site banner
PaperclipPerfector  7d ago (text post)   27736 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 13, 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.

5
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

This is a meaningless statement- the president recognizing a constitutional amendment has nothing to do with anything. The Supreme Court has to recognize it to overrule the archivist. The whole statement is deeply silly. Not dangerous, not unconstitutional- silly.

I view it as burning epistemic commons to get applause from his followers.

If he had said: "I am of the legal opinion that the ERA is in effect, but recognize that I will need to convince SCOTUS of that", that would be one thing.

It would be like Trump saying "The election was stolen from me through fraud, and the SCOTUS will recognize that and award me the presidency".

Instead, what either of these presidents said was basically on the level of "the sky is green".

People should disagree on opinions, but not on facts.

You appear to be operating on the assumption that the rules enforce themselves. They do not, cannot, and never could. Rules can never constrain human Will; all they can do is coordinate the wills of the many to a coherent goal.

This would be silly if it had no chance of securing a significant political outcome, and if employment of the strategy were costly to those utilizing it. As things stand, there is no significant cost and the chance of securing a significant political outcome is non-zero. That outcome almost certainly will not be that the ERA becomes the law of the land; much more likely is some combination of eroded public trust in the courts that decide against the lawsuits, more talking points about right-wing lawlessness and judicial oppression, and perhaps local wins in blue-tribe areas that take years to overturn on appeal. Such outcomes would not be worth it if the attempt came freighted with a significant cost, but since they are effectively free within the decision-horizon of Blue Tribe, there is no reason not to employ them as often as possible.

[EDIT] - Let's try for some additional precision.

I think I'm exaggerating to say that lawsuits based on this are "inevitable." My assessment is that the person who set up and released this announcement percieves lawsuits as a likely-enough outcome to be worth the cost, which is very likely to be minimal to non-existent.

That's where we disagree. Forking the constitution doesn't seem likely to me; more likely than that is that activist judges will continue citing other random bullshit while being activists, and the ERA won't even come up.

Frankly I don't think this is a calculated strategy to fork the constitution. If it's an attempt to do anything coherent, it's an attempt to get another attempt to pass the ERA.

I'd point to the Climate Kids case as an example of how badly some judges do want to jump not just on random bullshit that helps their side, but specifically whatever framework needs legitimization at the time.

I think you're right that a lot of the Tribe-thinkers genuinely think they can just force it through by meme magic and lawschool paper bullshittery, and they're not even wrong in every case, but that looks a lot like forking the constitution in practice.

The smart take is that the Constitution can't really be forked because under the current arrangement the Supreme Court gets to decide what the interpretation is.

The galaxy-brained take is that the Constitution is constantly being forked due to circuit splits!

It's meaningless until some left wing judge acts on it. It's meaningless until some bureaucrat can be pressured to publicize it.

It's literally legal disinformation being promulgated by the President and Vice President of the United States. It is a naked power grab. Presidents have been impeached for less.

He will not be president long enough to be impeached.

In practice, the Supreme Court needs to be convinced that that bureaucrat had grounds to publicize it. They won’t be. This is extremely silly.

He will not be president long enough to be impeached.

Correct. Which is why he's doing this now.

In practice, the Supreme Court needs to be convinced that that bureaucrat had grounds to publicize it. They won’t be. This is extremely silly.

This is an attempt, effectively, to fork the Constitution. This creates and purports to legitimize a blue-tribe consensus that there is a 28th Amendment and that it is the ERA, while the red tribe continues to operate under the view that there isn't such an Amendment.

Will it work? I don't know, but someone clearly thinks it has a chance of working. How many people have to act as if something is the case, before it becomes the case? Might this go nowhere? Sure, it might. But all by itself, Biden's and Harris's willingness to try it is shocking and disturbing.

This creates and purports to legitimize a blue-tribe consensus that there is a 28th Amendment and that it is the ERA

It helps to legitimize it, but it doesn’t create it. Just last month, 120 Democrats in the House and 46 in the Senate signed letters asking Biden to take this step, since, in their view, the amendment was already validly approved. Other blue tribe groups like the National Council of Negro Women and the New York City Bar Association also published similar letters in December. This move may have blindsided Republicans (myself included), but the Democrats were clearly preparing for it.

Just last month, 120 Democrats in the House and 46 in the Senate signed letters asking Biden to take this step, since, in their view, the amendment was already validly approved.

I have a hard time believing that attitude is anything but kayfabe. If it wasn't an amendment they liked, I don't think they would have the same view on the ratification process.

Almost all views on con law- especially blue coded ones- are keyfabe eventually. The ‘living breathing document’ interpretation seems to be code for viewing the constitution the same way I view municipal zoning requirements- as annoying hurdles that need some ‘campaign contributions’ to get them waived.

Almost all views on con law- especially blue coded ones- are keyfabe eventually.

Right. The progressive-aligned school of constitutional interpretation is living constitutionalism—essentially, if we like it, and we can get away with it, that's what the text means. The conservative-aligned school of constitutional interpretation is originalism, where they attempt to find a justification from the original text, when it's convenient, and find a workaround otherwise, unless you've really got a spine. Originalism is better than living constitutionalism, because they won't drift as far.

My state legislators don't even kayfabe it, they not-my-job it. When they were considering, and eventually passed, bills that clearly violated the stipulations of Bruen, I wrote them cathartic letters expressing as such, not expecting to get more than a form letter response.

I did end up getting a substantial response from a staffer. After some back and forth, I found the position was essentially this: It would be inappropriate for the legislator, not being a constitutional scholar or a member of the Supreme Court herself, to even entertain the question of whether the bills she votes on are constitutional.

Here's one of the responses, obfuscated slightly by ChatGPT to make it difficult to link me to this exact text:

Senator X, who is not an attorney and does not serve within the judicial system, operates in the legislative branch and is unlikely to participate in any cases before state or federal supreme courts. Therefore, it would be inappropriate to expect them to form an opinion on constitutional matters or to provide historical examples for judicial proceedings.

If clarification is needed, I can share a document outlining the separation of powers and the distinct roles of each branch concerning the creation, execution, and interpretation of laws.

Therefore, it would be inappropriate to expect them to form an opinion on constitutional matters or to provide historical examples for judicial proceedings.

Wow, “trust the experts” applied to the literal law. How (D)emocratic!

Let’s just abolish the whole “representation” thing if our legislators are going to be this dense.

Oh, I agree. My point was that Biden didn’t make this decision out of nowhere. Influential members of his party were pushing him to make this announcement (and actually to go further, but it sounds like Biden isn’t planning to apply pressure to the archivist to certify the ratification).

The thing this is probably attempting to do is get another shot at passing the ERA. It's not to engage in constitutional lawfare- that's already going on, sovereign citizen tier arguments in left wing constitutional law won't help them and the people in the Biden admin know it.

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