site banner
PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   15177 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 6, 2025

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.

6
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

There are broader arguments here, but I want to pick at a couple of the smaller bits:

a country with a fundamentalist religious tradition

This condition is neither necessary nor sufficient for something to be referred to as "fascism" in any meaningful sense. Nazism was more occult than religious, Pinochetism doesn't have much relation to religion, Oswald Mosley wasn't interested in Anglican authoritarianism.

To be more direct, the United States doesn't really have much of a fundamentalist religious tradition - it's a religiously pluralist country where the largest single religion is Catholicism, and it's a squishy strain at that.

violence

The American right broadly and Trumpists more narrowly are just not very violent at all. The central example of right-wing violence during the Trump era is a single riot where the only deaths were one of the rioters and a couple geezers that got too excited and had heart attacks. This wasn't nothing, I didn't like it because I don't like riots, but the political violence in the United States has been primarily racialized (BLM riots and associated violence) or Islamist (various acts of terrorism) for decades.

The American right broadly and Trumpists more narrowly are just not very violent at all.

Incorrect.

A primary motivation of January 6th protesters was the belief that the election was stolen by the other party, which is a decidedly anti-fascist motivation. Many of them were interested in more safeguards for the democratic process, like voter ID and a ban on election machines. This is in stark contrast to BLM, where the whole idea of American democracy and rule of law was thrown out in favor of an emotional narrative centered on an oppressed people — a textbook example of how fascists get into power. You may argue that Trump was being fascistic when he accused his opponents of election manipulation, but then the very fact he had to cloak his intention in the language of democracy is a testament to the absence of a fascistic undercurrent in the American Right. Which, in my opinion, is unfortunate, because there are a lot of good arguments for the introduction of fascistic aesthetics, prosocial values, and meritocracy to America. Isn’t China being fascist when they make the State beautiful and promote Han civic values and ban immoral entertainment and curtail the power of billionaires? How about El Salvador? Okay, it’s not exactly going poorly for them.

Were people riled up because of the sanctity of democracy?

I’m not sure that was the core motivation.

I think the modern new American right is one of the movements which is developing an anti-democratic undercurrent.

It’s not mainstream, but you start to see it pop up more and more. Your comment itself is bordering on being a testament to that.

I think people were riled up because they felt their voice within a democracy was being suppressed via extra-judicial means (e.g. Twitter files and similar machinations within its orbit; aggressive legal persecution of Trump; debanking and deplatforming of voices or platforms that served their ends)

Whether this is a truly accurate representation of reality may beg whether the movement is truly democratic or not, but the motivation to have a political movement fairly represented within a democracy is unquestionably pro-democracy, no?

the motivation to have a political movement fairly represented within a democracy is unquestionably pro-democracy, no?

Depends on the political movement.

Fascism is pretty often born out of democracy.

I’m not at all saying that this is Trump/MAGA.

But objectively, an anti-democratic movement could easily come to power on claims of shenanigans in an election, whether valid or not.

Alternatively, a simpler explanation is that Trump/MAGA doesn't care about the reality of the election and attempted to take power on January 6th anyway.

We definitely have a tradition of fundamentalist religions, even though no single fundamentalist tradition holds sway. The theological differences between Baptists and Pentecostals and Methodists haven’t kept them from converging on various policy positions. They get the Catholics on board surprisingly often, too.

Other than that, you’re correct. The MAGA wing is positively gentlemanly compared to the kind of mass protests we had over Civil Rights policy, let alone the labor battles of the early 20th century.

Yeah, this is a good and correct point. I waffled a bit about how I wanted to phrase it, because we certainly do have fundamentalists and not just a few of them. My objection is that phrasing it as "a fundamentalist religious tradition" suggests to me that this is a uniting force that is a key element of the current Trumpist movement. While some fundamentalists are part of that movement, they aren't exactly steering the ship - JD Vance is Catholic, Musk isn't religious, Vivek is (I think) Hindu, and the Cabinet nominees are a mishmash of different religions and constituencies. So, what I mean to say is not that the United States lacks fundamentalist religions, but that it isn't a fundamentalist nation and the Trump coalition does not emphasize fundamentalism. I unironically think integralist Catholics have more political sway with this administration than young Earth creationists.

I unironically think integralist Catholics have more political sway with this administration than young Earth creationists.

Integralist Catholics are creationists, albeit often old earth.

Trump and Tom Cotton performed hypothetical violence by suggesting sending in troops/national guard, quite fascist. Direct and tacit support for lawlessness and chaos on the streets though? Nope.

The central example of right-wing violence during the Trump era is a single riot where the only deaths were one of the rioters and a couple geezers that got too excited and had heart attacks.

Are you referring to the Diet-Coke Hall Putsch?

There was also the Charlottesville Massacre. (Kind of book-ends it....)

Is "Charlottesville Massacre" meant sincerely?

I’d have gone with “PBR Hall Putsch,” personally.

Beer Hall Pudge

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