site banner
PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   31535 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 22, 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.

10
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

My God. I was getting real deja vu. This is the exact sequence that happened four months ago. Down to the exact evasions about an “American wife” SS deployed after being challenged.

How often is the spouse of an American citizen who applies for a Green Card arrested and deported? He was in the United States illegally because he was actually escaping political persecution unlike the millions of asylum seekers who are welcomed with open arms while their cases are adjudicated, but it did not qualify as such in the eyes of the United States and his application for political asylum was rejected. The United States deported him even though he faced prison for what would be legally protected speech in the United States.

On 11 September 2004, Rudolf married a US citizen and settled in Chicago; the couple later had a child.[8] He applied for political asylum, or at least for the right not to be expelled, but this was rejected in November 2004 on the basis that the application had no merits and was a case of frivolous litigation. Rudolf appealed against this ruling, and in early 2006 the US Federal Court in Atlanta found that his application was not "frivolous", but upheld the decision that it had no merit.[1] The Immigration Services said that Rudolf did not have a right to file an application to remain with his family. On 14 November 2005, Rudolf was extradited to Germany where he was wanted for incitement of racial hatred (Volksverhetzung).[9] On arrival there, he was arrested by the police and transferred to a prison in Rottenburg, then to another in Stuttgart in Baden-Württemberg

Good.

Dude was told he wouldn’t get asylum, then got married, then tried to appeal on grounds of the marriage, then tried to pull procedural nonsense.. No sympathy.

Nobody is asking for your sympathy, just a recognition of the fact that Rudolf has faced unfair treatment from the United States due to his holocaust denial. The US courts declared that he didn't prove he faced persecution "on account of imputed political opinion", and then deported him to a German prison where he was persecuted for his Revisionist work. I don't care if you have sympathy, but don't play dumb and pretend that his role as a prominent Holocaust denier didn't influence his treatment by the US immigration system.

Yeah, I looked into that.

As to Scheerer's first argument, the administrative record is devoid of any evidence that the German government ascribed a political opinion to him and then punished him for that imputed belief. Rather, as the IJ held, the evidence only reflects that Scheerer was "held to account by a highly developed and sophisticated legal system, . . . received due process, was convicted, and sentenced to a term well below the statutorily established maximum." Substantial evidence thus supports the IJ's conclusion that the only inference to be drawn from the record is that "[Scheerer] has been subjected to legitimate prosecution" in Germany.

He wouldn’t have committed a crime in America. That doesn’t mean he was entitled to our legal aegis. Germany would have prosecuted him just as hard if he voted for die Linke. Therefore, it wasn’t political prosecution. I expected a better case for “protected social group,” but for whatever reason, he didn’t make that appeal.

Out of curiosity, do you have a link to the IJ’s actual order? I can only find parts of it as quoted by the appeals courts.

Wait, what? So, if Saudi Arabia passed a law against Christians and then prosecuted them (after full "due process" of course!), they wouldn't be eligible for asylum in the US?

The definition of asylum can't be limited to just due process. It has to account for the laws that said due process is upholding!

In the US, asylum requires persecution on one of five grounds:

  • race

  • religion

  • nationality

  • political opinion

  • a particular social group

So Christians would be covered. Were Scheerer prosecuted for being German, for voting far-right, or similar, he would be covered. Holocaust revision, however, is not recognized as the political category.

“Particular social group” is notoriously fraught. Intuitively, I would have thought it applied to deniers, but apparently the usual meaning%2C%20and%2C) is more about professions, family ties, or social class. Or as a catchall for Title IX groups which didn’t hit the other categories. Regardless, Scheerer’s lawyers didn’t try that tack.

Feels like splitting hairs. How is supporting a highly unpopular opinions not covered? Because it's outside the Overton window in this case?

More comments

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