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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   2450 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for October 6, 2023

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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I have a suggestion for how to solve the problem of balancing the blog-length posts in the CWR with the more discussion oriented stuff a lot of people (like me) would like to see there, and I think I have a thought on why the confusion/frustration exists:

The original "culture war roundup" was meant as a containment thread for all of that weeks stupid culture war happenings. If some person showed up at a spa and insisted on exposing himself to a bunch of people in the locker rooms but insisted that he was just trans and this was just normal, instead of needing a lengthy blog post about this, you could post in CWR. It was a containment thread to prevent these sorts of common, repetitive posts from clogging up the more in depth discussions other people wanted to have.

[edit]: It's probably my fault for being unclear here. I am giving this as a historical example of the type of things which would get caught in the CWR, not as an example of the type of things which should be looked at as ideal posts for the CWR. I clarified in a response below that at least historically these types of posts stopped being made organically because people stopped interacting with them due to their repetitive nature. My general point, also made in that clarifying post, is that allowing users to organically enforce the culture of the community is a good thing, and I contrast this with what I perceive now, which is micromanagement. My response to the 'well tended gardens die to apathy' blog is that it is also possible to over prune a garden.

I think the problem is that the CWR thread has become a place where people go to post their blogs, and that they're trying to emulate the style (or more specifically the length) of SA's posts. In my opinion this results in lots of really, really unnecessarily long, usually pretty terribly written posts about long passed culture war topics. This is fine, and just like everybody else I've of course written tens of thousands of words of blog posts myself. So here's my proposal:

Split the blogs off into their own thread, call it "longform motteblog" or "the bailey: blogs from themotte" or something like that.

Allow the CWR to return to its roots: a weekly roundup of culture war topics.

Still remove low effort trolling, sneering, etc.

For reference, here is a link to the CWR from a random week in 2018: https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/9sabky/culture_war_roundup_for_the_week_of_october_29/

Notice how most of the posts here follow the form of: here is a current event, here is a couple of sentences either describing it or giving a jumping off point for analysis, and then lots of discussion. The longer posts/discussion type stuff is usually contained beneath one of these topics.

Here we can go back to 2017: https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/comments/5z5dm1/culture_war_roundup_for_week_of_march_13_2017/

Almost every top level post made in there would be removed from the current themotte CWR thread.

Maybe this type of thing is just explicitly not what themotte is trying to do, and the name is really just a holdover. Hopefully this explains my frustration (which I believe is shared by others) with the way that length seems to be getting used as a proxy for quality. I hope this also explains the recent post (which I was banned for making) demonstrating that length is not a good proxy for quality, and is easily fakeable using LLMs. (Of course like most people who get banned for anything: I think this was completely unfair, I think the point I was making was obvious, I think it was on-topic, and I think I even made clear that I wasn't trying to deceive anybody, just demonstrate that length is a bad metric for judging quality, especially now that LLMs are cheap and available).

I value the CWR threads, obviously value themotte as a discussion forum, and it makes me sad to see something I value seemingly go away. I have enjoyed the CWR roundup threads for a substantial amount of time (at least 6 years), and I think my recent posts expressing this frustration are an attempt by me to keep that type of (imo valuable) discussion alive.

balancing the blog-length posts in the CWR with the more discussion oriented stuff a lot of people (like me) would like to see there

Blog-length posts generate tons of discussion!

If some person showed up at a spa and insisted on exposing himself to a bunch of people in the locker rooms but insisted that he was just trans and this was just normal, instead of needing a lengthy blog post about this, you could post in CWR.

Posts like this are frankly just not interesting anymore.

How many incidents have we seen like this over the past decade (it's been almost a decade since GamerGate!)? How many more outrage-bait links do we need? Trans person did this, woke corporation did that, liberal college gone mad did this that and the other... is anyone in 2023 not informed that these sorts of things are going on? This is just normal reality now.

The metagame for culture war discussion has evolved. If people want to keep discussing these issues that have already been beaten into the ground many times over, I don't think it's too onerous to stipulate that they should contribute something original and substantial.

Split the blogs off into their own thread, call it "longform motteblog" or "the bailey: blogs from themotte" or something like that.

Well. I wouldn't prefer that. The blogposts are the main reason I enjoy TheMotte and I like that our current formal and informal standards nudge people towards more longform posting.

I take your point that this isn't necessarily concordant with what the CWR thread was historically. But thankfully, the mods' current vision of how the CWR should be run are more in line with my own than those of the BLR supporters, so I have less of a need to justify myself!

I value the CWR threads, obviously value themotte as a discussion forum

Then just... write a paragraph sharing your thoughts on a news story before you post it? I don't understand why this is so burdensome. I can't remember the last time someone got modded under the effort rule when they had written a complete paragraph. Certainly by two paragraphs I don't think anyone's ever been modded.

Posts like this are frankly just not interesting anymore.

I agree. I don't think you are understanding the point of this example within the full context of my post.

Then just... write a paragraph sharing your thoughts on a news story before you post it? I don't understand why this is so burdensome. I can't remember the last time someone got modded under the effort rule when they had written a complete paragraph. Certainly by two paragraphs I don't think anyone's ever been modded.

Look at the current CWR thread. It's getting about 1-2 topics per day of discussion. Again I'm not saying this is bad, I'm saying that it has replaced the CWR, which was a good thing to have.

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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.

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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."

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