site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 24, 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.

11
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Yeah, almost nobody is taking only $10,000 to move to [insert random African country here]. Or hell, most countries. This is where "race-conscious" people's views of frankly, black people's intelligence fail them. Even prisoners would realize that 10k isn't getting them far, even in the poorest nation's on Earth.

Like, maybe 100k? Maybe? Even then, it'd only be the very bottom, most desperate, frankly kind of moronic ten percent who'd take the deal (and quickly end up dead, broke, or both), and frankly, that wouldn't make much of a difference, because the smart criminals could find plenty of possible low-level criminals from the next ten percent.

As you mentioned, with Liberia, the native African's had basically no connection with the outside world and the freed slaves had every advantage, including kind of implied American backing. So yeah, drop a aircraft carrier off the coast, and somehow give some poor black people laser guns and they might be able to pull that off again.

yeah the aircraft carrier would need to be there for sure, as the colony full of wealthier than they are scary expats would be like the ultimate honeypot for any local warlords to raid. being sent to africa with 100k in cash sounds more like a death sentence to me than exile. Like getting thrown into a pool of sharks but you get a free duffel bag of wagyu beef.

Yep. This plan does not account for these dudes just getting fucking robbed. That's the biggest damn hole in the plan. Maybe you could have some Special Forces guys train these guys and build a fortified compound? But at that point, you're just another bushleague African warlord, this time you speak English and have great training. And don't forget that $10k, you'll need it to buy guns, ammo, food...