site banner
PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   29299 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.

I suppose I didn't make myself clear. I am somewhat sympathetic to motives of the Puerto Rican nationalists of 1954, and I don't have a great argument for why they should have seen political violence as beyond the pale given their island's relationship to the United States. The ordinary means of political redress were denied to the Puerto Ricans, and violence seems reasonable enough under those circumstances, even if I prefer if Congress would not be attacked by people for the sake of stability.

While I don't think January 6 posed all that great a risk to the country given how badly executed it was, I tend to be less sympathetic to the January 6 rioters. A big part of this is because I don't think the thing they were angry about - stolen elections - were a "legitimate" complaint, if we don't engage in a motte and bailley about what we mean by a "stolen election."

However, what makes one "acceptable" and one "unacceptable"? I would prefer if there were easy and widely accepted principles for when political violence was considered acceptable, but the mainstream answer seems to "never, except in retrospect."

However, what makes one "acceptable" and one "unacceptable"?

Like I said, for me it's the 'shooting up congress' bit that's unacceptable -- if the Puerto Ricans had held it to breaking a few windows whilst yelling and milling about in restricted areas, it would not seem like a very big deal? (either)

Do you believe there are ever any circumstances where it is okay to attack the US congress? Do you believe that there are any actions that the US congress could commit that would ever make violence against them acceptable?

I think the difficulty I have is that we in the United States aren't a nation. The United States isn't and has never been defined by being a single ethnic group sharing a common birth. We are a civic state, defined by our ideals and institutions. (This is the reason American conservatives are so different than "blood and soil" European conservatives. By and large, even the conservatives are classical liberals in the United States.) Because we got our start in a bloody revolution justifying itself based on a conception of natural rights, it must be the case that there are circumstances where it is alright to attack a government and its representatives. But despite this being a core part of the ideology under-girding the United States, I'm dissatisfied that the vast majority of people seem to think that it is never okay to rebel or engage in violence against the state and its actors.

If one of the justifications of the 2nd Amendment is that capacity of violence against the state needs to be preserved to lessen oppression and tyranny, why is it that in practice the set of "tyrannical acts that would justify violence against the state" seem to always be an empty set? Is it because America truly is the freest country ever conceived with no hints of tyranny and oppression anywhere in its 200+ year history? When is violence against the state ever justified?

Do you believe there are ever any circumstances where it is okay to attack the US congress? Do you believe that there are any actions that the US congress could commit that would ever make violence against them acceptable?

Certainly -- not an expert but I think Puerto Rico's grievances did not rise to this level; or to the extent that they did it would have been more appropriately addressed in Puerto Rico. And J6 did constitute an attack.

why is it that in practice the set of "tyrannical acts that would justify violence against the state" seem to always be an empty set?

Would that it were so -- 'people don't assault the state over trivial inconveniences' != 'you can push people as far as you like'.

Is it because America truly is the freest country ever conceived with no hints of tyranny and oppression anywhere in its 200+ year history?

It's relevant that the first part remains 'mostly true' -- the interesting part of the current phase of the experiment is that the bar is getting pretty low.

The United States isn't and has never been defined by being a single ethnic group sharing a common birth.

This is incorrect and a vile form of genocidal propaganda that i will not let go unchallenged*.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Those fathers are the ethnic group of common birth. You are wrong, and while your conception is popular today, it is an invention of post WW2 globohomo. America literally didn't allow people who didn't share that common birth any citizenship at all.

America was founded by Americans, and I mean ethnically, not on paper or with a hyphen. There was an ethnogenesis which created the American race, and we exist despite people of your ilk trying to pretend me and mine dont exist and never did.

This is incorrect and a vile form of genocidal propaganda that i will not let go unchallenged*.

Look, on my dad's side I am 14th generation American with ancestors that were on the Mayflower. By your definition, I'd qualify as an ethnic "American."

I think it's okay to be proud you had ancestors who fought in the Revolution or whatever, but I don't think your categories make a lick of sense. At the very least, I think most people would say that a white person who grew up in America from birth is basically "as American" as an "(Anglo) American." I have friends who were 100% ethnically German, and who grew up speaking English and no German and they're about as American as you can be. They're definitely not German.

