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 -
Patriot Front is protesting as part of the March for Life in D.C., I guess they're mad the Great Replacement isn't happening fast enough. The Online Right is calling them feds, based apparently on ... nothing? I'm not saying they're not feds, just that I see no evidence for it. I can only wonder if it's because Patriot Front is pursuing the strategy of "white nationalist fusionism" (combining white nationalism with ultraconservatism, muh flag, muh constitution, pretending to be Christian, etc.) that many people think should be working. Normie conservatives are utterly uninterested.
I don't really think this meets the effort bar for toplevel posts. Give us background on what Patriot Front is, and avoid things that are just dunks like 'great replacement ins't happening fast enough', and 'based on apparently ... nothing?'.
More options
Context Copy link
One of the major goals of the March for Life is to create a positive and accurate image of an activist movement that is strawmanned as misogynist white males while actually being extremely female and pretty racially diverse (especially among the Catholic contingent). The presence of large groups of rich private school kids like the unfortunate Covington Catholic group doesn't exactly help, but their inclusion is understandable and forgiveable if not tactically ideal. The same can't be said for the PF, whose image and history have no sympathetic overlap with the pro life movement.
Even though they are probably not literal feds, their presence is unwelcome because it's doing the feds' job by tying the most (and arguably only) successful grassroots right wing activist movement to the failures of various scary nazi larpers. The online right's tendency to accuse any and all vibe harshers of glowing in the dark is probably net beneficial, at least for now.
More options
Context Copy link
The online right calls them feds because they operate in a structured, organized manner, complete with uniforms designed to protect thier identity and make future prosecution difficult.
Plus, they're all fit. I don't think I've seen an obese Patriot Front member, ever. (Talk about confession through projection.)
The depressing part is that this is pretty much what right-aligned protestors should be doing if their ideals are a bit more spicy than normal, but the past decade has seen a degradation of trust and an elevation of suspicion to the point where anything that seems grassroots is assumed to be a honeypot managed by the feds.
There aren't fat PF members because they have physical fitness requirements.
Yes, they do.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
They also have a suspiciously high rate of Oakley sunglass and Danner boot ownership.
More options
Context Copy link
Some of this is the relatively minimal reporting when they do fuck up in conventional garbage person ways -- hradzka has a few examples that are pretty good evidence of them at least not being fed-employees-rather-than-informants. Where other groups it's hard to find a front-page level story that doesn't at least mention weird psuedoincestual cuckolding or a story that looks like this, here they've got enough message discipline to make good villains rather than Coen Brother Villains, both internally and externally.
It doesn't take a lot of organization-minded people to do that, though it does take a lot of their time and energy (and, conversely, it doesn't take many getting bored to drop a 'functioning' not-awful-people org down). And the difference in news coverage could just be an artifact of the time. But it's weird for it to have happened for this group, and only this group.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Because of a history of right wing direct action groups being chock full of feds. The more kinetic the higher percentage. Two recent one's Malheur Occupation and the plot to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer were approaching 50% fed. Probably goes back even farther but Randy Weaver was set up by feds. For decades it has pretty much been assumed any organized far right organization is going to be infiltrated.
Reminds me of a bit in Bill the Galactic Hero, where there's an infiltration of a seditious organization. When the big day comes, it turns out the entire org is infiltrators, except the leader... who was hired by the (now current) ruler to off his predecessor, but doesn't read the news and hadn't realized he was leading a revolution against his own boss.
This is common in fiction because it's common in real life.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
I mean, patriot front doesn't fit with regular pro-life organizations(who among other things, tend to not be very focused on WHITE, regardless of their opinions on the subject, don't mask, and are heavily female), but feds could conceivably think it does. I think that's the reason the online right is calling them feds.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link