site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 9, 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.

8
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I'm pretty sure you're aware that there used to be such a thing as freedom of association.

I mean, you still have freedom of association in your personal life - some people in fact, call that 'cancel culture' when some people don't want to associate with other people due to their personal views, but yes, if you want the privileges and success that can come with being a business owner in America and all the advantages that has thanks to centuries of work by men and women of all colors and creeds, you don't get to make that business a private club for your own kind.

Or to quote a current Presidential candidate, you didn't just fall out of a coconut tree.

You know perfectly well that is not at all what cancel culture is. You also know perfectly well that freedom of association as a concept traditionally present in American civic life applies to communities and groups, not individuals and private lives.

And it's been a dead letter for 60 years. Sadly we did not have Switzerland's foresight to allow people to deny citizenship to their literal neighbors.

Tbh in Switzerland the cantons where almost all immigrants are (Zurich, Basel, Geneva) have a standard naturalization process that doesn’t really involve locals having that kind of say.

The process you’re referring to was more about rural Swiss-German communities being able to stop annoying Germans (often wholly useless professionals like doctors and engineers) being able to waltz in and ‘become Swiss’, sit on the local town council etc. it affected the occasional unlucky migrant family from further afield, but for the most part they don’t want to live in Inner Appenzell or Schwyz or whatever.