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.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
Western elites don’t give two shits about Ukraine’s sovereignty. The war in Ukraine from a western perspective is based on the idea that 1) Russia is an enemy and 2) it’s much cheaper for Ukrainian Nazis to kill Russians than to potentially have to do it ourselves. That’s not the kind of war that needs a ‘plan’. It just needs a checkbook and some CIA operatives.
No doubt Germany would like the war to end, but they don’t call the shots. For sure Poland wants to keep the Russian losses coming.
The issue is that they hyped it up so massively that there is no easy way of pulling out. They lost Afghanistan in 2021, now they have spent three years talking up Ukraine and have wasted enormous resources on it and are losing. Not only has the cost been in the trillions counting the inflation, higher interest rates, and higher energy prices. But the US is constrained in weapons manufacturing. NATO suffers from a lack of hardware, old hardware and low production rates. At the worst possible time a sizeable portion of the stockpiles have been shipped off to Ukraine.
To make matters worse the US will have to reconstitute a military about 30% of the size of the US military. It simply isn't sustainable.
More options
Context Copy link
I’m starting to believe that they honestly didn’t expect Russia to go for it. They thought they could just keep slowly boiling the frog and by 2030 Ukraine would safely be in NATO and Russia wouldn’t be able to do anything other than cope and seeth or start World War III. After Russia did go for it, I think the State Department backup plan is just to turn Ukraine into a disposable speed bump to keep the Russians out of anything important. Like the Baltic States. Or Poland.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link