site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   29894 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 12, 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.

5
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Covering women's areolas and nipples has been used as a work around for women going topless, leading me to believe those are the areas of primary concern when people talk about bras and modesty. Since typical bras accentuate and highlight breasts, rather than minimize them, and wearing a bra is considered more modest than not wearing a bra (by the OP) that is potentially the case here. It's weird. More clothes is generally considered more modest than fewer clothes, but bras specifically highlight breasts, you would think people who think of bras as for modesty would be arguing for binding, not bras. Bras accentuate the form, they don't conceal it.

So from my perspective if the concern is nipples, bra or not isn't going to change what people see of mine. And braless-me is less breasts-forward than bra-me is.

Covering women's areolas and nipples has been used as a work around for women going topless, leading me to believe those are the areas of primary concern when people talk about bras and modesty.

Perhaps others will disagree, but I'm not actually convinced that that's true. I think it might be more of people having modesty norms that allow for part of the breasts to be uncovered, and that's the easiest way to draw a line, rather than being what is relevant in itself.

I don't really have opinions on what effect bras have on modesty.

I'm with you. It's an easy line to draw in a law somewhere, but I'd call pasties less modest than simply being topless.

Since typical bras accentuate and highlight breasts, rather than minimize them

Hard disagree, here. IME, bras standardize the form of breasts under the shirt, thus drawing attention away from them, by making them more uniform. They also hold them in place and tuck them away, once again drawing attention away.

Note that I'm excluding push-up bras from this category, since those are the case where they unequivocally exist solely to accentuate and highlight breasts. But they're also not the norm.

This is fascinating. As a breast haver and occasional bra wearer, my perspective is that wearing a bra makes my breasts more pronounced. And I am just talking regular bras, not any fancy gravity defying wizard bra. When I am not wearing a bra, you can see my breasts as forms under my shirt, but they don't pop out, they aren't molded into stereotypical half domes thrust out from my chest.

The biggest difference is the "liveliness" of braless breasts. If they are big enough to have a jiggle, an inertia of their own, however small, they will draw male attention.

Regular, every day, lift and separate bras don't immobilize breasts. They still move. But yes, they visibly move less than braless breasts do.

Do you think it's the movement that draws the eye, or that OP expects women to be wearing a bra, and is drawn to the deviation from his standard? (Or embrace the power of "and.")

That's an interesting question and I don't know how to separately test these two hypotheses.

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