site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 26, 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.

6
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

But in American cities I don't see how they would make these. We already have building, sidewalk, lane, lane, sidewalk, building. No room for extra-wide bike lanes with barriers on each side.

It's: building, sidewalk, bike lane, narrow barrier (since there's no parking), 20mph lane (one way only), sidewalk, building. You even get to widen the sidewalks a bit. Since American cities are built on a grid, you can easily alternate the direction of one-way streets.

I do like one-way lanes in urban cores. But thinking about this, we don't need two barriers and two bike lanes if it is a one-way street.

We could instead have building, sidewalk, parking or one-way car lane, a second one-way car lane, barrier, one-way bike lane, side walk, building. That just doubled car capacity or puts street parking everywhere for free.

And 20mph max speed is way too slow for virtually all roads. Even driving by an elementary school during pick up or drop off time is faster than that.

20mph is perfect for city streets. In Europe, school zones are usually limited to 20kph, or about 12mph.

20mph is excessively slow. 12mph is comical.

I get I'm just voicing American opinions about this, but Europe sounds like it is in sorry state if they do this. Is around 20mph limits commonly implemented where you live, or is this very aspirational on your part? Are you some ultra-slow-driving contrarian going against the rest of society, or is this the norm where you live?

I see 20kph signs next to every school.

30kph zones are common in Germany, I want to see them in Russia on all urban streets that are two lanes wide or narrower.

I mean 20 mph is the typical school zone limit anywhere I've been -- do you live somewhere where you can zoom by schools doing 40 and the cops aren't camped out there all the time running up their numbers?

(This does seem quite slow, but kids are really dumb. Maybe it's a hangover from when kids actually walked/biked to school?)

I just googled it and the law is 25mph in some places such as the places I've lived and 20mph in others. Google says some school districts can go as low as 15mph, but I've never seen that. I suppose I happen to be used to 25mph.

And no, I have not seen 40mph signs in front of elementary schools when children are present. And at my local schools lots of kids walk and bike to school. Not driving near masses of them at 40mph is sensible.

The California Vehicle Code (CVC) also sets the following statutory speed limits:

15 mph in alleys, at blind intersections and at blind railroad crossings

25 mph in residence and business districts, school zones and playground areas when children are present, and at senior citizen facilities.

These speed limits may be posted or unposted.

And also:

What is the speed limit in most school zones?

25 mph Around Children

The speed limit is 25 mph within 500 feet of a school while children are outside or crossing the street.

https://www.dmv.ca.gov › handbook Section 7: Laws and Rules of the Road (Continued) - California DMV