site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 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.

9
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

They have made it crystal clear that their ire is not constrained to Trump. It regularly spills over to his base, Republicans in general, and even people that just are just not faithfully aligned with Blue Tribe values.

It is astounding reading and watching people act like this is some hot topic of the week that will blow over in a month. Maybe? What I don't see enough chatter about is how Trump voters received a loud and clear message that their deaths and misfortune (not just Trump's!) will be minimized at best and actively celebrated at worst (see also Babbit). As if it matters one bit to me if Crooks was a registered Republican when I subsequently saw how sizable chunks of the Left reacted to it.

This memory will not be going away any time soon.

"The basket of deplorables."

I'll second this with roystgnr's caveat about it being a lot worse where people like Comperatore are victims, and also point to people who've made similar arguments in other contexts. FCFromSSC has pointed to the celebrations around the murder of Aaron Danielson (and conspiracy theories about the police shooting of his killer), but there were also significant efforts to explain how Lee Keltner or Jessica Doty-Whitaker 'deserved' it, and state prosecutors gleeful that their campaign lead to Jake Gardner's suicide.

(see also Babbit)

This is much worse than Babbitt.

"It's okay to shoot at a mob engaged in violent breaking-and-entering" would have been a classic conservative talking point if not for the valence of that particular mob. It might have even been considered an especially-conservative talking point; centrists might agree with Niven's "1a) Never throw shit at an armed man." but the "why didn't you aim for the leg" crowd would hesitate at enforcing "1b) Never stand next to someone who is throwing shit at an armed man."

However, "It's okay to shoot at a political rally for the wrong politician" is only defensible if the politician is Actually Literally Hitler, not Hyperbolically Literally Hitler. The election may now be Trump's to lose, now that every anti-Trump campaign message has to thread the needle between "doesn't invoke Godwin's Law at all" (in which case it might not be persuasive, given the alternative and the implicit backpedaling) versus "kinda invokes Godwin's Law" (in which case it looks like irresponsible stochastic terrorism to anybody who isn't already pro-assassination).