site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 13, 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.

7
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

It's really crazy how much the discourse is shifting. Tucker Carlson now directly calling out Jewish mega-donors for facilitating "White Genocide" (his words) in contrast with their pearl-clutching over campus opposition to Israel. Even some left-wing commentators like Kyle Kalinski are Noticing at levels never seen in our lifetimes.

There's a Civil War at the Daily Wire, with Candace Owens delivering a scathing endorsement of Nikki Haley as "president of Isreal" and Ben Shapiro responding with bridge-burning insults. Nikki Haley, for her part, has said she would respond to the rise in Anti-Semitism by de-anonymizing social media, for "National Security". With Nikki Haley's own campaign channel considering this clip from the Republican debate to be worthy of actually posting on the channel, Owens isn't far off.

This all does make me concerned for a Nikki Haley surge, although Trump isn't less pro-Israel than Haley, and Biden has proven to be sufficiently pliable and his administration isn't exactly composed of people who are going to threaten American loyalty to Israel regardless of anything Israel chooses to do.

I've never liked the term "white genocide." The word genocide itself is just a word that gets to be claimed by the victor, as the definition is broad enough to be applied to nearly every conflict...

Any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Destroying a group "in whole or part" is just up to the interpretation of the victor. So if you have no power, like white nationalists, claiming you are being genocided is just going to be dismissed and valid complaints about i.e. demographic replacement are discredited.

In any event, this should just confirms that Jews are right to be wary of encroaching antisemitism.

In the past I've described antisemitism as anti-fragile. So let's say Jews are going to respond to antisemitism. What are they going to do that isn't going to further and visibly validate the arguments made by antisemites? Pushing for greater authoritarianism in the public discourse is their only strategy, and it's becoming less effective quite rapidly.

On the other hand, I think this rhetoric is going to have a real deterrent effect on Jews. You are going to be less likely to see people like Jon Stewart say things like "Jews and blacks should gang up on whitey." Even the ADL is relatively mum recently despite Musk now overtly endorsing DR rhetoric, likely due to the negative PR campaign started by Keith Woods.

In the past I've described antisemitism as anti-fragile. So let's say Jews are going to respond to antisemitism. What are they going to do that isn't going to further and visibly validate the arguments made by antisemites?

Indeed, there is nothing they can possibly do that would bring antisemites to change their position. There's another word for that sort of belief: unfalsifiable. Any action 'the jews' take that isn't obviously in line with the antisemite view is just evidence of ever more complex trickery. And so it is found that both 'pushing for greater authoritarianism' and 'staying mum' all leads to the same rotten conclusion.

There's another word for that sort of belief: unfalsifiable.

What would prove antisemites wrong would be for Jews to systematically exert their talents and influence for the interests of white people. Basically, for them to treat white people as they treat their own in-group, or even putting white people above their own in-group in political and cultural conflict. That's not going to happen, and I don't even necessarily blame them for it, it's just something that has to be accepted.

Look at 2rafa who has said that we can't support a White identity because it might be threatening to Jews. Accepting this premise is true, yes it is very difficult for Antisemites to be proven wrong with the remaining options for how Jews should respond to Antisemitism given that, you know, "be on the side of white identity" isn't an option.

Why, when even white people will not do this themselves?

They did for the vast majority of the existence of the United States, and that radically changed along with the change in elite composition and saliency of prevailing Grand Narratives, specifically around WWII and later the Holocaust. White identity has been made taboo by these grand narratives formulated by our cultural institutions. If you ask the average person why advocating for White people is the most evil thing in the world, they will surely respond "What do you mean, haven't you seen Schindler's List?!"

The post-WWII and Holocaust narrative has formulated an anti-fascist dialectic on both the left and right. The left is anti-fascist because of their social liberalism, and the right is anti-fascist because of their economic libertarianism. But they all agree Hitler is the anti-Christ of this post-war moral Universe. This is the cultural context in which white people have turned against their own self-interests.

Jews who have supported ‘the interests of white people’ like Stephen Miller don’t change your mind, nor do Jewish reactionaries like BAP.

I could turn this around and ask why Jews haven't allowed their mind to be changed about supporting White identity given all of the benefits and friendly relations they have enjoyed from the West since the end of the Second World War.

To this day, Jews will go and wail like toddlers at a freakin' wall to constantly relive a thousands-year old offense, and they won't allow a single shred of advocacy for White people without invoking the Holocaust and "Never Again" to explain why it's beyond-the-pale. Anybody who wants to advocate for white people or White identity is absolutely correct that Jewish influence in cultural and political life is the most significant barrier to accomplishing this. Unless that changes, which it won't, it's misdirected to say that the Cart is driving the Horse, or claim that Dissident Right twitter is the reason Jewish influence is so hostile towards white identiy.

King Charles' very first speech featured a promise to construct the new Holocaust Temple in the gardens in plain view of parliament. That way, any lawmakers or citizens walking by the center of political power cannot do so without being reminded of Jewish suffering. There's just not much room to doubt the source of these cultural narratives that have inspired bitter hostility towards white identity.

The ADL never says "Look at that 'It's OK to be White' poster, we have to oppose this to make sure blacks aren't re-enslaved." They say "we can never have the Holocaust again, so we need a whole-of-society effort to suppress this."