site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 7, 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.

9
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I think you are misunderstanding the dynamics at play. The Huffington Post is not cancelling Hanania, mainstream right wingers are. Ben Shapiro and Bari Weiss have certain things they care about a lot more than the inane shibboleths of 'left vs right'. In fact these kinds of gatekeepers for mainstream right politics make no effort to hide their distaste for any outsider who potentially recognizes and therefor threatens their perceived ingroup.

And who can blame them?

I blame them, because their short-sightedness will come back to bite them just as much as it will everyone else.

I fail to see how. These same tactics won them their spot as the mainstream to begin with when they ousted everyone not sufficiently zionist out of mainstream publications like the National Review.

"Zionist" isn't the word you're looking for. Zionism is complementary to nationalism, especially ethnonationalism.

Anyway, giving white people no options other than self-loathing and extremism is going to lead to extremists.

Zionist is exactly the word I was looking. How else would you describe people so desperately in favor of Israel?

Anyway, giving white people no options other than self-loathing and extremism is going to lead to extremists.

People have always been given the option of believing and doing exactly what they are told. And they wont do shit no matter how bad things get. Because they are told this is normal and they believe it, just like their idiot parents did back when a new normal was being established for their generation.

To that end the pool of 'extremists' has stayed the same.

That they're in favor of Israel isn't the problem.

Also, I don't agree with the idea that human nature is infinitely malleable, and the desire to stand up for oneself against a constant torrent of hatred is a part of human nature. But the people in China have yet to overthrow their totalitarian government, so maybe I'm wrong.

Being in favor of Israel is what drove them to remove those who were not in favor of Israel. I don't understand what your concept of the 'problem' is.

Also, I don't agree with the idea that human nature is infinitely malleable

Neither do I. But the fact you can very effectively modulate peoples ingroup and outgroup distinctions through propaganda, as well as normalize a wide range of living conditions, is a demonstrable fact. Take any self described 'conservative' as an example. 20 years ago, 40 years ago, 60 years ago, 80 years ago. Modern day conservatives worship black people, whilst a 100 years ago most of them would not have considered them as people.

Inducing self hatred in whites is a small step on the road that's already been walked.

They're removing people who support Israel for also wanting white people to have an Israel, or for acknowledging HBD. Support for Israel isn't the relevant trait.

Seems like splitting hairs and drawing arbitrary distinctions to me. People like Bari Weiss and Shapiro aren't going off of just views on policy. They are looking at who is a threat to their ingroup and who is subservient to it.

A mainstream right winger wrote the huffpo piece?

No. You are still misunderstanding what's going on.

Like I stated in my first post, The Huffington Post and the like had already functionally 'cancelled' Hanania before they ever published anything about him. They did not publish anything from him, they did not report anything positive about him, they would not associate with him or his associates. At best they would slander him. So who can still effectively cancel Hanania after this 'dox' thing drops?

If he is not getting banned from twitter then Elon is not cancelling him. He was already considered a hostile element by the likes of The Huffington Post. So they can't cancel him more than what they had already done. So who can cancel Hanania? People who would or could potentially have worked with him!

Bari Weiss is tagged in the twitter thread because she can effectively gatekeep Hanania from the only gate he could potentially walk through to get more mainstream. That gate being the likes of The Daily Wire, Joe Rogan and any other smaller connected mainstream center/right wing media. If that gate is locked, Hanania can go nowhere and can't easily grow beyond the dissident right containment zone. That's the point of this 'dox' thing.