site banner
PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   23861 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 10, 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.

7
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I find it amazing that someone who's been here for a long time and is clearly pretty smart can end up with these interpretations of themotte's viewpoints, reading the same words I have but interpreting them so differently, lol.

From the post you linked about someone being downvoted for advocating colorblindness, I upvoted this reply:

As far as I'm concerned, the policy of acknowledging both race and additional information you have about a person is strictly superior to doing the same but ignoring race. I'd be more concerned if a black doctor was treating me since I know about how much AA they receive, I'd be less concerned if the doctor publicized his SAT score or had other objective markers for performance like a specialization in a field where his race counts for nothing (I doubt that's the case in the US, but I could be wrong). This is where AA in general taints by association, said doctor could absolutely be someone who managed to get in without not so subtle nudges, but since they usually lack a way to prove it, they're automatically discounted in the eyes of a rational agent with no additional information.

This is ... not speaking against meritocracy. If you have a way to measure someone's merit, use it, If not, because it's being suppressed, then use race as bayesian evidence. The replies to the post are evidence against, not for, your claim that a lot of mottizens believe 'people should be treated differently solely because of the race they were born as'.

supporting race blindness makes a comment one of the most controversial in your posting history

We can trade examples all day long, but I don't know how else to interpret even a moderator (who I think should be more aware of the general pulse of the forum than either of us) saying this:

Looking through my own "top" and "bottom" comments I am not surprised or offended by their placement. My "bottom" comments are often my controversial mod decisions, or times when I have decided to defend viewpoints that are unpopular here on TheMotte (like race blindness, or open borders)

(adding emphasis)

That's not trading examples, I found that by looking for the exact comment you're referring to. Cjet's original post about race blindness, The Case For Ignoring Race, got 18 upvotes and 5 downvotes, which is a perfectly normal ratio. The most downvoted comment related to race blindness on his page has a net karma of ... -3, and it's in response to a 38 upvotes comment with the following:

As far as I'm concerned, the policy of acknowledging both race and additional information you have about a person is strictly superior to doing the same but ignoring race. I'd be more concerned if a black doctor was treating me since I know about how much AA they receive, I'd be less concerned if the doctor publicized his SAT score or had other objective markers for performance like a specialization in a field where his race counts for nothing (I doubt that's the case in the US, but I could be wrong). This is where AA in general taints by association, said doctor could absolutely be someone who managed to get in without not so subtle nudges, but since they usually lack a way to prove it, they're automatically discounted in the eyes of a rational agent with no additional information.

This is just ... not ... "people should be treated differently solely because of the race they were born as". This is "we should judge people on their merit, or our best estimate of their merit, and that merit is correlated with race is an objective fact about the world".

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats