site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 20, 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.

8
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Americans spent centuries taking strong and specific action to keep the races separate and thus specifically prevent assimilation.

And then when they stopped trying to keep them separate, whites were ethnically cleansed from the centers of what used to be world-class cities. Assimilation did not happen, but ethnic cleansing of white people did.

Buying mansions in the DFW suburbs is now considered ethnic cleansing? Also, there are tons of white people walking around Manhattan. The whites seemed to have rebounded well from the genocide.

  • -11

Most of the people living in the DFW suburbs had not previously been living in Dallas proper; they moved to the area.

Honestly I was just fired up about the phrase “ethnic cleansing”. Felt like such an insane phrase to use for people moving to the suburbs.

  • -10

Nobody gets fired up about a similarly charged phrase for people moving to the suburbs, when that phrase denigrates those doing the moving rather than those providing the impetus to move. I refer, of course, to "white flight".

Personally if I was told a family was ethnicity cleansed I wouldn’t assume they moved to a nicer area of town, but to each his own.

Whether something is "ethnic cleansing" or not does not depend on where the removed population goes.

Who/whom, as always.

@JTarrou’s legendary comment:

White people move in - Gentrification

White people move out - White Flight

White people stay where they are - Segregation/xenophobia

White people move somewhere else - Colonization

Few progressives will say it, but 'ol Willy Ockham's shaving implements point to a direct and explanatory answer.

But not an insane phrase to use for cohesive communities being destroyed by newcomers who inflict wildly disproportionate, racially-organized lawless violence on them, with the tacit support and approval of institutional actors. That most of the community members escape with their lives by promptly fleeing, losing their community and much of their wealth and resources in the process, does not change the fundamental nature of the situation. Nor does that nature change when the fleeing is conducted under color of law, through sale of their property.

And, key to the ethnic cleansing claim, the authorities let it be known they've been told not to stop the violent blacks from terrorizing the whites.

That's not what he's referring to.