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 -
This whole Israel-Palestine issue has made it even more clear than ever that politicians and many of the "elites" have literally no critical thinking skills or the ability to reason out one or two steps into the future. First there is the "Cease Fire People". It's understandable that people are upset seeing what is going on in Gaza with women and children, but what do they think a cease fire will accomplish? It is literally just kicking the can down the road again. Do they think Hamas will be more reasonable and someone people can negotiate with? If not, you are literally just allowing them to regroup and commit another terrorist attack that could destabilize the Middle East again in a few years. It's really that simple. If you want peace in the region, Hamas cannot be allowed to be in charge in Gaza. And if you asked the Egyptian government, they'd probably tell you the same thing since they just had their own issues wit the Muslim Brotherhood.
Then you have the people who think there will be peace if the Palestinians get their own state. Throwing out for a minute whether or not the Palestinians will attack Israel, the real question is how quickly they will start attacking each other an a civil war. We already know there was a Fatah–Hamas conflict recently, and why would they not fight each other again in a civil war that could very possibly be even worse than what's going on in Gaza? Looking at the neighboring countries, it's not exactly a place known for political stability.
I understand people seeing things on television that makes them sad and they just want it to stop. That's understandable. But has anyone in the State Department revolting against the Biden Administration for their stance on Israel given any reasonable plan for what comes next after a cease fire with Hamas? And I say this as someone who is not a Zionist or a huge fan of Israel.
Westerners just don't seem to be able to understand Muslim extremists. Hamas fighters are literally Islamists that can't be reasoned with. This should be obvious by now to everyone on planet earth after Al Qaeda and ISIS, but apparently some people still haven't learned this obvious fact. I don't know if it's because Westerners don't think that people could actually sincerely believe in their religion like that so they must be ACTUALLY motivated by something else (wrong, as their writings tell us), or their belief that inside everyone is a Westerner waiting to come out who supports gay marriage and diversity, a combination of this, or something else entirely. But if these people think that a cease fire with Hamas will lead to a long standing peace then they are delusional.
I think it’s a combination of a lot of things.
Most Westerners live in extremely safe societies where war is something they see on the news. Americans are safer than even Europeans, having never had a war on their own soil since the end of the American Civil War in 1865. We’ve had a few attacks on our own soil: Pearl Harbor, and 9/11. This makes understanding the need to fight the war a bit more difficult. To a Westerner, war is optional even when you are being attacked. I think much the same of crime — for most people, living in suburbs and gated communities, crime isn’t a reality to them. It feels bad to lock up a thief who stole from a store. But, living in a high crime area full of drugs and gangs where everywhere makes it harder to live a normal life, and makes it far more likely that you yourself will be mugged or assaulted.
Second, most westerners haven’t taken their religion seriously since at least the end of WW2. Looking at the supposed rise of Christian Nationalism, what the term seems to mean is Christians who actually believe in Christianity and live by it. They don’t like drag queens or transsexuals because they understand the Bible to say those things are wrong. They want the traditional family structure as they believe the Bible commands this. The elite see this as weird, but it’s actually the default state of humanity. Most people throughout history have made moral decisions based on their religion, and most humans do today. But if you understand religion to be “go to church, temple, synagogue, or mosque once a week and ignore it the rest of the time”, you have no way to understand people who orient themselves by scriptures. They literally have no lived experience with people who think like a religious person, so they don’t understand that Hamas means what they say, that Allah commands them to war and dying as a martyr.
Third, the university teaches that all of history runs on economics. Poverty causes crime and war and terrorism. The only solutions are thus economic and redistribution or wealth. So they’re learning only one toolset. If you just made Hamas rich enough, they’ll stop. The fact that Gaza is awash in aide and the leadership make the list of rich, and are still launching attacks should show that they don’t care about the money. But the West seems unable to look for other reasons for the attack. So the problem cannot be anything other than Israel hoarding the wealth and the land and refusing to share.
First: yes, the Western insulation from war and violence is doing a lot of the work on this issue. Our decisions over here won’t ever lead to a rocket hitting our neighborhood. As long as supporting/condemning Palestine is basically cost-free, we’re going to get people playing tribal politics rather than carefully trying to construct a solution. No surprise.
Second: no way. Calls for a ceasefire are the fruit of a deeply Christian national character. They are the extreme form of turning the other cheek. This holds true even when the perpetrators are unrepentant, because Christian thought just views punishment differently. “Eye for an eye” is Old Testament, after all.
(I also disagree with your characterization of Christian fundamentalism, but that’s beside the point.)
Telling the Israelis not to fight back is deontological. There are good things and bad things, and bombing Palestine is presumed to be a bad thing. All the rest of this discourse—the naïveté, the tone-deafness, the lack of an alternate plan—stems from this one assumption.
It kind of seems like when you say "eye for an eye" you mean "makes the whole world blind", i.e. forgiveness instead of retribution. Just to be clear, the Old Testament is in favor of eye for an eye.
Leviticus 24, 19-20.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link