site banner

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 18, 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
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has said that the policy of the House is that women's restrooms are for women, and men's restrooms are for men

Why is this such an issue? Restrooms have stalls. I couldn't tell what gender was in one if I tried.

I hear that women tend to change & reveal more skin in women's locker rooms. In men's restrooms, we pretty much do their business and leave. From that perspective, the men's locker room is more 'gender neutral'.

Yes, it was a woke rallying-cry. But in 2024, it's become a tier-1 losing issue.

I've seen several prominent-ish democrat spokespeople openly blame transgender people for the 2024 presidential loss.

AOC is the democrat's weathervane. She's scarily opportunist and makes radical position changes right before a movement runs out of gas. She broke rank with the squad on Israel right before the campus protests turned ugly. She recently removed pronouns from her twitter bio. It's Joever.


As for people being naked in locker rooms, I'd be happy to see the practice die out. Trans people or not. I don't wanna be looking at random dick and balls. It's the old men who're the worst. Dude, don't spread your legs on the bench to clean your saggy balls, and what the fuck's up with being naked while having socks on !! Please No !

As for people being naked in locker rooms, I'd be happy to see the practice die out.

Then how the fuck are you supposed to change out of your wet/sweaty/dirty clothes?

To me, it’s the lack of understanding. I don’t think Transgender people in general get how dangerous it is to open the door to the idea that any man can put on a dress and walk into the women’s restroom anytime they want to. There are safety issues here. Men can so easily overpower women that it’s not even a contest. And without the very firm rule of “biological men are not allowed in women’s spaces, particularly where dressing and undressing are happening, it’s impossible to prevent a rape from happening. If you’ve ever wondered why women generally use the public restrooms in pairs, the reason is men who might enter the restroom and try to rape a woman. And the trans community hasn’t even glanced in the direction of understanding the issue or reassuring women that they too are opposed to men in the women’s restrooms and locker rooms being an issue. If anything, their attitude is “women, you aren’t allowed to object to this for any reason. The only reason you care is that you hate trans women.” Followed by using authority to force women to shut up about it. Not a thought about rape, secretly being photographed naked for porn, or being harassed, or worse these things happening to children. I feel like the entire rest of society, particularly the woke end has decided that the rape of women is a small price to pay for feeling progressive about letting transgender women into women’s spaces — without vetting at all.

Why is this such an issue? Restrooms have stalls.

If I’m allowed into the women’s bathroom, I’m 100% going to listen to women pee and it’s going in my spank bank for later. So if women don’t want that, they should keep men out of their bathrooms!

My eyes are burning. It's so graphic.