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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 2, 2024

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bring these incidents up not to gossip about two people. People yearn for ideals to strive towards, heroes of sorts. Those studying music look up to Mozart rightfully and would be visibly disgusted upon finding out about his scat fetish accusations. E celebs are considerably dumber and likely worse people than Mozart. Both Lauren and Nick are people who played a game of Motte and Bailey, Nick far more than Lauren, both have had run-ins with the government (Nick was an agitator during jan 6 who was on a no fly list but never tried, whilst people who followed his orders were, go figure) and are terrible people in their personal lives.

I’m not sure I buy this, and it seems like an isolated demand for purity. If I’m basing my political beliefs on you, the only part that matters is whether or not you are consistent and correct on that thing. If it’s music, I don’t care about your personal life as long as the music is good. I think unless what you’re talking about is a serious felony, personal conduct outside of your own domain is irrelevant. I’m into Elon Musk because he’s building cool rocket ships and internet satellites. Do I really care if he’s banging a trans chick while hanging from a trapeze? No. It has absolutely nothing to do with Space X or Tesla.

I’ll also note here that from my point of view, only the right is really expected to have these high hills of purity to climb. I’ve never heard anyone rag on the leaders of left leaning people over their impurities. And some of them are much more connected to the issues at hand. BLM leadership siphoning money from donations is directly related to whether or not they’re good leaders. Fuentes banging a hooker doesn’t connect to anything else he’s talking about. Fuentes fans are supposed to drop him over porn. BLM supporters are not supposed to care how much money the founders are paying themselves.

Fuentes banging a hooker doesn’t connect to anything else he’s talking about. Fuentes fans are supposed to drop him over porn.

He claims to be a Catholic Integralist. If you're going to say that people should be held by the state to religious standards of behavior, you damn well better be sure you're following them yourself.

I’ll also note here that from my point of view, only the right is really expected to have these high hills of purity to climb

I recall one of our old conservative grandees, from before the move to reddit, either BarnabyCajones, Hlynka, or FacelessCraven making the case that these "high hills of purity" were what distinguished the right from the left. A man on the left is allowed to have "no enemies to the left" and no values beyond the pursuit of politics. But a man on the right expects, and is expected, to be judged against some higher power or virtue. Some of more vocal NRX and Alt-Rightist(Alt-Litists?) In the comment section like E. Harding, Vox Day, and The Dreaded Jim felt they had been called out and caused something of a furor.

Sadly (for archival purposes) Scott appears to have memory-holed many of the old culture war conversations from those days, but i also can't say that i blame him. The original discussion leading up to and surrounding, The "You're Still Crying Wolf" "This Blog Endorses Anyone but Trump" posts got pretty heated.

That would definately not have been me. Probably Hlynka or Barnaby.

I mean, in large part that's because my tribe cares. We can overlook some spousal infidelity on the basis of 'politicians aren't often good people', but homosexuality is a bridge too far.

I posit that there are things liberals/progressives could be caught doing which would impede their credibility for moral reasons. Everyone has ritual purity standards. I don't know what would be a serious violation of them in a progressive- trying to pray away the gay? Marrying a teenager? But I am confident that they exist.

Now I've never been a Nick Fuentes fan. But among IRL people with actually far-right beliefs, being gay is disqualifying from having an opinion.

The right plays second fiddle to the left so has to be the moral side so that they can call the outgroup for "hypocrisy" which is utterly spineless since only the powerful can be hypocritical.

To get what I mean, imagine if you woke up and realised that Musk was just a front used to pump up the value of the various firms he is in and is closer to Elizabeth Holmes than to steve jobs, that he literally does nothing at his day job and just larps, purely hypotehtical scenario. In that case, it would sour how you view some things. People who are attached to movements that are defined by a person feel that way when any kind of moral rot is found as it obviously matters. The political sphere is very vengeful and zero-sum, everybody dogpiles and doxxes others, it is done many times for personal reasons, so to them it is akin to seeing an elder turning out to be a duplicitous purpose.

I do not feel that way at all, I have never had issues with homosexuality or any values that go against Christianity not just because I am not a Christian but because I do not believe the cover story or the idea of a hero to begin with but many buy into that.

The right plays second fiddle to the left so has to be the moral side so that they can call the outgroup for "hypocrisy" which is utterly spineless since only the powerful can be hypocritical.

If anything its the opposite. The left plays second fiddle to the right as the left defines itself in its opposition. The right erects structures that the left then subverts and destroys.

only the powerful can be hypocritical.

Lenin was wrong though, hypocrisy has nothing to do with being strong or weak, it is the price paid for having principles that go beyond political expediancy.

See, I kinda see it differently. The demands of non-hypocrisy and morals are much less important if you’re the weaker party. The thing that the underdog must do is get sufficient numbers and popularity to be a credible threat. You can’t do that if you’re throwing potential allies away for reasons that have nothing to do with the issues at hand. Numbers matter if the goal is power. That’s why the Left loves to pound the right on hypocrisy especially hypocrisy they’d never hold their own side to. It’s an easy way to limit the power of conservatives, as they’re having to throw away good Allie’s all the time for whatever reason the left starts pointing them out. And as such, you end up with fewer people fighting for power

I think the causality is backwards — the left is powerful because they are willing to be hypocritical, they’re willing to be accused of being a crime-thinker. The right has less power because the accusations of hypocrisy and thought crime still bother them enough to make them embarrassed. A lefty accused of being socialist or progressive doesn’t get kicked out. A rightist will be, to the point that even the accusation is too much.