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 -
Low effort top level post. This is against the rules. I strongly doubt that you don't know this. 1 day ban.
This seems excessive. I agree that the post could use more original analysis than she offered, but this is a breaking-news sort of situation that could have important implications, and I think it’s reasonable to want to spark a quick discussion of the major questions sparked by this development.
We are for discussion. Start the discussion if you are a top level post.
We are not for breaking news.
If all you have is questions and no real discussion to add consider:
Normally this kind of thing is only a warning or not brought up at all by the other mods. But what's the point of a rule if it is never enforced? Bad luck of the draw getting me as the reviewer of the post. I am not a fan of infinite warnings.
Fair enough, point #2 strikes me as particularly compelling.
The feeling of working on an effort post on a topic, only to see that it was brought up a half day earlier and the discussion is mostly done is disheartening. It is why I often personally want the rule enforced against others. Point 1 is how i make sure I don't violate the rule or the spirit of the rule. I've had stories I've wanted to share here, but all i can think of is "[link] discuss?"
lol, I mean sorry, but picturing someone despondent because their internet post didn't make it out of the oven fast enough is just embarrassing.
If you have a long effort post to make, why not just make it as a reply to a less narrow top level post like the one above? Shorter posts like this generally have a much broader scope and therefore you can have a lot more replies and jump off into a larger variety of topics. If someone writes a 10 page essay about that time Feinstein almost got killed by left wing terrorists in response to her passing then people that might want to discuss some more topical aspects of the event are forced to post an entirely new top level comment. Which is obnoxious considering this place is already a chore to navigate and horribly disorganized. Especially for anyone trying to find older discussions.
Its fine if you leave. I only see warnings and bans on your notes. If you don't like it, that is more of a complement than a criticism. Not sure why you consider it worth it.
That isn’t really a response to the criticism. Pure ad hominem. I even understand your position but shouldn’t you hold yourself to a higher standard
They started it off with a criticism where they basically call the purpose of themotte "embarrassing"?
I mean this without ad hominem, and without reference to the remzem: if you are not here to discuss the culture war then you don't belong here.
The second criticism is that larger essays tend to have a narrowed scope. I don't think this is even true. Plenty of top level long posts have a large scope. If it was true, their complaint is then that the discussion is overly narrowed, so if you want to post on a separate aspect of the event you need to go create your own high effort top level post. This sounds like a feature of the rules and not a bug. Our rules are meant to facilitate higher effort discussions. Complaining because a rule does exactly that is always going to be met with a "good, glad its working".
The third criticism is that searchability is poor on the website. I'm human, not a robot. I do try and hold myself to a higher standard, but the user has quite literally missed the whole purpose of the community, and insulted it while deep into that misunderstanding. So yeah at this point I was annoyed at the user, and didn't address it. If someone who was a respected member of the community had asked me I would have probably addressed it thus:
The fourth criticism is that navigation is a chore. No details on why, so its hard to know what aspect of it is a chore. The fifth criticism is that nothing is organized. I'd probably have the same responses to that criticism as I would to the searchability complaint.
In general the goal of this community is discussion. We try to have rules and features that serve that purpose.
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
More options
Context Copy link