domain:sotonye.substack.com
JTarrou
8hr ago
So, you live in a different reality to me, your side is incapable of even token compromise, and you think three internet edgelords are the marginal Republican voter?
You don't need to convince Yarvin of anything. You need to convince fifty thousand midwesterners. But because you don't think some blogger who has been banned from most internet forums would accept it, you don't think it's even worth attempting.
But please, for the love of god, don't take my word for anything. You stay so angry at (who was it again?) :checks notes: Curtis Yarvin that you can't support politicians who maybe could see their way to enforcing basic public safety. Maybe someone who lies and pays a little lip service to having a border? Even Obama did that! Maybe accept people in the party who don't support gay marriage? You know, like Obama! Maybe someone who would write some legislation to crack down on a nationwide crime wave like Joe Biden and sign it like Bill Clinton?
There's just nothing to be done! Those wacky Republicans just won't accept anything!
ulyssessword
8hr ago
Huh, so what you're saying is that the Jews really did have it coming?
Lol, nope. But I did check.
Cults are marginalized, criminals are jailed, and pedophiles are excluded from some jobs. Unproductive workers are fired (or at least not promoted), unpleasant people don't get invited to parties, and flaky people don't get trusted with responsibilities. I'm guessing I would agree with the consensus 90% of the time, but that last 10% is very important.
MotteInTheEye
8hr ago
"I don't really think trans women are women, but if I'm just casually talking with someone and not sleeping with them, I don't want the other person to be unhappy and it's no big deal to say "she" instead of "he." "
The problem is not just that trans activists aren't content with this, it's that it's an inherently unstable position. It is a big deal to say "he" or "she", much of society is built around there being men and women and it being easy to tell which is which.
rokmonster
Lives under a rok.
8hr ago
NYTimes steps up to sabotage the Trump administration's attempts for peace on the Korean peninsula
Yesterday the New York Times broke a story revealing that in 2019 the Trump Administration attempted to insert a Seal Team to plant an electronic interception device to capture Kim Jong Un's communications. The mission went sideways and was aborted after the commandos ran across a fishing boat, thought they had been discovered, and broke mission silence to kill them. There are probably volumes to be written about different contingencies that could have been taken and how the mission was poorly designed, but we're here to talk about culture war.
Specifically, I wanted to talk about the suspicious timing of this article. It is pretty obvious to anyone who is watching that Trump has been gunning for a Nobel Peace Prize. He has inserted himself into the Israel-Gaza conflict to try to find peaceful solutions, he's been trying to negotiate between Putin (who seems to be playing him) and Zelenski, he successfully stopped a conflict in Cambodia (which somehow got more press abroad than in the US), and he claims to have put pressure on India and Pakistan to wind down their conflict.
Well, two weeks ago during a meeting with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, Trump and Lee found common ground over seeking peace with North Korea. In Korean news this was reported as "Trump says he wants to meet Kim again", but reading a transcript, it looks like Lee broached the topic first and was a bit flattering Trump's ego: "So I look forward to your meeting with chairman Kim Jong Un and construction of a Trump Tower in North Korea and playing golf at that place. I believe he will be waiting for you." Trump was playing bad cop at first, mentioning B-2s and B-52s, but ended up remarking that "I look forward to meeting with Kim Jong Un in the appropriate future." And there was a really good line by Lee: "And the only person that can make progress on this issue is you, Mr. President. If you become the -- the peacemaker, then I will assist you by being a pacemaker." So the South Korean public, who still dream of Korean Unification, was pretty happy about this summit.
The timing for peace overtures could not be better. Although North Korea declared South Korea a "permanent enemy" state two years ago, they contemporaneously also began the process of market reforms in farm management, and just a few months ago discontinued use of cross-border propaganda speakers. It's a small token, but a small step in the correct direction.
And now the New York Times reveals that US Special Forces went into North Korea in 2005 and 2019, and killed North Korean civilians while executing a mission under Trump's "direct approval". The Times claims that it is important to break this story because "If the public and policymakers become aware only of high-profile successes, such as the raid that killed bin Laden in Pakistan, they may underestimate the extreme risks that American forces undertake." I suspect this the timing is less of a coincidence: either former members of the Biden administration (who performed a classified investigation into the mission's failure) reached out recently to spread the story, or the Times has been sitting on the story for a while and decided to publish in the event that Trump made overtures to North Korea. Either way, I expect the North Koreans will be furious, this will renew their dedication to not seeking peace, and any inter-Korean summit will be off the table for at least another year.
