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 -
To add to The_Nybbler's point, oral arguments in Rahimi were November 2023, a case where an incredibly unsympathetic defendant (alleged multiple shooter, drug dealer, and girlfriend beater) was indicted for possessing a firearm while subject to a domestic restraining order. We won't know for certain how the court rules until the opinion drops, and that probably won't happen for a month (or up to three).
But it's extremely unlikely that this will result in a significantly broadened understanding of the Second Amendment. The most optimistic takes in the gunnie world hope that the Court will allow Rahimi's conviction and just require a finding of 'dangerousness'. Most expect that they'll overturn the lower court, or leave only the most narrow process grounds to protect Rahimi.
And there are reasons beyond oral argument tea-leaf reading for that. It's already happened before in Gary/Greer, where unsympathetic plaintiffs made it easy for the court to decide that for process reasons a prohibited person didn't need to be proven to know they were prohibited.
But even more broadly, there's just not that much of the court touching this right to protect all but the most aggressive infringements in the cleanest-cut cases across the wide scope of all people in a jurisdiction, and sometimes not even that, even as case after case was teed up.
If the Court wanted to protect the rights of people who hadn't been violent, they had a case where a man was banned from possessing guns because he was convicted of counterfeiting cassette tapes in 1987. And they punted. If the Court wanted to protect the rights of people who had suffered mental illness long ago and recovered, they had a case where a man was banned from possessing guns because he had a depressive episode in 1999. And they punted. States requiring guns to have technologies that don't exist? Taking private property without warrant or compensation or grandfathering? License denials for
driving while blacka police encounter that did not result in an arrest or any evidence of wrongdoing? Punt punt punt.The best result the gunnie sphere other than Bruen was Caetano v. Massachusetts (2016! and see the massive resistance in O'Neil v Neronha, only finished in 2022). After that, there's maybe the GVR on Duncan v Bonta... except they GVR'd it to the Ninth Circuit, which even at the time had literally never allowed the Second Amendment to do anything, and since broke rules to slow Duncan down further. It's not like Bruen is even the only example: Caniglia v. Strom, was more a Fourth Amendment case, but see the later punts on the massive resistance it has faced by lower courts.
Maybe I get surprised here, or VanDerStok is where (... in 2026? assuming it doesn't get punted then?). But despite an environment with a massive variety of low-hanging fruit, these are the only things the Court cared about, and that's not random.
More options
Context Copy link