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 -
Well, if it isn't true, I don't think it's that great that we need litigation. Polluting the epistemic commons is bad, actually (inb4 "but my outgroup also does it!").
I'd be curious to know where the claims of pet eating originated.
There's this video of an African man peacefully trying to cook what's purportedly a cat on a fire on the sidewalk in Italy while an elderly Italian woman is yelling at him...
More options
Context Copy link
Not being able to ask if something is true, because it might turn out it isn't, seems badder.
Well, if you truly believe this is bad, I'd say we have far bigger problems then this. We have entire institutions doing it on a mass scale, it's odd you'd dismiss it with a snarky quip.
It's not asking if it's true that pollutes the commons, it's uncritical repetition of seemingly baseless claims.
I'm hardly dismissing concerns about the outgroup doing it. I'm dismissing using that as a justification for the in-group doing it.
But you were responding to OP, not JD Vance?
I'll be honest with you, I didn't really understand what OP meant.
I'm not sure what he meant by killing fire with oxygen, but the rest seems pretty clear. He thinks litigating the "truthiness" if controversial claims is good. Floyd's drug habits are given as an example of an inflammatory claim that could be neither confirmed or denied at the time, but we eventually learned the truth of.
Actually, I'll take a stab at interpretation. Perhaps what he meant was that the controversy itself was essential to us finding the correct information? If you "killed the fire" we'd never know the truth, but it was kept alive with "oxygen"/controversy, and so we eventually did, because people were invested in winning old internet spats.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
Agree in principle with the caveat that it's a Paradox of Toleration problem. If only one side tells outrageous lies (Trump wants to ban abortion nationwide!) and media is partisan and complicit, then the side that lies wins, and the principled libertarians wail and gnash teeth in the outer darkness.
Or, put another way, once the epistemic commons are polluted, they are really hard to unpollute. Probably we need to start with the universities.
To the best I can tell there was a crazy woman in Ohio who ate a cat. She wasn't an immigrant and she didn't live in Springfield.
The problem I'm seeing is that trumpeting nonsense claims is a shortcut to getting dismissed by normies. People I know are sending me articles from the MSM dunking on Vance for repeating the pet thing. The whole issue has been settled as much ado over nothing in their minds, and any actual problems are swept under the rug with prejudice.
Is it unfair that the MSM can make shit up with impunity but Vance can't? Yes, but Republicans best get used to it because that's the state of play right now.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link