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 think some people would disagree with it, either because their livelihood directly depends on it or because their livelihood indirectly depends on it (see Democrat politicians). Between those two types, there will be enough squeaky wheels to conflate the real issue of administrative bloat and Elon & crew's mishandlings of its reduction. I think its coverage and the reactions will largely depend on how badly the Trump Admin and Elon manage to piss everyone off in the moderate camp. Your concern about them replacing one biased regime for another is fair, just so long as you can openly admit that the one being ousted was also biased.
I doubt the goal is to weed anything out in a surgical manner. In fact, I think the idea is to not get into the weeds, but simply cut right through them.
If it helps, I'm very conservative, have voted for Trump three times now, and am deeply disgusted with the state of our country and our government. I have an intense and burning disdain for Biden and the Dems in general and a vague positive feeling toward Trump.
Coming from this position, though, my chief priority is fixing systems where possible, not punishing the other tribe or trying to enforce my values from on high. The reality about wokeness and the decline of conservative values as such is that these things didn't happen because Obama decreed they must and hired a bunch of libs into the bureaucracy. These values, ones I deeply dislike, won so to speak in the market in that they both captured institutions which allow them to propagate and more importantly spread organically through the early internet and ground level organizations. The libertarians put up a fight but the conservatives silod themselves and ceded the battleground in many ways.
If the goal is to cut costs or remove ideology from government spending, this is counterproductive. If the goal is spectacle, then I suppose this is a win (but is it a flattering or damaging spectacle?). If the goal is to punish blue tribe, then I'm not sure how much collateral damage red tribe is willing to take. I've heard from veteran coworkers (very red) that their benefits and loans applications were being possibly being impacted or at least paused until the details are worked out. It will take time for the trickle down to work through, but the effects on infrastructure projects on every level are going to disproportionately impact the red tribe who dominates construction and engineering. If the goal is to win Vance-types (red tribers trying to escape bad situations) scaring everyone about impacting FAFSA is counterproductive.
I think the immigration crack down is being handled much better. The focus on criminal illegals first has many benefits - much lower cost in political capital and headlines about rapists being deported are an easy win, early success is a foot in the door to broaden scope later without freaking the public out, it can be used to force though mandatory everify by linking it to punishing criminal illegals etc. This is a much more deliberate and thoughtful approach to illegal immigration than we are seeing on other issues.
I actually disagree here despite ostensibly being on the other side. The alternative to these programs getting cut isn't that they just stick around and everyone is happy - the US is currently on an utterly unsustainable course and if nothing serious is done the US will lose the ability to actually pay for all these jobs anyway when reserve currency status goes out the window. Given your stated priorities you probably don't care about the environmental/resource issues underlying these problems in the same way I do, but I'm sure you can recognise that fiscally at least there's no option to just leave these jobs or spending as they are forever - just the option to kick the can down the road, building up even more of a hangover for when the bill finally comes due. The cut is coming no matter what - ending these positions now, when there's still a lot more slack left in society, is a kindness.
More options
Context Copy link
The idea of fixing systems, whether they be bureaucracies within the government or institutions outside of it, would ideally start on a very fundamental level. That said, I'm not convinced the anti-progressive or moderate segment in our country has that ability right now. The progressive movement maintains that ability because, as you mentioned, they still have the institutions. Things like Entertainment, Higher Ed, etc. aren't conservative in the slightest. They're not even really moderate. As a result, our conveyor belt of future government workers all align themselves on one side. Therefore, the notion of operating within these systems that progressives have taken over (and will continue to replenish) doesn’t sit well with many people, myself included. It seems harder to win that way.
I will acknowledge that what matters to a lot of people are the services that are being provided by the government, and that some people really need those services. I can see how Elon and Trump proposing and implementing drastic measures is concerning to those people, but I still believe the goal is efficiency, not pure destruction. It's fat trimming, except this time it may be done with a cleaver instead of a fillet knife because the fillet knife just doesn't seem to work. I'm also not interested in making political opponents suffer for the sake of making them suffer. I am interested in strategies that will actually address a problem without getting bogged down in the system that is designed to bog things down.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link