site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   29426 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 19, 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.

Personally my preferred gun regulation model is banned handguns and semi-autos, combined with unregulated ownership of bolt/lever action long guns.

  • -10

Your policy would likely result in a much larger number of dead criminals and/or people, and basically boils down to 'black plastic bad, wood good'.

Most bolt/lever action long guns use much heavier caliber cartridges than your typical AR platform.

I don't think so. It's certainly possible to use a bolt action rifle in a crime, but observationally it doesn't happen often.

Now you can argue that's because for any particular place either better options are available (USA) or all kinds of guns are unavailable (other countries), but I don't think that second part is true. Countries with gun control mostly don't have literal bans, but still allow these types of guns with licenses and storage regulations and so forth.

I'm pretty skeptical of the power of these sorts of regulatory hurdles - once people can get guns they can then be stolen or sold under the table or whatever. So I'm led to believe that the low prevalence of rifles in crime is because they're not really well suited for it.

Sigh.

The reason long guns are rarely used in crime is because the majority of documented crime is basically blacks shooting and killing one another with their handguns of choice. Funny, despite the prevalence of glock switches displayed on public forums like, say, youtube, you never hear about the ATF raiding and confiscating them.

This is one of those tells that people whom actually know anything about guns can sniff out - politicians always, always bang on about banning ar-style platforms and their ilk in the wake of their pet tragedy, despite, numbers and capita wise, they're never used in violent crime.

But that's not my point. I'm looking at the law of unintended consequences. Mauser-style and lever-action long guns tend to be hunting rifles, and despite the snide asertions from various political pundits about how 'deer don't wear body-armor' when it comes to critiquing ar-style rifles, the typical hunting round, such as, oh, say, 30-06, is a much, much more powerful round than 5.56.

5.56 puts holes in people's heads, 30-06 makes heads disappear.

People respond to incentives. You ban ar-style rifles(for some reason) and only allow hunting rifles, and suddenly people are defending themselves with said bolt rifles with much larger cartridges, likely ending up with alot more dead criminals.

And before you say 'Well, actually, bolt rifles are much more difficult to wield than ARs', no, I've handled both. They may weigh more, but that doesn't make them more difficult to handle, especially when you're defending yourself.

I don't think so. It's certainly possible to use a bolt action rifle in a crime, but observationally it doesn't happen often.

Tell it to John F. Kennedy.

Reaching back 60 years to find an example seems like strong (if unintended) support for both "certainly possible" and "it doesn't happen often".

And? I'm not arguing that it never happens.

Most bolt/lever action long guns use much heavier caliber cartridges than your typical AR platform.

And can be cut down to something bad for self-defense, but still acceptable for crime.

What about single action revolvers?

I lean against, but don't have strong opinions. Basically if I could be convinced one way or another what the likelihood is they would be used in a significant amount of crime, that would swing me.

Saturday Night Specials enabled a whole generation of criminals. Even with the limited capabilities a revolver provides, they're still extremely dangerous to civilian victims.

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