I guess in principle, I'm not against the idea of calling out specific subethnicities like "Anglo American", "German American, "French American", but people just don't do that for white people, and it seems likely that we'll see a new ethnogenesis of "White Americans" if it hasn't happened already. And to be fair, I think the Anglo Americans played a large role in the ethnogenesis of White Americans.

America was founded by Europeans (or perhaps the British presumably if we are being more specific. It can't have been founded by Americans as no Americans existed prior to its founding surely?

They became Americans with its founding certainly, but that isn't quite the same thing.

It was founded by Americans, as the ethnogenesis had already occurred by then.

Certainly by the 1789 Constitution.

1789 Constitution.

The US was founded in 1776 though. Possibly by 1789, you had enough of a change (though I would think it probably took significantly longer), but that still means that it was not founded by Americans.

I suppose that does also pose the question, would you consider those brought into the US via the Louisiana purchase Americans? Do they get a pass because the territory being incorporated was carried out by the Founders? Are Cajuns Americans in your system?

To the extent that they are Cajun, no they are necessarily not American. That's the point I'm making.

Would WASPs not be American then? Given that is essentially a good amount of the founding stock? Does Anglo-Saxon trump American? I'm just trying to explore the boundaries here, because I think for large portions of the time America has existed people would have claimed to be WASPs or Cajuns or Texans AND Americans both?

I’d like to register my disgust with this definition.

Civic nationalism, the choice to become an American through the legal naturalization process, is as fundamentally American as birthright citizenship. As long as my neighbors have come in through the front door, or were born on this land, I welcome them as my cousins.

If someone rejects America while living here, as many WEIRD socialists do, they are to me as alien as the person who snuck in under cover of night.

is as fundamentally American as birthright citizenship.

Is it?

Can you find support for it in the earliest writings of the founding fathers? I am open to being persuaded, but they left enough comments about their "posterity" and how the USA could only be possible among their type of people etc that I can't really see this claim being valid.

That's fine, you can be disgusted, but no Italian or German or Mexican or Chinaman can be an American. They can be citizens of These United States of America. They can even have American children, provided they procreate with Americans and not other foreigners. But they cannot ever be American because that is an inheritance of blood, earned by my fathers, bequeathed to me.

is as fundamentally American as birthright citizenship

So, not fundamental at all? Only a result of a despotic empire punishing its conquered enemies? Because what was fundamentally American were Free White Men of Good Character, and Negros and Indians not welcome.

It was a hundred years ago that people like Roosevelt and Wilson warned about hyphenated Americans. Was birthright citizenship really fundamental to America then? Hell no, and they both knew it. It's all post-WW2 dreck, and I'm tired of entertaining it.

As long as my neighbors have come in through the front door, or were born on this land, I welcome them as my cousins.

This is insane to me. My cousins are my family, my neighbors are my neighbors. Living in proximity is not the same thing as sharing grandparents.

If immigration were still restricted to FWMoGC, then maybe I'd feel more like you, but when half the country thinks everyone on earth is already an American, some are just missing a plane ticket, then there's little room for me to do anything but say, "no."

That's fine, you can be disgusted, but no Italian or German or Mexican or Chinaman can be an American. They can be citizens of These United States of America. They can even have American children, provided they procreate with Americans and not other foreigners. But they cannot ever be American because that is an inheritance of blood, earned by my fathers, bequeathed to me.

Yeah, except that your fathers never put any such restriction in the founding documents of the country, and made no distinction between "Citizen of the United States" and "American."

You may believe that they never intended anyone but Anglo-Saxons of English descent to be Americans. Probably that is what many (not all) of them did believe. But that's not how they wrote the Constitution. They certainly didn't write anything like "Chinamen can't be Americans, but their children can be as long as they procreate only with Anglo-Saxons." Your entire formulation is idiosyncratic and appeals to your very specific prejudices, but it's neither coherent nor historical.

And if your objection to all this is "Foreign immigrants changed the deal that was understood to be in effect by my forefathers," well guess what, they changed the deal that was understood to be in effect by... the people who were here before them. Presumably you believe Anglo-Saxons coming here and creating America (and conquering the natives, and bringing slaves) was justified because... they could. So given that amassing sufficient power justifies altering the polity in which you find yourself, that's what happened.

Also, while you may disagree with people who think America is not defined by a single ethnicity, it's pure hysteria to call that opinion "genocidal." If you don't like leftists calling everything they don't like "genocidal" and "literal violence," then don't call things that are nothing like genocide genocide.

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