag though.

tl;dr - rainbow flags were being used by other hippy-adjacent groups before they became gay flags, and the older meaning has not fully been lost

Rainbow flags identical to the gay flag except for "PEACE" written across them were still being used as a non-LGBT-specific peace symbol in Cambridge UK as late as 2002

Here in Italy I still see them used that way, if it matters.

That is interesting. I suspect it reflects less-than-complete Americanisation of Italian leftism - I don't think you could get away with a rainbow peace flag in an English-speaking country in 2023.

I don't think I said it was completely lost. But SecureSignals was asking if the meaning of the rainbow had changed from 20 years ago, I was pointing out that even then, the association wasn't completely unknown to people.

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