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 -
This argument would be stronger if school was monopolizing students time. From my understanding, the school is not. Plenty of kids have enough free time to learn an instrument, play a sport, get really good in some video game, become an expert of some nerdy lore like warhammer, baseball or LotR, etc. I am sure that there are religions who mandate that their followers study their scripture for at least five hours a day, but if you feel you need to accommodate these in public schools, then the next thing you will be someone saying that their religion requires them to loudly yell 'Blessed be His Noodly Appendages' every five minutes.
Do you generally propose a system where the general taxes of people in some special interest groups are used for the goals of these groups? So the religious taxpayers get to fund religious education, while the taxes paid by of fans of adult entertainment go to fund state-run strip clubs?
Ideally, taxes are there for universal expenses. Almost all citizens use roads. Almost all citizens benefit from not being invaded. I will grant you that a lot of the sinks modern states pour taxes into are not that clear-cut public goods: public education, aircraft carriers (for the US) and welfare, preservation of the environment, cultural events and a zillion other things can be debated at length.
But the key point is that taxes go to what society has decided are collective needs. If you are proposing taxing religious people more so that their extra taxes can fund religious education (and the same for the admirers of scantly clad females and strip clubs), then I am ok with it. Of course, the easier system would be that the state does not collect these voluntary taxes, and people get to spend their money after taxes however they want.
What you’ve listed are leisure activities. Video games, fantasies, sports, and playing an instrument are for leisure. (Unless a student is exceptional, they have just one hour a week of a violin teacher or something which may constitute non-leisure education, I suppose). The fact that students do not typically learn from books/teachers in an organized setting away from their school system strongly indicates that school has a monopoly on non-leisure learning. What we can call “book learning”. But book learning is an essential part of religious indoctrination, which means it is an essential part of the exercise of religion. A human is simply not able to absorb “book learning” after ~6 hours of secular education with 1-2 hours of at-home work. To me this means that we have thwarted the free exercise of religion. We have overburdened the right.
One hour is more reasonable, but adding an hour of book-learning on top of the modern school curriculum is an unreasonable burden. I think up to two hours is acceptable.
Category error. Religion is not mere special interest or mere hobby. Religion is a special protected activity for a reason: it encompasses urgent, existential and totalizing moral concerns. It’s its own category of human activity. And the believer necessarily believes that the education in his religion is urgent and essential.
Your theory of taxation is not an enshrined right. But freedom of religion is such a right. It’s both more logical and more just for the tax revenue from a religious group to go toward that group’s religious education — not with extra money, because that overburdens their right to religious exercise. If they are paying for 18 “credits” of high school, then allow them to substitute 8 of these credits for up to “8” religious credits. This way the school is not funding religious education except with the funds of those who desire to practice their right to pursue religious education.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link