So is the Times deliberately sabotaging peace on the Korean peninsula just to hurt Trump? I have no way of knowing, but the timing is a hell of a coincidence.
JTarrou
8hr ago
Give them twenty years of the sort of power the lefty cult has had, and they'll sing a different tune. Such are the tides of society.
hydroacetylene
8hr ago
Aside from the slanted playing field, monthly church attendance is quite a bit higher than weekly.
FCfromSSC
Nuclear levels of sour
8hr ago
I'm aware, believe me. We're trying to make the best of the time we have. And at the same time, our family situation would be much worse-off without them helping with the kids during the workweek. It's been really, really good for all of us.
FCfromSSC
Nuclear levels of sour
8hr ago
In an actual scenario where they start a civil war and win, why would the Reds not rule with a jackboot?
Because oppressing people is an unproductive pain in the ass. I've already written off California. If the population of LA wants to live in a shithole, they can do that to their hearts content. People who don't want to live in a shithole should move somewhere else. It's the same reason the Union, post-civil-war, didn't enslave or exterminate all the southerners; as modern Progressives frequently note with frustration and regret, they weren't actually Progressive enough to apply final solutions to the Southern Problem, and so peace resumed and the rupture largely healed.
You are correct to note that this is not something one can actually be certain of across the tribal divide, and not being ruled by people who hate you applies equally to Blues as it does to Reds. The goal should be to find a way to secure that goal that doesn't involve ruling lest you be ruled. Maybe there is no such way and we are doomed to fratricide, but I think my hope is better.
I wouldn't trust any belligerent in the culture war to be magnanimous in victory on the best day, and here we are in a subthread where we're actually talking about the blog by some redtriber who is very openly fantasising about jackboots and lots of other redtribers are assuring us that he is very important and influential.
Who in this thread, specifically, is assuring you that he is very important and influential? I do not think he is important or influential to any significant degree. If his views ever gain prominence, well, second amendment solutions apply for people like him as well.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
8hr ago
"[X] is persecuted because it's bad" should be the default assumption, despite what a lifetime of cultural conditioning tells me.
Huh, so what you're saying is that the Jews really did have it coming?
I agree you should examine the object level views on a case by case basis, this is, in fact my default. I disagree with "if they're persecuted, they're bad", though persecution probably indicates a fundamental incompatibility of values.
aaa
9hr ago
I actually meant "Antman and the Wasp: Quantumania" (Antman and the Wasp would be the second of the trilogy and came out in 2018). It's one of those movies where the putative male lead in an action movie is in actuality sidelined by the strong female costar, think Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (which also came out in 2023 and also flopped and it's probably a better entry from this list than Antman).
ulyssessword
9hr ago
Also conveniently forgetting that people got deverified for badthink. That kind of put the nail in the coffin for the claims of "objective notability" for verified status.
ulyssessword
9hr ago
Ingroup you mean? Why would it?
"[X] is persecuted because it's bad" should be the default assumption, despite what a lifetime of cultural conditioning tells me. Are they correct when they claim that those views have no place in a well-ordered society?
I think they're wrong to look down on those views, but I had to examine the object level to reach that conclusion. A different group of people imposing fear about a different set of opinions might be right.
lurker
9hr ago
Speaking of, anyone have a steelman of model minority being a myth? I'm reading the wikipedia article and this clearly isn't it. It's honestly the most insane cope I've read in years. Nothing but nitpicking obfuscation and moral condemnation for noticing.
Tiber727
9hr ago
I'd say there's a variation. Let's take BLM for example. Some guy dies after a cop puts a knee on his neck for several minutes and he's asking for help. This has enough scandalous accusations in it to generate discourse. So somewhere between 15 and 26 million people protest. There are a range of views someone might hold regarding police in America. Here are some:
-
Police in America rarely face consequences when they commit bad behavior.
-
Police in America often commit bad behavior.
-
When one police officer commits bad behavior, others protect him from punishment.
-
This bad behavior disproportionately affects minorities.
-
Police in America are racist, often intentionally so.
-
All structures in America are racist
-
America requires radical transformation to resolve racist structures.
...and so on.
Where I'm going with this is there are clearly escalating claims being made. But what happened to George Floyd and people's general beliefs are such that a lot of the populace believes at least some of these claims. And the amount of outrage was enough that people were willing to tolerate or overlook the stronger claims (especially with a friendly media) because they wanted to see some sort of reform when it comes to police accountability.
