site banner
ZorbaTHut  2yr ago (text post)   31615 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022

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.

16
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Jobs that exist solely as a way to redistribute the fruits of capitalism from those who have found a way to way to produce for society and those who didn't.

While I'm not a fan of HR, this characterization is not correct. Why would companies keep HR employees on the payroll at any time if they weren't providing value? What's happening now is companies are expecting not to hire much in the next ~year so they're cutting employees that help hire people -- HR and recruiters.

I suppose if you take a wider view, the HR roles are a way for society to feed people who aren't producing anything, and companies are coerced into participating in the farce by employment laws that require compliance. It's similar to police: they don't produce anything; they're just there to ensure compliance. The difference is that police stop crimes that are actually harmful, while HR stops implicit witchery.

While I'm not a fan of HR, this characterization is not correct. Why would companies keep HR employees on the payroll at any time if they weren't providing value?

There are many theories of this, but labor hoarding is quite well established empirically. Cultural influences seem non-trivial - managers just don't like firing people. I once replaced someone with about 20 lines of code and kept them around doing the same job (producing a spreadsheet that was formerly read by a cron job, but is now read by no one) until I found an internal transfer for them.

https://s3.amazonaws.com/real-dev.stlouisfed.org/wp/2005/2005-040.pdf

https://www.nber.org/papers/w3556

https://pure.eur.nl/en/publications/cultural-influences-on-employee-termination-decisions-firing-the-

Why would companies keep HR employees on the payroll at any time if they weren't providing value?

To cover employer asses from potential legal liability created out of thin air by the State.

One could even say that this is the only reason. Think about it, what is it that HR does that doesn't ultimately stem from some legal obligation? Even fucking conflict resolution could just be handled by private society but has to be there because otherwise you get sued for "fostering a hostile work environment".

It's made up sinecures all the way down.

It's made up sinecures all the way down.

This article takes this thesis and tries to talk about the gender dynamics behind it:

One would expect office politics to intensify when good jobs are scarce. But where some respond to scarcity by fighting harder for existing resources, others may seek to deepen the pool. Here a look at the cradle of elite (over)production suggests something intriguing is afoot.

“Administrative bloat” has been a remarked on feature of higher education for some time. According to one 2014 study, the number of faculty and teaching staff per administrator fell roughly 40 per cent at most US colleges and universities between 1990 and 2012, and now stands at around 2.5 faculty members per administrator.

Less remarked on is the sex breakdown of the growing proportion of administrators. A recent diversity and inclusion report by the University of California indicates that women make up more than 70 per cent of non academic staff across (among others) nursing, therapeutic services, health, health technicians, communications services roles, and a majority or near majority across all non manual staff roles. In other words, if men are still over represented in top academic roles, the non academic supporting ecosystem is overwhelmingly female.

In practice, then, as pursued within universities, one byproduct of student activism is something akin to a “jobs for the girls” scheme, in which a heavily female student body drives demand for more roles across feminised non-academic administrative roles, which in turn helps create an environment geared toward women, and so on. Or, as 2019’s “Afghanistan Papers” famously described that military campaign, a “self licking ice cream cone”.

Young alumnae graduating from this ecosystem might be expected to carry its insights out into professional life. And indeed, according to America’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, HR (a career whose employees are 71 per cent female, according to one industry report) is one of the fastest growing occupations in the country.

70.3% of all human resources managers are women, while 29.7% are men.

https://www.zippia.com/human-resources-manager-jobs/demographics/

I imagine it's harder to get this kind of scheme to work in private industry, but I don't see a reason why it wouldn't be at least a minor component. In my own experience, most HR folks I've talked to were women who were also heavily into a certain flavor of politics. I wouldn't put it above them to invent work, then use that to argue for increasing headcount and hiring more comradettes. But I don't think this is a large force. More like upper single digits of % perhaps?

I wouldn't put it above them to invent work, then use that to argue for increasing headcount and hiring more comradettes. But I don't think this is a large force. More like upper single digits of % perhaps?

More like near-triple digits. Arguing for increasing one's subordinates is a standard managment behavior, as documented in the classic "Parkinson's Law or the Pursuit of Progress"

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats