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 -
Sub-state organization. Possibly sub-legal. Vigilance committees, neighborhood watch but tooled up. You saw this a lot in Hispanic neighborhoods during BLM. The Roof Koreans during the RK riots. You have to organize and strategize to defeat both retaliation and arrest.
The current failure is only of social pride and excessive legalism. People near the edge of the law cling to it all the more. Get realistic, look at your sub-legal options.
Go the other way. Find a group you won't snitch on. Teach each other, train each other, police each other. Street crims ain't shit to three guys who know what they're doing.
You know what? I might have a story for this.
Because once you've crossed that edge you can't cross back. You can be a white-collar professional, allowed into the good jobs and (maybe) the good clubs and parties, but to do so you have to scrupulously follow the laws which count (which include those against vigilantism). Break one of them and get caught and you're done -- your professional licenses go up in smoke, you're legally barred from various industries and (for many crimes) any jobs dealing with kids, and where you're not legally barred most companies will bar you anyway. At that point, you'll likely realize that you lack the skills to survive either in the part of the working class which accepts these things, or the precariat. So perhaps some of your former friends will cluck their tongues about the tragedy when they hear about your suicide... but most likely not even that.
The state is typically far more dangerous to those it protects than the rioters. (and I mean that in both senses).
Shouldn't be a thing. You should be prevented from doing a profesion only if you commit a crime to harm a customer directly.
They are a thing though; they're part of how the government keeps control of the professional classes.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
And this is why people live in gater communities where they can outsource the "beat up shitty human beings" to security who stop shitty human being from entering inside in the first place, mostly made up of hardened members of the lower classes who're never going to get professional licences etc., so the security guards are fine if they beat up shit tier human beings.
Win win for free trade if you ask me.
I wrote a Dethklok-style song during the pandemic about that trend. It was cathartic to fantasize about burning those kinds of HOAs (and their contracts) to rubble.
The existence of keycard-locked and gated neighborhoods is a strong signal that most of the Americans that can afford them believe their surrounding society deserves low-trust interactions. This, in turn, earns a disgust response from me and others who cannot afford the security you buy.
How does this at all possibly follow? The cart is before the horse here. People have bought into these communities because the surrounding communities are already so low-trust enough to force them into protective enclaves.
When was the last time you've heard of people making real decisions based on fiction they've read or seen? Or based on news articles from only one color of the spectrum?
If kids see a cartoon about bullies targeting people with glasses, they're less likely to wear glasses. Adults are nowhere near immune from that kind of false-positive threat modeling. They're just a lot more effective at overreacting. See: post-9/11 reactions to Arabs & Muslims, Japanese internment camps, Pizzagate, parental advisory stickers.
People can and do put the cart before the horse when making decisions on which neighborhoods to move into. It's common, and no amount of 'rational threat analysis' will change that.
Can you elaborate on what "putting the cart before the horse" means specifically, in this context? It seems you're claiming that crime and general social dysfunction isn't that big of a deal, and so organized efforts to exclude these things from one's immediate community are misguided, apparently because they only solve the problem for themselves rather than for everyone. Is that the general idea?
...But then here you seem to be claiming that the people doing this are mistaken about how low-trust and dysfunctional the surrounding communities actually are, that they've been propagandized into a fear response that is not warranted by the situation. Is this also accurate?
...But it seems these two points contradict each other. If the security they obtain is illusory, because it's really not that bad, then why does paying more and restricting oneself to gain this illusory "security" earn "a disgust response from me and others who cannot afford the security you buy." If they don't need the security, then you and the others who can't afford it don't need it either, right?
Straightforwardly, and from direct personal experience as well as observed experience of those close to me, low-trust areas are in fact absolutely awful, and the crime and dysfunction they engender makes living a decent life far, far harder than a reasonable person should or will tolerate. The people who take positive action to exclude such crime and dysfunction from their communities are doing what they can with what they have where they are. Those who cannot enjoy such coordination could, if they wished, get the same effect through the powers of the state; not doing so is a decision that a majority of them have made and continue to make, because they consider the steps necessary unacceptable. I see no reason to consider your disgust toward the people who wall themselves off from such dysfunction legitimate in any way.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
And reading your comment just makes me even more convinced about the goodness and necessity of having a gated community to live in, far away from those with fantasies like yours. First the lower classes take away the surplus we generate through taxation and spend it on themselves, showing precisely zero gratitude for what we are giving them and then they fantasize about hurting us for using what portion of the fruits of our labour we have left over to create a healthy, functioning society for ourselves.
Nothing we do inside our gated communities precludes you from creating a similar thing for yourself on the outside. It is the bad behaviour of the lower classes which led to the necessity of gated communities in the first place, and now you hate us for doing exactly what you would have probably done were you in our situation... Gated communities don't create low trust societies but rather low trust societies create the need for gated communities in the first place.
We are the ones paying for your continued existence and in return you treat us like this? I've always felt that the higher classes are fundamentally better human beings than the lower classes (and therefore if you were to turn the tables and give the current lower classes stewardship over the resources of society the world would get much worse very quickly because every single vice the common man accuses us of is present in even greater quantities amongst the lower class) but I guess it's good to get some vindication for my belief.
Are we LARPing, or just throwing speeches at each other? 🤣
Consider the following:
The benefit cliffs from tax subsidies are real, and most technician jobs pay in the shadow of them. Competent contributors without a strong social network seem to get the worst of both worlds. Especially if the work is structured to have compulsory overtime to meet legal deadlines, and face-to-face socializing is rarely possible during work hours.
Everyone fantasizes about violence. Some people sublimate it better than others. I appreciate your honest distaste. It's less exhausting to communicate with masks off.
You're welcome to believe we deserve our hell, as I believe you've invented one for us by relying on Internet art and thirdhand stories.
Now, this might not be the thread for it. But are you ready for some productive conversation after we've puffed our chests at each other?
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