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.

There are a lot of people in this thread comparing their child transitioning to death.

It's one thing to think of it as a bad thing that is happening to your child. But it is hyperbolic to compare transition with death.

Um. Sir or Madam. Your child is not dead. Unless you're saying they're dead to you-

Doesn't medically transitioning make your child infertile? From an evolutionary psychology perspective, isn't that similar to your child dying? It doesn't surprise me that some parents react as strongly to that as they would to their children dying.

You can freeze sperm and eggs before the transition and then have a surrogate bear the child. Let's say some billionaire has a trans kid and creates a massive free sperm/egg preservation service and covers the cost of surrogacy/artificial wombs in 2040 for all trans people. Is the issue resolved, do conservative parents suddenly become okay with their kids transitioning knowing their genes will live on? Who is a conservative parent more likely to keep in their social life, an unmarried childless cis straight son or daughter, or a trans kid in a T4T marriage with a biological child?

Obviously not, because the issue isn't actually fertility (which is massively declining among cis people too). It's an aesthetic/social/moral revulsion at transness.

Obviously our programming can’t update for continued fertility so it would be weird. Same way every guy I’ve ever met doesn’t want to wear a condom during sex. It’s just feels fake even if the sensory perception is identical.

There is still a fakeness about being trans that is giving up a bit of your humanity. Your gender is a part of your identity and I don’t believe in fluidity as being natural. It has no evolutionary advantage. It appears to be purely a social construct as opposed to gender at birth being natural.

Personally for those who want your kids to be gender normal I think you need to boost their confidence and hope they are one of the cool kids. Trans seems like goth or emo to me in generation past where the non popular kids take up something to have their own internal social structure they can win at without competing with the traditional social hierarchy.

Ummm, I've had sex wearing and not wearing a condom and it's noticeably different. Sex with a condom on is still great and guys who pressure women by claiming it's awful are shitty but no, it's definitely not identical.

Yeah so we're in agreement, it's not actually about fertility it's about the belief that transness is fake.

Sex with a condom is kind of shit though. Not really worth it unless you're a horny teenager.

I agree that sex without a condom is better, but let's not go into absurd hyperbole territory here. Sex with a condom is still really good and well worth it.

I genuinely disagree. Sex with a condom isn't really worth outside of the first sexual encounters with someone (and even then it's highly frustrating) or when you're a teenager.

I feel like the expression of eating candy with the wrapper on is fairly accurate. There is some enjoyment to be had but unless I'm really starving I'm not going to bother.

When you say "it's not worth it", I take it to mean that you would rather not have sex at all than have sex with a condom on. There's no accounting for taste and all, but I can't really understand why you would say that. Having sex with a condom is definitely lesser, but I'd much rather have a lesser pleasure than none at all (which is the alternative here).

More comments