site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 4, 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.

5
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I think the whole discourse has been poisoned by Zionists who regard criticism of Israel as a state as criticism of Jews as a people, which is an absurd notion.

This is a ‘yes but…’, but ‘Jews out of occupied Palestine’ is ethnic cleansing by definition. And that is in fact the end point of ‘Israel as a state doesn’t have the right to exist’.

Yes, Israeli Jews will find someone- probably Canada, which is retarded about immigration to begin with- to take them in if they have to leave on short notice. But it’s still pretty bad to kick people out of their homes.

This may come as a surprise but I do not support the forced expulsion of Jews from current Israel either!

Uh, what do you think happens to Israeli Jews if Israel no longer exists?

Ideally we end up with a state that integrates both Jews and Palestinians equally. I an agnostic on whether this state is named "Israel".

And ideally when the two wolves and lamb vote for what’s dinner they will settle on grass.

But I’m not holding out much hope for the lamb.

I mean in this case given the relative military strength I think it's more like the horse and the weasel voting on what's for dinner. I think the horse will be just fine.

If it's just one state, don't they share the same military power?

In practice I expect not, if they start trying to turn that military power on groups of their own people.

Then, if what you are saying is true, when the conflict is over, the jews will once again control isreal and re-install an apartheid state.

But the problem is more fundamental. Any situation in which both jews and Palestinians cohabitate in isreal under a democracy will end with one group incredibly cruelly oppressing the other, or become unstable and turn to violence after which it will resolve back an apartheid state.

Unless you want to remove the requirement of democracy, the two groups will not live peacefully together.

A fair democracy will reflect the sincere beliefs of its constituents. The sincere beliefs of both the jews and the Palestinians are that the other group should be oppressed at best. That makes sharing a peaceful democratic state fundamentally impossible.

More comments