site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 13, 2024

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.

Richard Spencer hit the nail on the head. Women in particular are drawn to these sort of cult-movements, and have been for all of recorded history. It's not just about being progressive, that is only incidental because progressivism has been the popular cult-religion challenging prevailing Order. There are also accounts of conversion to Christianity being motivated by zealous women demanding it as a condition of marriage for more religiously apathetic pagan men.

The cause is the Dionysian Force. The Richard Hananias who try to discredit the protests because they are all women don't understand how that is how all cults proliferate. These cults challenging prevailing order become powerful precisely because they are led by women.

I think this is cherry-picking. Revolutions against established Order have not, historically, been dominated by women more than by men. The rise of Islam and of Protestantism, as far as I know, were not mainly driven by women. There was nothing female-dominated about the French Revolution or the Russian Revolution. The 1960s social revolution in the US was not female-dominated either.

At this point, I don't think Wokeism is a revolution against the established order, certainly not to young people and definitely not college students. Wokeism IS the established Order. They're conforming to the social context around them.

The 1960s social revolution was driven by sex, making it ipso-facto female-dominated. Not because they were intellectual or political leaders in a revolutionary movement, but because they became entranced by Sex, Drugs, Rock n' Roll. The 1960s social revolution would have gone nowhere without women.

I would also make a distinction between religious cults and revolutionary movements. The "Dionysian Force" Richard is talking about falls more on the former than the latter. Women are more susceptible to cults, but then they kind of become kingmakers for the cults that blossom into political/social movements.

"She was a bold-looking girl, of about twenty-seven, with thick hair, a freckled face, and swift, athletic movements. A narrow scarlet sash, emblem of the Junior Anti-Sex League, was wound several times round the waist of her overalls, just tightly enough to bring out the shapeliness of her hips. Winston had disliked her from the very first moment of seeing her. He knew the reason. It was because of the atmosphere of hockey-fields and cold baths and community hikes and general clean-mindedness which she managed to carry about with her. He disliked nearly all women, and especially the young and pretty ones. It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy."

This problem with modern politics was identified at least as far back as 1948. It has yet to be solved.

But in that particular case, Winston was wrong!

But Julia was an outlier, and only avoids repercussions by putting on a tremendously convincing performance of the type of woman Winston thinks she is.