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 is the sort of perspective I've heard from some of the 'end the war now' people in e.g. Trump's entourage, and I find it incredibly annoying, because it treats Ukraine as just some pawn instead of an independent country. It's the same perspective Putin has.
Simply look at what Ukrainian leaders are saying. They are the ones who will not accept a cease-fire without security guarantees, who have been pushing to take back their land and insisting on an eventual return to their internationally recognized borders. Do you honestly think they're just saying these things because Biden told them to? It's so demeaning to the Ukrainian people who are fighting for the independence of their country.
I hear people like Vivek Ramaswamy say things like "we need to come to a peace agreement that's good for both Russia and the United States" and I get so frustrated - the parties to the war are Russia and Ukraine! Ukrainians are the ones who will determine how far they are willing to go to protect their homeland and their people. If Western countries decide to withdraw support, that will affect the calculus of the Ukrainians as to what they can accomplish, but the decision is still theirs whether to keep fighting.
The choice is 100% up to Ukraine. It's a shit choice, since it's one of these Copenhagen interpretation of ethics choices, but it's still up to them:
Is it moral to help someone a little if you can easily help them more? Well, states are amoral golems, so it's a moot question.
More options
Context Copy link
Well, you know, that doesn't bother me. I don't believe in countries (states). Literally, I don't believe that they exist. They're fictions, like corporations. Really it's a sort of theological idea.
I do believe in nations and to be charitable I can sub that word in. But in that case, from a secular perspective, it's not clear to me why one nation has a right to a piece of land and another doesn't. Where would such a right come from, if not the test of societal virtue that is war? And how sure are we that the ruling class of a nation actually represents that nation, rather than having parasitized it?
If they don't want to fight they can stop. Or, if the people want to stop but can't -- as is evidenced by their enslavement and sacrifice by the men calling themselves their leaders -- we should ask if perhaps that's the real problem!
It's not clear to me that the ruling society of Russia intends to harm either the land or the people. Actually I think it would be happiest keeping both wholly preserved (but under its own control).
Seems to me that what's going on here is that the land and peoples (the people living there are hardly homogeneous) exist and two competing ruling classes are vying for control over them. One is willing to enslave them and spend their lives to stay in power. The other is basically willing to do the same. It's not clear why either of those is 'right'.
I just don't know where everyone seems to be getting their sense of clear-cut moral stances from.
Definitely an interesting philosophical framing. The moral framework for me is something of a practical one - how can different nations live in the world with a minimum of morally despicable things taking place. Things like: war, slavery, poverty, oppression.
The goal of the 'rules-based international order' was to create rules for the game of international competition and cooperation where the morally worst actions are taken off the table. We don't go to war to settle disputes over who gets to control land and peoples (especially nuclear war) because it's something everyone wants to avoid. It's morally bad and it's practically bad, especially for those lands and peoples.
Russia is the clear bad actor in this framing. They are signed on to a ton of agreements that say 'we will not invade other countries to take their land' - the most fundamental being the UN charter, which says any UN member will respect the borders of the existing countries. This may seem arbitrary under your system, but it serves the very basic purpose of preventing war. It's not a complicated moral stance. If Russia hadn't invaded another country, there wouldn't be a war.
Hell, if Russian troops weren't blatantly and constantly committing war crimes, targeting civilians, indoctrinating the people of territories they've conquered... then maybe we in the West could ignore this as just another border dispute, like the other times in the 21st century Russia has invaded its neighbors. But, Russia is doing all these morally despicable things. They are the clear moral bad agent in almost every way, and are simply flaunting the fact that they can break international rules and norms, essentially do whatever the hell they please, because they have nuclear weapons so nobody will stop them. But whether this deserves punishment from the international community on a moral level is beside the point. This needs to be punished so that every other aggressive authoritarian government with delusions of grandeur doesn't do the same thing, and the whole world devolve back into war.
Right, well, they can't. The incentives don't align that way and never will. It can be more or less overt, and more or less local, but it's going on somewhere. This is due to resource scarcity. Someone has to lose, and usually many people. Those with the ability to change this are better-served by winning, and arguably should. And even they can't change it much.
No, that's just what the most-powerful cabals at the time said to justify the cementing of their power into the foreseeable future. In fact they're plenty willing to do abhorrent things when it suits them.
Only the power of the hegemon prevents war. This is a symptom of that power failing, not a de novo source of evil.
I think you'll find that we and our allies do all that stuff in spades. Who, whom.
From the perspective of the hegemon, it needs to be punished to preserve the hegemony. The question is whether that's possible any longer.
War simply is. There are ways to sort of move it from one column into another on the ledger book but basically, given resource scarcity, this is just how things work. There is no other way. And a bad peace is worse than war.
