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 -
I would sooner suspect a man who has been to the sex tourism capital of the world than the one who chose to live there. The former man's motivation is scrutable, the latter's more complicated. I have not heard of many people who love brothels so much they'd live next door for the convenience.
That's why I find Musk's signaling worse, he went on the tangent of a largely baseless accusation in a personal spat.
A hypothetical set of "Reasons to live in a country" doesn't necessarily subsume the set of "Reasons to as a tourist visit that country" but it can be assumed there will be significant overlap. The argument here is a person who would go to Thailand to indulge in pedophilia would be unlikely to see a reason to permanently reside there. This doesn't follow, people move countries to facilitate all other kinds of crime. Or maybe you're arguing pedophiles as a group might generally have the resources to take a trip to Thailand but not to successfully immigrate. This is stronger, but still falls, because they're not a uniform mass.
The subgroup of the population with pedophilic tendencies includes bottom-feeders who would be lucky to leave their home town. It also includes the opposite, the highly connected and well-resourced who cover their tracks. There will also be those at neither extreme, who are fastidious enough to prioritize not going to prison over their perversions, who are perverted enough to find appealing the idea of living in a country with lax policing where they may regularly indulge, and who are capable enough to be successful at moving to such a country. In short, there are without question white expatriates permanently residing in Thailand and elsewhere in southeast Asia because of and in pursuit of their pedophilia.
This is circumstantial evidence for Unsworth. Not enough to indict, but more than enough to fairly suspect. Yeah, if he's not that, it sucks, but he can't be shocked because that's what happens when you move from Britain to Pedoville in Pedo Province in the Kingdom of Pedoland. This is the reason Musk called him specifically a pedophile and why he initially doubled down on it before deleting the tweets. It wasn't apropos of nothing, it was from the I guess uncommon understanding of what goes on in Thailand. I say "uncommon," above the SNL skit I linked was from 10 years ago, and that's its joke.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link