site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   31395 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 30, 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.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Here is my prediction of what would happen

And here's mine: it would look much like the weekly thread on r/blockedandreported, only better because the quality of commentators here is higher.

I just have zero sympathy for people who want to post bare links, because our requirements to add something meaningful are not that stringent. Every person who claims we require MOAR WORDS or meaningless verbiage or a ChatGPT sensitivity pass is lying. All you have to do is add something like "Why is this interesting? What is your take? Why do you care? Why should we care? Why do you think it is worth bringing to our attention?" Add some commentary (doesn't have to be very much, does not have to be particularly insightful or long), just more than "Hey, look at what those fucking wokes did now!" It's not a high bar. It just fucking isn't. I am tired of people pretending that we put barriers in the way of their very interesting conversations that we do not.

Dude, this whole discussion started because a "rather well-written" effort post received a warning. You are definitely setting the bar too high.

And here's mine: it would look much like the weekly thread on /r/blockedandreported, only better because the quality of commentators here is higher.

Or it would eventually look exactly like that thread or worse, because:

  1. The higher quality of commentators would leave
  2. Everyone would put in less effort.
  3. And we don't have a popular podcast that draws in a stream of new and active users.

Dude, this whole discussion started because a "rather well-written" effort post received a warning. You are definitely setting the bar too high.

A well-written thing that is not a discussion is still not a discussion. The bar is not high. In this case they went and climbed at a neighboring gym and put in a bunch of effort, but the bar we were monitoring which is much easier to reach was left empty.

The higher quality of commentators would leave

Quite a few of the high-quality commentators have already left and while I have no way to prove this, I'd posit this has something to do with the very limited number of topics that are discussed here nowadays.

A well-written thing that is not a discussion is still not a discussion. The bar is not high. In this case they went and climbed at a neighboring gym and put in a bunch of effort, but the bar we were monitoring which is much easier to reach was left empty.

And yet an interesting discussion it spawned. Which is my entire point.

Let's drop it. I said my piece, I accept I'll never convince you. I'll bring it up again once we reach a weekly thread with less than a thousand comments.

They will often tell us why they have left, and none have given us that as a reason. Usually it's complaints about low quality comments that don't quite break the rules, but are bad enough to annoy them when aggragated together.

Im fine dropping this, I did feel like new things were coming up.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats