site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 24, 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.

10
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

My point the list was intended to illustrate was that foreign policy rarely coincides with fundamental worldview. It's like an orthogonal axis of political belief.

I agree with this take. I would extend this from foreign policy to policy in general. The fundamental compass for most politicians is their own personal power. That's why you see revolutionary groups like the Bolsheviks flip from anti death penalty to extremely pro death penalty the second they gain power. Neither party in the U.S. can claim an anti-war mantle. If the Republicans are peaceful now it's only because they don't hold the reins of power. A younger me believed that anti-war Democrats had actual principles. It was blackpilling for me to learn that they don't, and disgusting to see them celebrating the death and destruction in Ukraine.

Why would "blank slatism", which as I understand it is the "nurture >> nature" philosophy, necessarily be a militant ideology as well?

I didn't say it was, but I actually do believe that, if strongly believed, blank-slatism must become militant. Why? Because it's wrong.

The blank-slatist believes that all races have (somehow) exactly the same IQ. Therefore any group differences must be explained by racism. Based on this flawed worldview, they make policy prescriptions to fix the problem. But it never gets fixed because all races don't have the same IQ. Convinced of their erroneous belief, they double down and take stronger actions, which still don't work. Etc... Etc...

If your belief set is that

  1. Racism is the most important problem that trumps all else

  2. Any differences in group performance is caused by racism

Then you will tear the world apart trying to fix what cannot be fixed. It's similar to how Communists, confronted with the failure of their ideas, blamed it on "wreckers" and resorted to totalitarianism.