You're just clearly factually wrong about this. The fact is that there have been no major wars in Europe since the creation of the rules-based order. In other words, when those countries played by the rules they've seen exactly the results they wanted: reduction in war, economic prosperity, global trade.
This to me is proof that you're not arguing in good faith. Anyone who's given even a cursory look at the war crimes committed by Russia could never say something so ridiculous. It's just cynicism for cynicism's sake, untethered to reality.
This is also obviously not true. International relations is not a zero-sum game. The global international order has decreased global poverty from 50% to about 10% in the last century. Who did they steal that prosperity from? Western countries, despite not going to war with each other, have grown wealth exponentially and raised the standard of living to the point where we no longer have extreme poverty at all. This myth of resource scarcity is not only foolish, it's dangerous, because it leads to bad ideas about policy.
I think you're just fundamentally incorrect about all these issues. Not meant as an attack, but you don't happen to be a communist do you?
These are gingerbread thoughts. Rules are nothing unless they're enforced. What matters here is that there has been a hegemon (EDIT: I'm talking about the USA) around to enforce those rules, which it does for its own benefit. The rules go out the window when it benefits the hegemon -- or when the hegemon starts to slip.
I really wonder what you think Russia is guilty of that hasn't been done by the US or US-funded allies and groups. Do you know what kind of stuff the CIA gets up to?
You're fixated here on economic resources, which is understandable, but only part of the picture. It's true that massive exploitation of non-renewable fuels has allowed for an unprecedented (and unsustainable) bubble of wealth which even distributed very unevenly benefits almost everyone in terms of material standard of living. Also that it's enabled us to access deposits of raw materials which we previously couldn't, and won't be able to again if we mismanage the energy situation.
But let's say arguendo that we basically solve the energy problem. Fusion or something; idk. Still there are other types of resources than energy and raw materials. Many of them are positional. This includes desirable real estate and high-value mates. These things will always be scarce and life is mainly defined by competition for them. Power is another. In all cases, some few people will end up with these things while most others go without.
If those who go without are kept from organizing and competing, well, I'd call that oppression. Really, that's what oppression is. Is it better if it's done with social programming and antidepressants and entertainment rather than the point of a spear? I'm not asking rhetorically. Your answer is up to you. But as for my answer, I'd suggest that a frog dropped into boiling water may be a lot better off than a frog deposited in nice water only for the temperature to be slowly raised over time. A lot of people you'd have identified as 'oppressed' managed to rise up and secure a place for themselves in the future. I say this is good and right for them to do. Noble; vital, even. Benefits the entire species. The modern 'soft' alternatives make my skin crawl.
Suppose the ruling class reorganizes society such that everyone has a lot more stuff but it becomes much, much harder to find a good mate or raise a family. Suppose communities, social fabric, and cultural inheritances are lost. The very rich become very very very rich. Everyone else feels increasingly-squeezed by some kind of invisible vice. Connect the dots.
I don't like the use of the word 'stolen'; it's just that some people outcompeted others for access to what's good in life. Some few win big and many lose. This is just how nature works, across species. Yes, some nations have massively exploited the natural resources in territory nominally controlled by others. So? Good for them. That's how it works. And some rulers have managed to con their workers into accepting more stuff instead of what actually matters in life. So? The relationship is somewhere between predator-prey and farmer-livestock. The lower classes can't maintain society without the leaders, and the leaders can't maintain their positions without workers, especially in competition with other leaders. Though I do wish they were more self-aware about what's going on and less prone to status-signaling among themselves.
There was really something to be said for the institution of overt nobility and privilege. I think we're all worse-off for pretending like our betters are just normal people like us. We should recognize the situation for what it is and demand some noblesse oblige. Some sense of actual responsibility, you know? But even this, I think, mainly comes down to incentives. Religion was also very helpful here. Oops.
This is very funny to me. No; far from it. I'm an ecologist. I'm not upset about these patterns I'm describing. This is just how reality is. Actually, I could also fairly be called a social darwinist, and in that I'm fairly pro what I'm talking about. Superior people out-reproducing inferior people is how the species improves. Ideally this would be arranged so as to avoid cruelty where possible, but there's a difference between evil and cruel. Evil is often necessary; cruelty never is.
What upsets me is the refusal (or inability) of others to see it. But that's also just how things are. Sometimes I meet other people who understand this stuff but mostly they've given up on trying to explain it to anyone. Just makes people resentful and angry. I honestly don't know why I bother except that the position feels lonely. And, who knows? Maybe if people started seeing more clearly we could actually make the world a better place.
More options
Context Copy link
I'm not defending the rest of TB's claims, though.
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
More options
Context Copy link