site banner
PaperclipPerfector  9mo ago (text post)   30160 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 14, 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
Top Bottom New Old Controversial
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I believe almost every libertarian thinks a smart poor kid should be provided with an education.

There are methods of obtaining education that do not depend on property taxes. For example, income-based repayment income-share agreements (selling a share of all your future earnings to the school [note: link changed]) presumably could be extended all the way down to kindergarten.

That link says "sure there are problems with it, this is a book after all so it has to show problems, but it could work out" without stating how to solve the problems.

Better link

An income-share agreement (or ISA) is a financial structure in which an individual or organization provides something of value (often a fixed amount of money) to a recipient who, in exchange, agrees to pay back a percentage of his income for a fixed number of years.

That's not convincing. It doesn't even cover the most obvious flaw, which is that procedures that are no problem for corporations are big problems for individuals because they don't scale down; a corporation can afford having a corporate lawyer on call, while just the threat of a lawsuit can be ruinous to an individual. A corporation can also go bankrupt; would an individual going bankrupt void the agreement?

It also claims

However, advocates of ISAs contend that since students have no legal obligation to work in a particular industry, and since it is illegal for investors to pressure them into a certain career, students are no more “indentured” than those with a student loan.

But the whole point of the scheme the way it's presented in the first link is that investors can make you act in financially beneficial ways. To the extent that that actually alleviates the problem, it also makes the scheme not work at all.

To be clear, I provided the first link only because I couldn't remember what the real-life version was called. I'll remove it now. Just ignore it and focus on the second link.

That version still has problems. For one thing, it's about college, where people can make informed decisions to take on debt. Elementary school students can't. For another, that version only requires that the system be no worse than student loans. But student loans for elementary and high school would be horrible.

Kindergarteners can't meaningfully agree to give up their future earnings

Kindergarten isn't education. It's a daycare service.

Schooling is a service. It needs payment. Private schooling is way more efficient already, and the funds gained from cutting education taxes would certainly provide more of a service for the average "poor" family.

Can't afford an education as it stands but know that it will help you monetarily long-term? Take out a loan. The current issues of student-loan stem from the governments mismanagement of state-assigned loans, which were in of themselves a mistake.

A parent is the trustee/owner of his child. Therefore, he is empowered to sell to the kindergarten a share of that trusteeship/ownership.

In the unlikely event that the child disavows the contract with the kindergarten when the trusteeship is terminated (whether at adulthood or at some earlier date), the parent is obligated by the same contract to repay to the kindergarten the lost expected value of the child's future earnings.

If the child can disavow the contract before they ever have to pay it never meaningfully existed. This is just the parents taking out a loan and hoping the child will eventually help them pay it back

That just ends up becoming parental debt. What person at 18 years old isn’t going to repudiated the debt on the grounds they didn’t consent?

And the entire point of the income share program is to get around the parents not having the money. So the debt going back to the parent has a value of zero.

We’ve known for a while that income share programs don’t work in practice because of negative selection effects. Engineers and financially stable don’t take them.

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