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.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Oh look, another week on the motte, another topic about DAE DAE da joos???. Actually strike that, that's the ̶s̶e̶c̶o̶n̶d̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶r̶d̶ seventh in seven days (thanks, fuckduck9000!).
I'd like to formally apologize to the mods for raising a stink about the HBD moratorium back in the old place. This is getting really annoying.
Jews are intelligent. As such, HBD provides no reason to be against them.
The Joo-posters are constantly arguing that Jews are essentially a malignant invasive species working for the benefit of their in-group (Jews) to the detriment of non-Jews, and that undermining Western civilization and trying to destroy white society is something they are naturally driven to do. In olden times, they would have just said this is because Jews are inherently wicked because God hates them. Nowadays, that doesn't sound very persuasive, especially to rationalists, so instead they make up HBD theories for why Jews are a uniquely pernicious tribe following biological imperatives.
I know this because it's not exactly a new argument, and you know this because you've been around long enough to have seen it yourself. Why are you pretending that HBD has only ever been about IQ? Even the people whose HBD arguments are primarily focused on blacks are quite open about their belief that HBD says blacks aren't just low IQ, but also impulsive, violent, criminally inclined, etc.
Isn't that overcomplicating it a bit? When did generic in-group bias become anything to do with HBD? There's simply no need to reach as far as HBD when a perfectly fully formed explanation of nepotism already exists a lot closer to the centre of the Overton Window?
Generic in-group bias would be a fully-formed explanation if the complaints about Jews were limited to their overrepresentation in banking and Hollywood, but the Jew-baiting posts very regularly make much broader assertions, that Jews are responsible for desegregation, affirmative action, increased immigration, laxer criminal justice, pornography, sexual liberation, feminism, and essentially, the entire liberal project, up to and including wokeism. Which is assumed to be a deliberate multigenerational campaign to undermine their neighbors and destroy their host society.
This only makes sense if you believe (a) Jews are just naturally evil for some reason; (b) it's some sort of biological imperative to conduct tribal warfare at a level that goes well beyond any "in-group bias" one sees in other ethnic groups. And some of the Joo-posters have made explicit HBD arguments to the effect that Jews just "evolved that way."
To be fair, you can hear that right from the horse's mouth. She herself relates this behavior directly to Tikkun Olam:
In other words, when all the people of the world abandon false gods and recognize the Jewish tribal god Yahweh, the world will have been perfected.
Whether or not you agree with individual Jews who believe that things that like gay rights and affirmative action are good, there is still a disconnect between "They're doing these things because they believe they're good" and "They're doing these things because they are driven by a Jewish impulse to corrupt and destroy." But I take it that you are, in fact, endorsing the HBD theory of Jewish nefariousness?
This is essentially what most religious adherents believe.
The Roman Pantheon was highly representative of subjugation and hierarchy, no doubt, but it integrated the idols and symbols of others into its order. The mandate to remove idolatry from the land and "cut off" the false gods points to Yahweh as a singularly jealous god. So a Jewish mandate to drive out the false gods of the Gentiles, or Ōr laGōyyīm, relates the systematic behavior of Jewish influence in Gentile culture. Yes, I do think, as in all religion, there is an HBD-understood influence between the mythos that has formulated the people, the genes of those people, and the behavior of said people. Same is true for Christians, Arabs, Hindus.
If we properly understand Yahweh as a metaphor and synonym for the Jewish people, then the mandate in Tikkun Olam to "utterly cut off" the false gods points towards an inscrutable cultural hostility. A hostility towards the national idols and traditions and even the very ethnic identity of Gentiles is openly professed under the banner of Tikkun Olam today.
Edit: Here's an interesting article from a Jewish group corroborating the importance of Tikkun Olam to the behavior of the Jewish people:
If we understand Tikkun Olam to relate to a psychometric quality like g then of course HBD would suggest that this idea which has been central to these people for millennia is both a reflection of and influence on their psychology, even atheistic Jews. Even Jews, proudly, relate a long history of radical agitation to the concept.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link