Why are there multiple SSC culture war spin-offs? If even SSC readers can’t avoid political polarization to this extent, I don’t see any hope for the rest of the population
I've got a summary of some of the history here, if you're interested. That post skipped over DataSecretLox, but it formed in Summer 2020, mostly from the SlateStarCodex open thread and subreddit readers (w/ a bit of tumblrsphere).
Most of these splits weren't on the matters of politics, at least directly. The tumblrsphere was leftish by ratsphere and SSC standards, but mostly bifurcated to allow more informal and scattershot discussion in a more person-oriented view. TheMotte subreddit split from the SSC subreddit because people were harassing Scott enough that he had a nervous breakdown, and the compromise was that any political discussion needed to be several steps away from his identity.
The CultureWarRoundup, as much as it favored righter-wing viewpoints, was more about different takes on what engagement styles people were going after. Probably still political, but not as much as it seems in retrospect. I think there was one or two explicitly right-wing one-person schisms, but I can't even find them now. TheSchism was meant as an explicit political schism in the aftermath of the Rittenhouse stuff, and a naive experiment, so I guess that makes two relevant ones?
So I guess, yes, that is a lot of bad signs for the general population, but more for how the explicit efforts went than by their existence.
magic9mushroom
If you're going to downvote me, and nobody's already voiced your objection, please reply and tell me
mdurak 7d ago
"Why" is that Data Secrets Lox was founded in the time between SSC's closure and ACX's opening, and not everybody suddenly evicted from SSC's comments wanted to move to the subreddits (this was before theMotte left Reddit). I was a member on DSL before I was a Motte member, for instance, because I didn't have (and didn't want to get) a Reddit account. It's not a "Motte for different politics".
It's also not specifically for culture war, although it allows it.
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Notes -
What's DSL?
Data Secrets Lox, another SSC spinoff forum (which also leans right, although perhaps less heavily than theMotte).
Why are there multiple SSC culture war spin-offs? If even SSC readers can’t avoid political polarization to this extent, I don’t see any hope for the rest of the population
I've got a summary of some of the history here, if you're interested. That post skipped over DataSecretLox, but it formed in Summer 2020, mostly from the SlateStarCodex open thread and subreddit readers (w/ a bit of tumblrsphere).
Most of these splits weren't on the matters of politics, at least directly. The tumblrsphere was leftish by ratsphere and SSC standards, but mostly bifurcated to allow more informal and scattershot discussion in a more person-oriented view. TheMotte subreddit split from the SSC subreddit because people were harassing Scott enough that he had a nervous breakdown, and the compromise was that any political discussion needed to be several steps away from his identity.
The CultureWarRoundup, as much as it favored righter-wing viewpoints, was more about different takes on what engagement styles people were going after. Probably still political, but not as much as it seems in retrospect. I think there was one or two explicitly right-wing one-person schisms, but I can't even find them now. TheSchism was meant as an explicit political schism in the aftermath of the Rittenhouse stuff, and a naive experiment, so I guess that makes two relevant ones?
So I guess, yes, that is a lot of bad signs for the general population, but more for how the explicit efforts went than by their existence.
Thanks for the context, I really enjoyed the summary!
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"Why" is that Data Secrets Lox was founded in the time between SSC's closure and ACX's opening, and not everybody suddenly evicted from SSC's comments wanted to move to the subreddits (this was before theMotte left Reddit). I was a member on DSL before I was a Motte member, for instance, because I didn't have (and didn't want to get) a Reddit account. It's not a "Motte for different politics".
It's also not specifically for culture war, although it allows it.
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