I think you can repeat that with a lot of progressive arguments. The general public is probably sympathetic to the weaker, saner versions of progressive arguments. And that's enough for the left to get by, usually. However, some cracks appear. When it comes to trans issues for instance, the Overton window is probably centered around the point of, "I don't really think trans women are women, but if I'm just casually talking with someone and not sleeping with them, I don't want the other person to be unhappy and it's no big deal to say "she" instead of "he." " But the progressive activist is only happy with that status quo to the extent that they think there's enough goodwill to push it further. But what if there isn't enough goodwill there? The activist has to keep pushing, but the public is tired of being pushed. Combine that with a Biden administration that seemed to care more about student loan forgiveness than raising inflation, and you get Trump.
Supah_Schmendrick
9hr ago
Unfortunately in most of my IRL friend group, casual wishing of death on Trump and veneration (literally, in the form of faux-votive candles) of Luigi Mangione is the norm. I've known and cared for a good number of these people for over 20 years, but SoCal shitlibbery won out.
TIRM
10hr ago
Roger Ebert had bad opinions about movies. He thought Fight Club was terrible.
ArjinFerman
Tinfoil Gigachad
10hr ago
Fun fact: you guys lost the war before you even knew there was one. Trans activists slipped in gender self-ID into the referendum that you thought was about gay marriage.
On the flip side, arguably the most prominent leader, in the whole worldwide pushback against trans, is an Irish woman.
Mantergeistmann
10hr ago
who names their kid Vox Day?
I think his real name is Theodore Beale, or similar.
ChickenOverlord
10hr ago
Sure, happiness is a state of mind, not a state of being. Men in POW camps in war have found tremendous happiness before, to give one example of many. And I am willing to bet that a significant chunk of women in Afghanistan are happier with the Taliban back than they were under US occupation, especially the more devoutly religious muslim women.
theincompetencetheorist
10hr ago
Ok, I'll post an archive link and edit my post to point to it. https://archive.ph/CXqXE thank you!
You don't have to believe it, you can try to search for proof to the contrary or you can try to find other aspects that might prove my claim. Absence of other things that might disprove the thesis that the coordination happened on Twitter.
popocatepetl
10hr ago
People don't like being lectured by hectoring feminist church ladies any more than christian ones.
I mean it seems like the basic difference here is that a much larger percentage of the population thinks the latter has some sort of moral authority to make lectures
Not any more. What percentage of people goes to church compared to college or works in a corporate environment with HR lectures?
That's a playing field so slanted it may as well be a mountain cliff. Everyone in church getting lectured by hectoring church ladies is there voluntarily, while college and HR talks are mandatory for anyone who doesn't want to be prole.
The average person in the west still sees pastors and priests as having some residual moral authority, which is why leftist activists still try to infiltrate churches. Respect for woke equivalents is mostly (thought not entirely! The piety of towards George Floyd, etc. is heartfelt) a reflexive and instinctive accommodation to power.
Yeah, now I'm past him and fuck platforming. I have explored the available map and it looks like I have two options: to beat the white fencer lady (and hopefully get some powerup that will let me find another path forward) or to learn to airjump on the red pods. The only game I liked airjumping in was the second Ori, and only because it had bullet time.
UPD: okay, the fencer lady is down, time for the big lava fight, reminds me of the Giant in Dead Cells. At least DC gave you lots of invisibility frames when dodging.
popocatepetl
10hr ago
Happy birthday to the Motte! If nothing else, it is a good time to remind myself that I am bad at predictions and should never play the prediction markets, because I didn't think we'd last this long. But here were are today, entering year four!
Any takes on what made our lifeboat more successful than other Reddit pilgrim colonies throughout the internet? The lifecycle of every other I've seen is:
- One month of elevated activity, with everyone criticizing Reddit and celebrating their new home
- A purity spiral towards the far right starts
- Ghost town
I'm certain a few departed/banned left-leaning posters will accuse us of going through #2. But it's nothing like what happened to Ruqqus, for example, and #3 never arrived. We've been stable at 1000-2000 comments/week for years now. Subjectively I'd say quality is down, but eh.
Perhaps mottizens are just built different™?
Lots of people saw this ahead of time, but only the chuds said it out loud.
More options
Context Copy link