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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 15, 2024

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Example bullet points are convincing and demoralizing. Do you have vast bookmark archives, or is your recall that sharp? I will bump an absolute banger of a post with junk and an AAQC report.

The behavior is better than literally burning witches and heretics. So, in a sort of Pinker-esque perspective it's not so bad. If we can't recognize any useful tools, people, or mechanisms, then hope or acceptance may be better than chasing the dragon.

Principles? Clearly these aren't shared values to the left

The left-left? They jettisoned, or were stripped of, any sort of practiced ideological pinning that shares any of the relevant principles. Progressivism consumed liberalism among city dwellers without much resistance.

Left of center people will still recall these principles. Their voices, politicians, and institutions even still give lip service and faithfully repeat the right platitudes. Until challenged by their moral betters with the most tepid amount of heat applied to their feet. Still, if those principles become apparently useful then something will change. Once upon a time, left-leaning Jewish lawyers rallied a hell of coalition to espouse, then enshrine such principles.

Appeal to the center?

I'm not sure what Trace means when he says centrists. Inasmuch as centrists supposedly can mobilize they are not in a position to be a prominent voice, nor equipped to actually do things writ large. Unless we define major institutions as inherently centrist, as a leftist would, then they may as well not exist except for a number of grey tribe weirdos. The moderate liberal does exist. I'd include a hefty slice of the aging center-left and some right of center folks. Powerful folks, even, but not cultural movers. They are cowed all the same when the hot iron is applied.

For as long as centrists are boring and culture warring fun they will remain cultural irrelevant. Politics, partisanship, and being mean to enemies is fun. Having enemies you won't die to is fun. The stakes aren't high enough for enough people to be stripped of fun. How do you compete with fun? You either take power to enforce boring, win a cultural victory via memetics like principles, or-- you wait for a terrible self-afflicted catastrophe that allows moderate temperaments to have their day in the limelight. Take advantage of the aftermath of some awfulness that reminds people why the responsible centrists are so eager to tell you why you're ruining stuff.

The radical, backbone-having centrists needed to start their march through the institutions 15 years ago, but they didn't, because they don't exist. They can't be real until the landscape changes to allow them to exist.

But the best arguments I can find for anyone else to behave differently don't look very good.

Christians have some good reasons. People in positions of authority have good reasons. Each individual person probably has one or two good reasons. LibsofTikTok has few good reasons.